Celestia H.

Age 17, grade 12

Billings, MT

October 19, 2016

Dear Next President,

Congratulations on acquiring one of the most historical and difficult jobs in America. I can’t imagine myself in your position and perhaps one time in your life, you felt the same. Yet, here you are, leader of liberal, unsteady, unpredictable America. I’m sure by now you’ve begun to feel the strains and burdens of that position; media, politics, hard decisions, long nights, and unsatisfied citizens. I’m sure that you’ve had difficult arguments with politicians, heard more than enough anger towards you in the media, and in the next four years, I’m sure you’ll have plenty of rants to deal with. I don’t want to rant at you, in fact, I prefer if we have a logical discussion. To understand my perspective, please note that I’m a young, middle class American citizen, trying to maintain a decent job as well as going to school, from the state of Montana. Yes, Montana. We too have a voice and opinion, even if small. Yet, as I have learned in government class, democracy stands for majority rules with minority rights, or essentially, the minority must be heard too. I hope you take some of my concerns as a young citizen into consideration. I would like to address to you energy sources in America. Reason being because America has the potential and resources to go solar and electric, which in the end can bring money back into America and impact the environment globally.

Nobody likes the idea of pollution. We think of smog, smoke stacks, acid rain, and people becoming sick. Just the idea that pollution has caused a hole in our atmosphere should raise concerns (NASA). The atmosphere protects every person and organism on earth from solar radiation, suffocation, and extreme temperature differences. Yet try to put pollution in a business perspective because ultimately, America’s biggest economic concern is business.

Currently, America is powered by fossil fuel. We have plenty of oil and fuel in America to run independently but oil companies still buy fossil fuel from overseas, where it’s cheaper to buy, bring back, and manufacture into usable fuels. For America, that means, American dollars and jobs are going out of country and overseas. That probably won’t change unless something dramatic forces those companies back to American soil and the chances of that happening are very slim. They’re already set up and they make a larger profit from importing rather than starting here at home. So in essence, we are paying other countries to fuel us back here in America. If you don’t see the problem with that, then to simply put it, we are losing money.

Well how can solar and electric put an impact on any of that? A huge argument against it is that trying to convert is expensive. That argument is correct but only because of the lack of production. If a car company only makes 15 cars of a specific model, those 15 are going to be outrageously pricey. Yet, if that same company made 200,000 of those cars, they’d be more affordable. See what I’m trying to get at? In America, solar panels are not in major production so they cost more. If production and sale were to increase, the price of those panels would go down. Why is this important to businesses, most of all, why is this important to the American economy? Take a look at Germany, they’re one of the leading countries in renewable energy, including solar, and the result? Germany produces enough energy from its citizens, who sell their extra energy back to energy companies, that Germany can then sell to other countries. That’s right, Germany is selling excess clean energy to neighboring countries and producing profit (Mzentgraad). What if America did the same? People talk about our debt but no one has made a move to stop its growth.

So why don’t we start converting and start seeing solar panels around U.S. soil? Perhaps because a lot of Americans, including me, pride themselves in the freedom of choice, like the choice of vehicle. I can admit I like diesel pickups, as do many other Americans. The thought of being able to only buy electric cars doesn’t set well with many people. A lot of our large transportation vehicles like planes, buses and semi trucks are diesel. Another reason may be because of oil companies. It’s their competition, going electric will make them lose a lot of money and the way things are currently set up, we can’t just get rid of oil companies. They do create a few jobs and pump some money into the economy as we saw in the Bauchen. So what can America do?

This is partly where you come in, President. Perhaps it’s possible for both natural and fossil fuel energy to coexist. Perhaps we replace all our energy plants with solar but keep our fossil fuel vehicles. Maybe we can increase the market of electric cars and solar panels, making them more affordable. We have hybrids proving both electric and fossil fuel and work together on the road. We can introduce and make an impact with electric by replacing or finding new ways to make our major transportation vehicles go from diesel to electric. We could increase solar panel production and raise awareness, put emphasis in marketing, so people can start buying them and creating clean energy at home. The oil companies would not be put out of business, especially since we still need oil and fossil fuels to create other products, like rubber, toothpaste, and tvs (Home).

Electric may not solve all our problems but it may help solve a few. I believe we can make clean energy and the oil industry work together and balance out here in America. It has the potential to make America money as well as some more jobs. Please take this into consideration.

Sincerely,

Celestia H.

Works Cited

NASA. NASA. Web. 02 Nov. 2016.

"Home." New Mexico Oil Gas Association. Web. 02 Nov. 2016.

"News 2016." Mzentgraad. Web. 02 Nov. 2016.