Talking energy: lab chief sees breakthroughs in wind, solar and hydrogen power.

• Author: Schwab, Robert
• Position: High Tech Coloradobiz - Interview

CITING HIGHER NATIONWIDE NATURAL-GAS PRICES, XCEL ENERGY over the next two months will raise natural gas bills up to 73 percent for the average Colorado household, and has asked state utility regulators for a $1.13 per month per customer electric-rate increase in 2004 because of increased electric demand across Colorado.

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For a business owner as well as a consumer, just the thought of those higher energy bills induces dreams of huge wind farms whoop, whooping up cheap, clean power.

The Golden-based National Renewable Energy Laboratory, led for the past six years by retired astronaut, vice admiral of the Navy and NASA administrator Richard H. Truly, has played a big role in proving that those huge windmills we see scattered across the Rocky Mountains can produce price-competitive new sources of energy.

But Truly's lab is involved with much more.

It is expected, for example, to win a bid to locate a new national research center at the lab that will look into the use of carbon nanotubes to store hydrogen, part of the U.S. Department of Energy's hydrogen-fuel initiative started by President George W. Bush.

Truly said the center would bring new jobs to the lab and an appropriation of an added $2 million to $3 million for perhaps the first five years. The lab now employs about 1,200 people in Golden, mostly engineers and scientists, and is budgeted more than $200 million annually.

ColoradoBiz, along with w3w3.com Talk Radio, recently had a chance to sit down with Truly to discuss energy issues and the latest work of the lab. An edited interview follows:

CoBiz: How does the laboratory's work address the problems of rising energy costs for businesses and consumers?

Truly: The most mature of all the renewables technologies is wind, which we have had a lot to do with because of the National Wind Technology Center, between Golden and Boulder, on the northern part of the Rocky Flats area. Now that natural gas prices have risen, wind is absolutely nose-to-nose competitive, and it doesn't use any fuel ...

We also have spent a good bit of time with our colleagues in the gas industry talking about how hybrid systems could be put together using both natural gas for base load, and renewables for peak load when they are available.

w3w3: What role is the lab playing in the government's response to terrorism, and the call for homeland security?

Truly: It's a major driver. Our (electric) grid is an amazing thing, really. It powers and...