John Suzukida, PE, Lanex Consulting LLC, Shoreview, Minn.

Can you envision an Energy Corps?

View the full story, including all images and figures, in our monthly digital edition   In the comic strip “Peanuts,” Lucy is forever fooling Charlie Brown by taking away the football just as his foot is about to kick it. This is what seems to happen with our reaction to energy. Even after numerous shortages, price spikes, and other energy crises, we are hesitant to make investments because paybacks calculated during high-price periods get extended when energy prices drop back down, and the paybacks don't seem to materialize. In Japan's bullet train, the ticket aisles normally have open gates that energize closed if someone's ticket is not valid.