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Military Going Green

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vfx

Well-Known Member
Aug 18, 2006
14,790
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CA CA
It’s Easy Being Green: A New Military Mission: Clean Energy
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In 2007, NPR reported that the U.S. military consumed and purchased 340,000 barrels of oil a day, making it the single-largest purchaser of oil in the world. If the Department of Defense were a country, they said, it would rank about 38th in the world for oil consumption, behind the Philippines.
 
How the U.S. Military Is Trying to Cut Its Enormous Energy Appetite - US News and World Report

Within the Pentagon, the Defense Science Board's task force prompted a question from Secretary of the Army Pete Geren. "He wanted to know what the applicability was to the Army and what the Army could be doing," recalls Paul Bollinger, the Army's deputy assistant secretary for energy and partnerships. At one point during a briefing in August, Geren "looked at me and said, 'Why don't we just go to electric vehicles?' And just like a TV commercial, we said, 'Brilliant, sir.' Right from there we shifted gears immediately and determined what we could do."

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They tried back in 2000...
Carmakers Pull Plug On Electric Vehicles - The Financial Express
Carmakers Pull Plug on Electric Vehicles
...Ford, too, is quietly reclaiming its electric trucks. Most of the 1,500 Ranger EV’s went to commercial fleets, including those of Vandenberg Air Force Base, the New York Power Authority and Southern California Edison...

http://www.epa.gov/projctxl/vanden/progrpt00.pdf
...In June 1999, Vandenberg AFB started the EV Pilot Program to continue testing new pollution prevention
techniques and reaffirm its commitment to the ENVVEST program. To implement the EV Pilot Program,
Vandenberg AFB developed a three-part technical approach to assess EV applications on base and has applied
each program component concurrently.
First, Vandenberg AFB established an EV loaner program that provides EVs and temporary infrastructure at no
cost to the recipient organizations. To date, the EV loaner program has reached out to 40 organizations at 17
locations on base. Nearly 300 base personnel have received EV user training, and more than 150 personnel
have actually test driven an EV. Program participants are testing and evaluating selected EVs for a two to four
week period. At the conclusion of each trial period, each participating organization evaluates whether an EV is
well-suited for its day-to-day operations. Based on the results of the evaluations, over 65 percent of the drivers
preferred an EV rather than their conventional gasoline-fueled vehicles. Second, Vandenberg AFB obtained a
pilot scale fleet of four EVs from a Base Realignment and Closure installation and installed the necessary support
infrastructure. This “pilot” fleet is under evaluation using performance criteria and user feedback. Third,
Vandenberg AFB assessed the applicability of phasing in long-term EV use on the base. This assessment has
identified possible vehicle fleet substitute options (make and model), infrastructure requirements, and vehicle and
infrastructure co-funding opportunities.
Vandenberg AFB currently has a total of 25 charging stations in operation that service a fleet of 22 Ford Ranger
trucks and four Daimler-Chrysler EPIC mini-vans. Base transportation personnel have been trained by the
OEMs to service and maintain each vehicle type. Additionally, Vandenberg AFB has established a Ford Warranty
Service Center on base to minimize EV down time and repair time. During 2001, the EV fleet size at
Vandenberg AFB is expected to double and by June 2001 the necessary infrastructure should be in place for
the planned expansion. The future planned EV fleet will consist of additional Ford Rangers and the soon to be
released Think City electric vehicles. Finally, plans are underway to develop and implement an intelligent Community
Electric Vehicle Management System (CEVMS). Applying clean technology vehicles such as EVs within
a shared vehicle system framework will further lower emissions, fuel consumption, and the fleet size of
Vandenberg AFB...
http://www.epa.gov/projctxl/vanden/prog00_11.pdf
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Reducing use of petroleum on Military bases
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12/09/02 - WASHINGTON -- The Air Force is using less petroleum products in California now thanks to a donation by a major automotive corporation.

The first of 112 electric vehicles donated by Global Electric Motorcars, a subsidiary of DaimlerChrysler, were delivered to four California Air Force installations in October....
 
TEG, does the govt still operate all those Ford Ranger EVs. It looks like the document comes from 2002 (just before 2003, when lotsa cars were taken away :frown:)

So did Ford take back cars they leased to the govt? You should know; you still have your Ranger EV, right?
 
Mine was one of those. As far as I know, they returned them all when the lease was done. They were headed for the crusher but some protesters convinced them to sell them instead.
 
Think of all the new euphemisms:

Eco-friendly fire,
Ethical cleansing,
Mutually assured desertification

But I can understand the need to reduce military spending through efficiency increases. Everyone wants more bang for their buck.
 

pittard, ... Is convinced that within five years it will be possible to take ft. Irwin off the electric grid. The nearby naval air weapons station china lake, also in the mojave desert, already is powered completely by geothermal energy generated by hot water below the surface.
the army has more than 12 million acres, including large tracts that cannot be used for military, residential or commercial purposes because they are intended as buffers between bases and the civilian population. Some of that land, eastin said, would be ideal for a solar array, wind farm or geothermal project. Within 15 years, he predicts, the army "will be a net energy exporter."
.

kahn noted that it would not be the first time the military has had a transforming effect on technology. Cellphones, the global positioning system and the internet all have roots in the military.


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