This Day In History: 1979
From History.com... Solar-energy system installed at White House
Carter presided over a nation still suffering from the fallout of the 1973-74 Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) oil embargo. Carter, a proponent of alternative and sustainable energy sources, put into practice what he preached and, in June 1979, had a $28,000 solar-heating system installed on the White House roof. The system consisted of 32 photovoltaic panels that generated enough energy to provide hot water for the entire White House. During his term Carter also had an energy-efficient wood-burning stove installed in the drafty White House residential quarters.In 1986, President Reagan had the solar panels removed and put into a federal storage facility in Virginia, stating that the energy crisis that had affected both foreign and domestic policy during Carter’s term would not be a factor during his own. (emphasis mine) Both the environmental organization Greenpeace and a college in Maine asked to have the solar panels after they were taken down. As an October 2004 Associated Press article reported, Greenpeace’s request for the panels, which they wanted to use in a homeless shelter, was ultimately rejected, and in 1992, the conservation-minded Unity College of Maine installed them to use for the generation of hot water in the student dining hall. Former President Carter sent a congratulatory note to the college saying he was glad the panels would be of some use.
By 2004, the solar panels had worn out. Unity College kept one of the panels for “historical significance,” donated another panel to the Smithsonian Institute and offered the rest for sale.
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Comments (5)
grrrrrrrr, Reagan.
i would dearly, dearly, DEARLY love for one of the current candidates to pledge to put the solar panels back on the White House (and while i'm fantasizing, might as well wish that all federal buildings be mandated to go solar). even as a symbolic gesture, it would go very far.
Comment #1 Posted by: evan austin | June 20, 2008 10:57 AM
oh, wait wait wait: i forgot that the solution is NUCLEAR.
ok, new plan: put a NUCLEAR REACTOR in every federal building, including the White House.
;)
Comment #2 Posted by: evan austin | June 20, 2008 11:01 AM
Today, it's 106 outside here in beautiful Ojai. I've got my central air conditioner running, the kids are watching a DVD, I'm on the laptop and the meter outside is still running backwards!!! - Gotta love solar.
Comment #3 Posted by: wildflowermama | June 20, 2008 01:04 PM
Good catch. Denis Hayes, who led a solar research office at the time, wrote an editorial about that very subject on the new Yale-based Environment360 site:
"In 1979, after the Arab oil embargo, Carter announced that by the year 2000 America was to get at least one-fifth of all its energy from renewable sources — mainly solar energy, wind, and biofuels. The Solar Energy Research Institute, which I then served as director, was at the heart of this effort. Leading a team of scientists and analysts drawn from national labs and major universities, SERI prepared the detailed technical and policy blueprint to meet or surpass the 20 percent goal.
In 1981, halfway through his first year in office, President Ronald Reagan abandoned the 20 percent goal, reduced SERI’s $125 million budget by $100 million, and installed a dentist named Jim Edwards as Secretary of Energy. To demonstrate his contempt for the notion of alternative energy, Reagan ordered the solar water heaters ripped off the White House roof. We’ve never recovered.
The successive administrations of George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, bobbing along on a sea of cheap oil, did little to shift America’s economy to renewable energy sources. And for the past seven years, the United States has been led by a president who projects such a breathtaking marriage of arrogance and incompetence that his refusal to even acknowledge the reality of climate change has not generally been considered one of his more glaring flaws."
http://e360.yale.edu/content/print.msp?id=2026
Comment #4 Posted by: Kit Stolz | June 20, 2008 02:14 PM
Without question, it's sunny days ahead for this country, the winds of change are blowing. If we had to get all the worlds power from nuclear power plants we'd have enough uranium to last about one decade, but I just have to laugh when I see the commercials on television sponsored by the coal industry that touts coal as america's most plentiful energy resource, but with only 200 years of reserves, coal is just a tiny, tiny bump in the road compared to the remaining 2 BILLION years of solar energy.
Let's get real, let’s vote for change in Novmeber...
Comment #5 Posted by: Michael Lind | June 21, 2008 09:36 AM