Energy: 'one big thing'.

• Author: Farrell, Lawrence P., Jr.
• Position: PRESIDENT'S PERSPECTIVE

U.S. Ambassador to Sweden Michael M. Wood is passionate about energy. He is particularly ardent about ways to make more efficient use of energy, as well as cleaner and more renewable forms of energy.

Ambassador Wood, to his credit, has named energy-related collaborations between Sweden and the United States as his "One Big Thing."

Having spent nearly a year a half in Sweden, he has had the opportunity to see what the Swedes have been doing about energy. He finds much to applaud. Since 1990, their emissions are down by 7 percent, while their gross domestic product has risen by 36 percent. Since 1970, Sweden's oil consumption has decreased by 47 percent, and its use of bioenergy is up by 60 percent. The bio-powered SAAB automobile constituted approximately 80 percent of auto sales last year in Sweden. And there are a number of technology firms in Sweden with good ideas, and looking for capital. This past April, Ambassador Wood brought a list of 30 Swedish companies to Silicon Valley as he met with top U.S. venture capitalists. The technologies on that list impressed many of the financiers, who asked Wood to organize a tour so they could visit these firms and see their technologies first-hand.

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Wood likes to point out that the Swedes have a solid track record of bringing innovation into the automotive industry. Their major contributions, he says, are the seat belt and the catalytic converter. He is now hopeful that in the list of technologies he compiled is the "seat belt of alternative energy."

In June, the United States and Sweden entered a formal arrangement on alternative energy cooperation. This agreement will focus on biomass production, liquid biofuels, efficient engines, standardization of engines and fuels, emission allowances and trading, and other forms of renewable energy.

This agreement is consistent with President Bush's invitation to major world economies to seek a global agreement on goals and strategies to improve energy security worldwide.

All of the foregoing cooperation is consistent with the president's technology goals in the areas of battery research, commercialization of cellulosic ethanol by 2012, making wind the source of 20 percent of U.S. power production, and a reduction in the cost of solar power, which currently leads all other forms of energy production at 40 cents per kilowatt hour.

A white paper on Ambassador Wood's "One Big Thing" can be found on the website of the U.S. Embassy in...