Energy Efficiency Is a Warfighting Imperative.

• Author: Seraphin, Arun
• Position: NDIA PERSPECTIVE

Undersecretary for Research and Engineering Heidi Shyu in February announced a list of Pentagon technology priorities, all aimed at providing future warfighters with advanced military capabilities.

While many of these priority areas--such as biotechnology, microelectronics, hypersonics and directed energy--were the same areas identified by the previous administration, one notable new addition to the list was "renewable energy generation and storage." According to the memo, "Technology Vision for an Era of Competition," this category includes technologies such as "solar, wind, bio-based and geothermal technologies, advanced energy storage, electronic engines and power grid integration."

The memo further notes the potential to "decrease warfighter vulnerability and deliver new operational capabilities for the department" and "add resilience and flexibility in a contested logistics environment."

The Pentagon's renewed commitment to bolster the development and deployment of energy efficient technologies in military systems is a welcome one. These technologies make sense as the United States seeks to counter emerging threats, improve its own operational and logistics capabilities and reduce costs.

Further, the defense industrial base and the commercial sector have demonstrated the capability and financial interest to develop and support the transition of new technologies into fielded products and services. The research community in academia, government labs, the defense industry and Silicon Valley are also constantly pushing forward the frontiers of science and developing new advanced energy technologies and systems to meet the future needs of both the military and commercial sector.

The operational and logistical advantages enabled by deploying advanced energy technologies are easy to see. Reliance on traditional energy sources, such as petroleum, and their accompanying logistics systems, creates battlefield vulnerabilities when resupplying forces.

One analysis found that more than 3,000 U.S. servicemembers and contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan lost their lives in fuel supply convoys. Issues like this led former Secretary of Defense James Mattis to reflect on these lessons learned and state that the military must be "unleashed from the tether of fuel."

Particularly problematic is the need for complex and costly infrastructure to support the logistics operations for fuel supply to forward deployed ground, air and sea forces, often dependent on...