MILITARY GREEN: IT'S ABOUT THE MONEY

Modern warfare would be impossible without vast quantities of fossil fuel. It is needed to power everything from tanks to jets to electricity generators that run the communications networks on which Western armies depend. In the punishing climate of Iraq and Afghanistan, moreover, soldiers' accommodations must be kept cool in hot weather and warm in the cold. U.S. forces consume more than a million gallons of fuel a day in Afghanistan and a similar quantity in Iraq.

Until recently, military planners had assumed that fuel would be plentiful and easily available. A Humvee with added armour does just four miles per gallon; an Abrams tank burns four gallons to move a mile, in some conditions. These days, though, the United States' armed forces want to reform their gas-guzzling ways; green is no longer just the colour of army uniforms.

What has changed? During the invasion of Iraq in 2003, U.S. marines often found themselves outrunning their fuel supplies. "Unleash us from the tether of fuel," their then-commander in Iraq, Gen. James Mattis, later pleaded. As insurgency engulfed the Americans, supply convoys became a favourite target. In July 2006, Gen. Richard Zilmer, the marine general then in charge of U.S. forces in western Iraq, sent out an urgent request for solar panels, wind turbines and other devices to reduce the need for liquid fuels. His troops were being placed "in harm's way each time we send out a convoy," he said; protecting supply convoys was drawing forces away from other tasks. And in 2008, the spike in oil prices played havoc with military budgets: The Pentagon's fuel bill rose from $13 billion in 2007 to about $20 billion.

So it is not a question of preventing climate change, reducing dependence on imported oil or even complying with President Barack Obama's green agenda. The need for alternative sources of energy is a military necessity.

In Iraq and Afghanistan about 40 per cent of fuel is used to run electricity generators. A successful quick fix to reduce energy consumption was to coat military tents with a thick layer of commercial insulating foam, of the kind used for cavity walls in homes, covered with a sealant to protect it from ultraviolet light. Joseph Sartiano, a Pentagon official, says this treatment halves the energy needed for air conditioning and pays for itself within three to six months, depending on the price of fuel.

If the various generators on a base are linked together in a "smart grid" system, which optimizes their operation and distributes power to priority areas, such as communications equipment, a further 20 per cent savings is possible, he adds. Such a grid is being tested at the army's model forward operating base, or FOB, in Fort Irwin, Calif., along with prototypes of a mobile, hybrid power station that combines solar panels and wind turbines with a conventional generator. U.S. marines are creating a smaller model FOB at their base in Quantico, near Washington, D.C., to test systems for deployment in Afghanistan by mid-2010.

Another idea, already being tried out at Camp Victory, the main U.S. base in Baghdad, is to convert trash into electricity. A battalion of about 500 men typically produces about a metric ton of waste every day. A machine called the Tactical Garbage to Energy Refinery, or TGER, heats solid waste to produce syngas (synthetic gas, a mixture of carbon monoxide and hydrogen), ferments food slops to produce alcohol and chemically processes the two to make biodiesel that powers a generator. TGER produces as much as 64 kilowatts of power -- enough to run the command post of a battalion.

Such measures should reduce the amount of fuel needed to produce electricity. Much of the Pentagon's fuel goes to the air force, however, and reducing the consumption of jet fuel is much more difficult. The air force is working to certify all its aircraft to use synthetic fuels made from gas derived from coal or biomass, using the Fischer-Tropsch method used by Germany during the Second World War. By 2016 the air force seeks to use a 50:50 blend of synthetic and ordinary jet fuel for half of its aviation requirements within the U.S. But the shift toward synthetic fuel has provoked criticism, because when such fuel is made from coal and then burned in an aircraft engine, more greenhouse gases are emitted overall than would be produced if the aircraft simply burned conventional fuel derived from oil. Nor does it help reduce demand in war zones.

The United States navy, for its part, is placing its faith in biofuels. It has tested a biofuel made from the camelina plant in its F-18 Hornet jet. Next it will test biofuels in ship turbines. It is also installing stern flaps on its amphibious vehicles that can reduce fuel use by two to three per cent, and developing better coatings to prevent the growth of algae and barnacles on hulls that cause drag and increase fuel consumption. In October, the USS Makin Island, an amphibious assault ship, was the first of 12 hybrid-powered ships to take to the water. It saved nearly $2 million in fuel costs on its maiden voyage alone. At slow speeds, it runs only on an electric motor powered by the ship's auxiliary turbine. At higher speeds, the main turbine takes over. This is a step on the way to the navy's ambition to develop all-electric ships. When fully dedicated to missile defence, some ships already devote 40 per cent of their power to electrical systems, says Rear-Adm. Philip Cullom, in charge of the navy's fleet readiness. "With an all-electric ship it will be a bit like Star Trek, in which the captain can order power to be moved to the weapons or to the engines," he says.

For the foreseeable future, clean technology will flow mainly from the commercial to the military sector. But over time, new technologies, such as "blended wing" aircraft and new composite materials, may come out of military-funded laboratories. At the very least, the armed forces could act as crucial early adopters for costly new green technologies.

They are also promoting one important conceptual change: the pricing of fossil fuel. Liquid fuel ordinarily sells for $2 to $3 a gallon, but by the time it reaches a war zone the cost is much higher: about $15 for delivery to a big FOB in Afghanistan and as much as $400 to an outpost that, say, has to be resupplied by helicopter. This "fully burdened" cost of fuel is seeping into the calculations of military planners. It tries to capture the cost of military logistics rather than environmental impact. But if military leaders are ready to put a more realistic price on fuel, perhaps other Americans will follow suit.

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition January 9, 2010 h14