Shortly after dinner on December the 8th, 1953, at the height of the Cold War, the American public were astounded to hear that their president planned to give away America's most closely held national secrets . The time had come, said former soldier Dwight D. Eisenhower, for the United States to beat the swords of atomic weaponry into plowshares of peace.

The president's "Atoms for Peace" plan, unveiled that day at the United Nations in New York, would open up the field of nuclear science — until then controlled by governments for military purposes — to help mankind by using the technology peacefully.

Eisenhower's vision changed the course of history. For centuries, mankind had used technology to build bigger, more awesome weapons, each more lethal than the one before. Now, the technology that had been earmarked for weapons of mass destruction would be used to help heal and feed people, and improve their lives by providing energy to produce electricity.

Over the decades since this radical idea was offered, the uses of nuclear technology have grown dramatically, affecting our daily lives through electricity, medicine, and consumer products. Today, 423 nuclear power plants generate 17 percent of the world's electrical energy. Factories worldwide use radioactive gauges to test materials for defects and ensure the safety of bridges, automobile tires, roads, and airplanes.

Products not invented 40 years ago — videotapes, contact lenses, and cleaning solutions — are made safer, more effective and at a lower cost through nuclear technology. Over 6,550 nuclear medicine centers across the globe save lives by using radioactive agents to treat and diagnose illnesses. Ninety percent of all drugs are tested with radiation during their development. In the U.S., one out of every three hospital patients undergoes a beneficial procedure using radiotherapy.

Today, electric power is required for almost every economic and cultural activity. For most uses of electricity, there are no reasonable substitutes. While it may sound romantic, no one would seriously entertain the possibility of returning to the era of gas lights, oil lamps and candles in those regions where electricity is available for lighting. There is no possible substitute for radio, television, the telephone or the computer.

Electrical energy has become so ubiquitous and essential in the industrialized world that it has almost joined the classical list of food, shelter, and clothing as one of the necessities of modern life. Just as the terms "bronze age", "iron age", and "industrial age" have characterized periods in the advance of civilization, today we can say we are in the "age of electricity."

Yet, when we as a nation consider the world's need for more energy, we become somewhat like that storybook character Alice in Wonderland. One moment we think very big, the next we think very small. One moment we say we must develop all energy resources as quickly as possible. The next moment we hear shouts like "harness the wind, the sun, and the tides." Or we listen to jabberwocky saying the world does not need any new or expanded energy resources; conservation alone will solve all the problems.

Like the Mad Hatter, some people continuously run around with wondrous charts and long lists of statistics ready to prove their point. Others sit on their academic toadstools and merely cry "Doom." A few puff their cheeks, and yawn, "Why worry?" It is enough to give Alice and anyone else a monstrous headache. Yet decisions must be made.

So, "Where do we go from here?" asked Alice.
"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cheshire cat.

When looking at the future of energy, the answer depends on where you have been. Let's step back in history a million years. Primitive humans each used some six thousand British Thermal Units of energy each day simply by eating food. One hundred thousand years ago our hunting ancestors used fire to cook and to warm themselves and consumed 24 thousand units — four times as much energy. By the 15th century, medieval people had learned how to use animals, windmills, waterwheels and coal, consuming 120 thousand units of energy — 20 times as much as early man. By 1875, the steam engine had put 340 thousand units a day at the disposal of industrial man in Alice's country of England.

In today's technological world, America is at the top of the benefit table with an average yearly consumption per person of 337 million units of energy ... over 56,000 times as much as the primitives.

In today's industrialized world, it takes the energy equivalent of one-half glass of diesel fuel to put one glass of milk on the table; two pounds of coal to produce a one pound loaf of bread; and three pounds of coal to produce one pound of hamburger. Making a car uses the energy equivalent of 1.3 tons of oil; running that car for a year uses another 1.3 tons. Each day transportation in the U.S. uses 836 Olympic swimming pools of petroleum.

In the midst of these riches, it is easy to forget that the world's population increases by one million every four days ... 177 people every minute, and such growth is expected to continue for another 120 years. By 2010 there will be 520 million extra car loads of people in South Asia, one million extra car loads in Europe and there will be one million extra car loads in just one Indian city ... just one.

By the end of the next century, five billion more people will be added to our present population of 5.5 billion. Most of them will be in underdeveloped countries where they will be packed together in ramshackle cities or left to struggle in rural wastelands. More people will almost certainly mean more pollution as they strive to power their lives with the nearest means at hand: fossil fuels.

Giving these additional five billion even a halfway decent standard of living means giving each of them adequate housing, food, transportation and one thousand kilowatt hours of electrical energy per year. Ignoring the energy needed for the basic necessities of life 1,000 kilowatt hours per person means 742,000 megawatts of new electrical generating capacity. Multiply that by the amount of carbon dioxide produced by burning fossil fuels and you will find the answer falls off your calculator.

It boggles the mind to think that five billion more people will be added to a planet where existing infrastructures are both overtaxed and collapsing. Many water lines in the developing countries are already crumbling, with raw sewage running into the water.

The availability of clean drinking water has already failed to keep pace with population growth. And there are few toilets and washrooms to break the transmission of disease. A recent Mexican health ministry study revealed no less than 80 percent of the food served on the streets of Mexico City contained fecal bacteria.

In Mexico's poverty-stricken Chiapas region, most of the homes have no method to dispose of human feces, other than in the gardens that surround the household. When the rainy seasons come, the human waste is washed into the water supply. Even though women carry their drinking water home from long distances, it is seldom safe.

Prevention — by boiling water for drinking and washing food — is a matter of economics: many families lack the money to buy kerosene. Boiling one liter of water for 20 minutes can use an entire day's supply of fuel.

A major dilemma facing society is simply "the risk of doing on the one hand and the risk of not doing on the other." The goal of conserving the environment inevitably conflicts with that of ensuring an adequate supply of energy to maintain life at adequate levels. It is a dilemma on which the Rio "Earth Summit" failed to come to a satisfactory conclusion.

Unfortunately, it is very easy, in fact too easy, for the majority of people in the developed world to embrace a severe case of myopia when they contemplate the world's population growth and increasing energy requirements. They are shocked, even stunned, by the extent of the problems. In addition to politics, economics, and physical supply problems, there are those of world energy flows and the impact on life support systems.

Fortunately for the world's poor, the problem is not complex — just difficult. There really never has been and probably never will be a shortage of primary energy. The problem man has always faced is how to convert our almost-boundless resources into mechanical work or other usable forms of energy. Mankind has managed to harness additional energy supplies at each stage of his development... and a new source is available today.

Man's newest energy source, nuclear power, must be used to help solve the world's energy problems. If used in fast reactors, uranium reserves should last 2,000 years. It could be potentially diastrous for the developed nations to abandon nuclear energy when in a few years' time, nuclear power could become essential to global survival.

The main opposition to nuclear power is centered among the educated, well-nourished and financially secure middle class. When was the last time you saw a hungry-looking anti-nuclear protester — a poor man in a lesser-developed country protesting against the establishment of a nuclear power program? Since it is not the poor speaking out against nuclear power, then how can the well-fed of the world feel justified in opposing programs that can only help their fellow man? The answer seems obvious. Because of the difficulty of the problem, they bury their heads in the sand, place themselves in Alice's Wonderland and listen to jabberwocky which claims the world does not need new or expanded energy resources; which claims that conservation alone will solve all problems.

Imagine — the industrialized world managing to halve its energy consumption. Imagine — as much as three-quarters of the world's present energy need coming from renewable resources. It sounds like the answer to a conservationist's prayer; no more wasting fossil fuels, no more pollution, no more need for nuclear power... and no more heat, no more light, no more transport! In the real world, the totally green dream would be the stuff of which nightmares are made. Because even those massive improvements in energy management just mentioned are simply not enough to ensure a viable future for our grandchildren, let alone the coming billions.

Most of our future population increase is expected in the developing world, where energy needs are rising all the time. Even if their consumption no more than doubles — and the rest of us make the massive savings suggested above — world energy consumption will still jump by 100 percent in the next century.

Where will it come from? With the present mix — nearly 90 percent fossil fuels — the world would grind to a halt by 2070. Newly-discovered reserves might keep us going until 2100 — if we didn't choke to death on carbon dioxide first. The pollution would treble in that time. Halve fossil fuel consumption and both nuclear and renewable energy sources would each have to provide three-quarters of the world's present total energy needs.

The industrialized nations of the world have an obligation to develop and safely utilize nuclear power — as well as all other reasonable alternatives to fossil fueled based energy. Only the industrial countries have the resources, skill and capital for such development. But above all, the industrialized nations have a social obligation to provide developing countries access to reasonably priced liquid fuels by reducing their own consumption through conservation and nuclear power and other alternative energy sources.

We also have to remember that the Middle East holds almost two-thirds of the world's oil reserves and three-tenths of the gas. Another third of the gas reserves is owned by Russia. Conventional energy supplies are vulnerable to political change. To control energy is to control food and political power.

It's even more frightening when we realize that today's national governments do not work well in the world of microchips and instant global information. William Van Dusen Wishard, president of World Trends Research, points out that all the major currents of 20th Century intellectual thought have dried up. Marxism has collapsed. Socialism is vanishing. Totalitarianism is discredited. Even the French are losing faith in nationalism.

Consider other recent events. The U.S.S.R and Yugoslavia have gone from being two nations to becoming 23 nations. There is carnage in Bosnia; whole nations have disappeared in Africa; barbarianism is rampant in our culture. We are witnessing the disappearance of national cultural and ethnic boundaries that provide identity. It is like a giant wave swelling under the very foundations of our lives.

The media often ascribes the violent upheavals around us mainly to ethnic and religous conflict. But something else is happening to make more and more places seemingly ungovernable.

"The Environment" has become the national security issue of the early 21st century. The political and strategic impact of the surging populations, spreading disease, deforestation and soil erosion, water depletion, air pollution and lagging fossil energy supplies will arouse the public, inflame existing hatreds and unite assorted interests left over from the cold war. As environmental degradation proceeds, the size of the potential social disruption will increase. Indeed the Saddam Husseins of the future will have more — not fewer opportunities because people find liberation in violence. Only when people attain a certain economic, educational and cultural standard will this trait be tranquilized.

Whether or not we believe the environment is the national security issue of the 21st Century, the ultimate losers in the debate are the poor — the inhabitants of the third world who spend their valuable foreign exchange for expensive foreign oil, who burn dung for fuel, who watch in silence as their fields turn to desert, their water supplies dry up, and their children starve.

We owe it to them and their children to follow the path mankind has taken since making the first tool and lighting the first fire. We must extend and multiply the power of our limbs by making use of increasingly potent and complex sources of energy in forms that can safely, easily, and efficiently be employed. I think the message is clear. The best thing for the environment and the world's disadvantaged masses is prosperity. Prosperity cannot occur unless adequate energy supplies are available.

There will always be doubters who believe this is impossible. Just like Alice they would say, "There's not use trying." Or in Alice's words, "One can't believe impossible things."

But I believe the Queen's advice to Alice is sound. "I daresay you haven't had much practice." She said, "When I was your age I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast."

In energy, as in all other considerations in the ecology of humankind, we still have the opportunity to determine our future — as people and as institutions. But time is rapidly running out.