Kenric Ward, Sunshine Times

Energy Forum seeks solar boost for Florida

While BP's oil gusher is an unmitigated disaster for the Gulf of Mexico, a Clean Energy Summit in Orlando warned Thursday that Florida has a power crisis in the making. According to Kenric Ward's article in The Sunshine News, the Sunshine State, the nation's fourth-largest electric consumer, isn’t even among the top 10 states in solar production. Though Florida has 92 million tons of biomass available for energy production, biomass plants provide just a paltry 2% of the state's power needs. Meantime, Florida utilities spend $30 billion a year to import fossil fuels to run their coal-, gas-, and oil-fired power plants. Lagging in the renewable power race is costing Floridians economically and environmentally, clean-energy experts warned at Thursday's summit. Hosted by Citizens for Clean Energy, a nonprofit consortium of green-leaning businesses, the Orlando forum turned up the heat on the Florida Legislature to incentivize renewable energy projects. The consensus and the challenge: There's a need. Is there the political will? Senate President-designate Mike Haridopolos, who delivered the keynote address and participated in the day's panel discussions, declared, "The Legislature is open for business and new ideas." "We need an aggressive energy policy -- an all-energy solution that works for Floridians first.