Commentary: Replace fossil fuels? It's already happening

By Michael Brune

Clean energy is already replacing fossil fuels.

The truth is, just as computers replaced typewriters and cellphones replaced landlines, modern clean energy will replace outdated fossil fuels - it's just a matter of how quickly. And that's because people around the country are starting to see that the transition from dirty fossil fuels like coal, oil, and gas to clean energy is best viewed not as an obligation but as an opportunity.

We're all familiar with the problems that should motivate us to move beyond dirty fuels: air pollution and asthma, water pollution, climate instability, volatile prices, and reliance on overseas oil sources. What many people are only beginning to see, however, are the economic benefits that come from making the transition to clean energy.

The easiest place to see those benefits is in the cities that have already committed to powering themselves with 100 percent clean energy. That's right: All the energy needed to power homes, businesses, and schools can come from clean sources. From small towns like Greensburg, Kan., to major cities like San Diego, mayors and other city leaders are announcing plans to go all in on clean energy. In fact, 15 cities across the country have already taken the pledge to move toward 100 percent clean energy, along with foreign cities like Paris, Sydney, and Vancouver. It's not just the right thing to do. With solar prices dropping 80 percent and wind prices down 60 percent in recent years, cities are learning that clean energy saves money.

"This was a business decision and it was a no-brainer," said the mayor of Georgetown, Texas. "This is a long-term source of power that creates cost certainty, brings economic development, uses less water, and helps the environment." Kevin Faulconer, the Republican mayor of San Diego, said clean energy supports both "a cleaner community and a stronger economy."

Clean energy also creates well-paying careers. The solar industry already employs more than 200,000 people - more than twice as many as the coal-mining industry. Last year, job growth in the solar industry was 12 times greater than in the general economy. The transition to a smart power grid could create millions of good careers for people who desperately need them, especially people from communities that have suffered the worst consequences of fossil-fuel pollution.

Clean energy can also bring economic benefits to every American family. Stanford scientists concluded that the transition to a clean-energy economy would save the average family more than $200 a year in energy costs and $1,500 a year in health-care costs. It's no surprise, then, that 90 percent of American adults agree that the government should be focusing on developing renewable energy, according to a University of Texas at Austin survey.

This year, clean-energy prices have dropped so fast that in many places around the country, it's now less expensive to power homes and businesses with wind or solar than with coal, oil, or gas. When the cleanest option is also the cheapest option, there's no longer any reason to keep using the fuels of the past.

When technology changes in this country, it can happen quickly. Just look at the transition from VHS to DVD to streaming, or from landlines to cellphones to smartphones. When better technologies present themselves, and when prices for those technologies begin to drop, innovators are quick to adapt and seize the better way. And when we're talking about a change that isn't just cleaner and healthier but also has the ability to boost our economy in a major way, it's clear that clean energy is an idea whose time has come.

Whenever a coal or gas plant is replaced by cleaner, cheaper energy like solar and wind, we are never going back.

Michael Brune is the executive director of the national Sierra Club (www.sierraclub.org). He wrote this for InsideSources.com.