Mines and the "New Energy Economy"
A speech by Gov. Bill Ritter
(click here to listen to original speech)

Colorado Governor Bill Ritter visited the Mines campus on March 20, one day after the signing of the Colorado Center for Biofuels and Biotechnology agreement (see story on page 22). He toured the Colorado Fuel Cell Center, a laser lab and a Physics 100 lab, and he was able to interact with students and faculty along the way. He capped off his visit by addressing a crowd of approximately 400 on Kafadar Commons. A transcript of his remarks follows.

Gov. Bill Ritter:

I want to start with thanking you all for being here. I really do appreciate the turnout. Today I would like to talk about three things: Firstly, I want to address the issue of education for the 21st century, then I’d like to speak about the energy economy and energy education, and finally I’d like to talk about Colorado School of Mines.

Let me begin by giving you a sense for the role and the place that you play in global issues around education and energy. We just had a meeting of the National Governors Association and the theme of the meeting was innovation. Because it was about innovation, it was really about education, and because it was about education, it was asking the question, “How do we educate kids to enter the workforce in a 21st century way? And not just to enter it in a 21st century way, but then to be able to compete globally in a world marketplace—in the one that will exist in 15, 20, 25 years.” The answer is that we do it by focusing on the things that will be demanded of the workforce in the 21st century, and a big part of that will be science, technology, engineering and math. And we’ll need to focus on creativity and innovation as a part of that. We’re not really sure what the level of technology will be, or what will happen in high tech fields or energy production. But we know it’s changing, and it’s changing quickly.

The second part of the conversation concerns our ability to be a leader in a new energy economy. I call it a new energy economy because it mixes the traditional energy economy of coal, oil, gas and other minerals, with renewable energy technologies, including solar, wind, bio-fuels and fuel cells. We need to look at ways renewables, in conjunction with the traditional energy economy, can get us to a place of energy independence in this country. In his last two State of the Union messages, the president has talked about this. And as a governor who has paid attention to this issue at the national and the state levels, I believe our ability to gain energy independence rests on states having energy policies that really examine the role renewables can play in traditional energy economies. “How do we ensure that we mine traditional energy resources in a very significant way without undermining our environment? How do we burn coal more cleanly? What role can coal gasification play in that?” Those kinds of questions are all on the table as we go forward, and as a state we can play a leadership role. And let me tell you why I think it’s important. It’s important because it’s an issue of national security and economic security for the United States of America. And as a state, we can be a leader in this arena. We can help forge an energy economy that uses improvements in technology to produce energy from traditional sources, the non-renewables, and at the same time look at renewables, and then we say, “Okay, what’s the mixture going forward—how can we get to energy independence?”

When you take those two concepts, they come together in a very big way at Colorado School of Mines. So for the people who are professors here, for the people who are administrators and for the students, you are at the vortex of what I believe is the future of this country in terms of developing energy policy, energy research and an energy economy because you combine research on that which I think is fundamental to our ability to have national security 25 or 30 years from now. 

I just want to congratulate you on the work you’re doing. We’re working very hard to ensure that, in this state, we pay attention to this issue. We’ve talked about the new energy economy in Colorado and our leadership role. We formed the Renewable Energy Collaboratory last year with Colorado School of Mines, Colorado State University, the University of Colorado at Boulder and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. We just announced yesterday yet another public/private partnership, Colorado Center for Biofuels and Biorefining, as a part of the Collaboratory that combines the efforts of the public sector and some very big players in the private sector. We’re going to keep emphasizing this new energy economy. We’re going to emphasize it for economic development reasons, for environmental reasons and just because we believe it is the future of this country.

So we’ll pay attention to energy policy and make sure that it is research and data driven. And we’ll make sure we are educating students so they can enter the workforce in a 21st century way. Thank you for the chance to be here today. Thank you for being students here, for working on your degrees in a way that’s going to be meaningful to us in the future. Thanks especially to the faculty, to the administrators and all the people who’ve been a part of making the School of Mines the school that it is—one of the best in the world around the educational programs it offers.