Reported by Staff

AURORA — Energy Secretary Steven Chu warned on Friday that the United States is in danger of falling irreversibly behind other countries in the race to develop clean-energy technologies and must act quickly to avoid that fate.

The setting for the Secretary’s comments was the Colorado Energy Jobs Summit, an event organized by Sen. Mark Udall that took place at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. Chu sited several areas where he said the U.S. has fallen behind other nations, including vehicle fuel efficiency, electricity transmission efficiency, battery technology and nuclear power.

To the Secretary, China is the gorilla in the marketplace with spending on new energy technologies there reaching $100 billion a year – way ahead of the U.S.

Chu said if we fail to keep pace with other countries’ efforts in clean-energy development, the U.S. would simply be swapping one kind of dependence (foreign oil) for another (foreign technology).

“If we don’t start moving, other countries are moving, and they will look at us as a market,” he said in a news conference after the speech.

While Chu voiced concern about our country’s position in the clean energy competition, he also expressed confidence that we could return to the forefront, saying, “America has the greatest innovation machine in the world. . . . We have an opportunity before us, an incredible opportunity, to lead the world in a new industrial revolution.”

Other notable panelists at the event were Sen. Michael Bennet and Gov. Ritter. Udall said the purpose of the summit was to bring together energy and environmental experts for discussions on energy independence, economic revival and “the next bold policy step we need to take. “We need to be laying the groundwork today so that Colorado will lead the world in the clean-energy revolution,” Udall said.”

While much of the dialogue focused on America’s growing international competition in advancing new energy technologies, the topic of nuclear power was also raised. Udall said he would support a nuclear power plant in Colorado if it had local support and could be built and operated safely.

Secretary Chu stressed that the continuing climate change debate, and who is to blame for warming temperatures, has hindered efforts to embrace policies that push clean technologies. A considerable portion of his speech was spent outlining evidence in support of human-caused climate change.

“We have to convince all of America that this is a nonpartisan issue,” Chu said. “This is our economic future.”