Letter: Can we afford to wait another 36 years to fight climate change?

Through most of 1979, I collected information and developed marketing plans to take Battelle into significant involvement in alternative energy for developing countries. In the Carter presidency, such work was expanding about 40 percent a year, admittedly from a small base.

In 1980, without any thought of political change, I wrote a rather detailed market report for Battelle. The U.S. State Department had a copy, and converted it to an Adobe Acrobat file. Oddly, it is still up on the web at pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/PNAAP585.pdf

In 1980, Jimmy Carter lost the presidency to Ronald Reagan. The international program at the Solar Energy Research Institute was promptly closed, the solar panels came off the White House roof, and the opportunities I had visualized for Battelle vanished into an alternative universe.

So now, in the face of the Paris Climate Agreement by 210 countries, our new president wants to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, calling anthropomorphic climate change a hoax. Déjà vu.

Another lost 36 years? Can we afford that?

This story was originally published November 29, 2016 at 4:03 AM with the headline "Letter: Can we afford to wait another 36 years to fight climate change?."