The current fuel and energy crisis is only going to get worse, but at the same time, it will produce job, career and business opportunities for those with the imagination to see them, a Colorado School of Mines professor says.

Dr. Roel Sneider, the W.M.Keck Distinguished Professor of Basic Exploration Science at the Golden university, made that assessment for members of the Evergreen Rotary Club at their June 13 meeting.

"Many foreign companies are taking advantage of these opportunities right now," Sneider said, "and we are lagging behind them."

Energy, Sneider said, "is the issue of our century and we need to be aware of the challenges and opportunities we face because challenges and opportunities go together. The whole issue of our energy supply and the whole issue of climate change and global warming are intricately related."

Worldwide, Sneider said, energy use "is expected to grow about 70 percent in the coming 20 years." And energy growth "is being driven by developing countries."

Showing pictures of a burgeoning India and of a small car being developed there to sell for $2,500,Sneider said Indians "want to drive their cars like we do" and that price will put a lot of them on the road, he said. And the Indian car, he added, "will take a lot less energy than the cars we drive."

The Chinese also "want to drive their cars like we do, so we have little moral authority to tell these people that they can't drive their cars and use energy and live like we do."

"They're going to do this...this is going to happen," he emphasized.

Sneider said production of petroleum is eventually going to peak and then start going down, though just when that might occur "is a contentious issue" in the industry. "It will certainly happen within a generation," he said, "and many of us will live to see it happen."

Mexico, he said, is exporting oil but will start importing in two years. China was exporting oil "till about five years ago and is now importing oil like crazy,"

Indonesia also is exporting oil but will start importing it in two years. Oil production in the United States, on the other hand, "peaked 30 years ago. We're a big consumer, but not a big producer."

"I hope it will be clear to you that we can't all be importing oil; somebody's got to be exporting it."

Sneider displayed a map of the world with each country's size proportional to its petroleum reserves. Saudi Arabia showed up disproportionately large.

The question of when peak oil production will occur, Sneider said, "begs the question of 'What is the plan when it happens,' and I don't know and I work in the industry."

"We have to decide we are going to face the issue and address it," he warned, "and we can if we want to."

Sneider said bio fuels, including non-conventional oils, such as tar sands and oil from oil shale, and ethanol, may prove to be interim solutions. But one big problem with ethanol production, he said, is that it's mostly made from glucose ("sugar we can eat") rather than cellulose ("which we can't eat").

What that means, he said, "is that we are competing with our machines for food."

"You and I," he said, "are rich; we can still afford our food; it's the poor in the world who can't afford food anymore and this is happening right now."

The United States, Sneider said, has coal reserves for about 450 years, but both coal and non-conventional oils "both produce much more carbon dioxide than oil or natural gas," and that will be bad news "from the point of view of the environment and climate change."

The good news, Sneider proposed, "is that we're wasting an incredible amount of energy," up to 60 percent of what we use. "Not all the loss can be reduced, but we can do a lot better."

And this is where the opportunities lie, he said, with efforts to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, with more "clever electronics and improved lighting systems and their design, marketing and sale and more efficient cars and trucks."

"We make choices every day," Sneider said, "and our actions have an impact. We can save 10 per cent today by driving 55 miles per hour."

There also are savings from wind and sun energy, he noted.

"Denmark generates 20 percent of its energy from wind," he said. "If Denmark can do it, we can do it."Germany generates about 20 per cent of its energy from sunlight "and it doesn't get any sun, so we can do it."

As citizens, Sneider said,"We can demand that the United States become a world leader in the responsible use of energy. We just have to put our mind to it."

Sneider is available to speak to other groups and can be reached through his website, http://www.mines.edu/~rsnieder, or by phone at 303-273-3456.

Jerry Williams is a member of the Evergreen Rotary Club.