Dear future President of the United States of America:

I am an eighth grader at Harper Park Middle School in Leesburg, Virginia. A hobby of mine is directing movies. I often go outside and use nature in my films. Recently, I have become more aware that the earth is not always treated with respect. We live and depend on this earth; we should not want to harm it. We can also harm the earth by the way we get energy and also not using the land we have for clean energy. Furthermore, I believe we need to use the land we have and make it a better place to work, live, and enjoy life on generation after generation.

Energy can be harvested in various ways: fossil fuel, oil drilling, wind, tidal energy and solar power are just a few. Many of these are more environmentally safe and environmentally inclined than other methods. Almost all would require land to build the necessities to obtain the energy we need. We have the land on which to build solar panels, wind turbines, and also nuclear power. More than half of the state of Nevada is owned by the government. In addition, a vast majority of the adjacent 10 western state's land excluding Nevada's are owned by the Bureau of Land Management.

Earth includes a total of 196,000,000 square miles of ocean and land, of which the United States covers 3.797 million square miles. The United States has land, we need to use it to our benefit in order to gain more energy. Building wind turbines and solar panels on government property and having tidal energy generators on the coast of Alaska would help us obtain energy in unique places. Where we have land that we can use and develop I suggest we take action on it.

Future president, the state of the environment and earth is essential to our lives. I believe that developing different sources of energy is important because we don’t know if someday one of our current sources will fail. There are many different factors that can determine the most effective way to harness energy. My school's theme this year is, "Be The Change." We can develop different energy sources and we can be the change in the world. We can take a stand and care for the earth. We depend on it for life, and we want to be happy here. Future President, you are taking on a role that is vastly important to our country. Our nation needs you to be strong, honest, and uphold all our laws, protect us, and serve us. We need you to be a change in the world.

Sincerely,

Makenna B.