When you think of stuff like carbon footprint or alternative energy, the United States Navy is probably not the first group you think of. We’re a warfighting organization. We run huge ships, lots of aircraft. We don’t spring to mind as leaders in energy change or in carbon reduction. But historically, we have always been at the forefront of energy change. We went from sail to coal in the middle of the 19th century. We went from coal to oil at the beginning of the 20th century. We pioneered the use of nuclear energy in the middle of the 20th century for transportation.
And every single time we did that, there have been naysayers. And now that we’re moving into alternative fuels, there are the same naysayers. They have been wrong every single time. And they’re wrong this time too.
The Pentagon is the largest user of fossil fuels on Earth. And the Navy is a little more than a third of that. Energy can be used as a weapon. And I certainly didn’t want that weapon to be used against us. The reason we’re moving toward alternative energy is it makes us better at what we do. It makes us a better Navy and it makes us a better Marine Corps. It makes us better warfighters.
Last December we signed the largest the largest alternative agreement that a federal agency’s ever signed.
At sea, we certified every one of our ships and every one of our aircraft on biofuels.
We’ve got SEAL teams in the field now that are getting close to net zero in terms of both energy and water. They use alternative energy to purify water, so that they can stay out almost indefinitely, with food being the one thing they may have to be resupplied with. Marines see a hill, they want to go up it. And they’re using knee braces to get that kinetic energy and translate it into power for their radio, for their GPS, for the other things that they need.
We just announced an RFP for the largest fleet of electric vehicles in the country — 50,000 noncombat vehicles that we’re trying to move to alternatives, to electric, to flex-fuel vehicles so that we can cut down on the amount of energy that we use and we can change the type. And we’re big enough to bring the market and change the way things operate. And that’s happened with the military over and over again. Flat-screen TVs, GPS, the Internet, all were military before they moved into the civilian world.
But you can’t work in any of the occupations that we’re in and stop. So I’m really happy today to announce that the Department of the Navy is going to participate in CDP’s supply chain program. We’re going to get our major suppliers – and we buy a lot of stuff – to participate, to disclose what their carbon footprint, their carbon management practices are, as they sell to us. It’s already in use by 85 global purchasing organizations to collaborate with their suppliers. And I hope that by bringing an organization as big as the Department of the Navy in will help to accelerate that.
We’re really glad to be part of this. Last year for the first time renewable energy accounted for a majority of the new electric generating capacity in the world. We’ve got an interest in this. We’ve got skin in this game.
As the climate changes, our responsibilities change. As the Arctic is becoming ice free, at least in the summer, we have a responsibility in the Arctic — for search and rescue, for helping to keep the sea lanes open for everybody. When the sea levels rise, instability almost inevitably follows. The Navy and Marine Corps are called on around the world. As sea levels rise, it’s beginning to endanger our naval bases on the water.
So what CDP is doing, what you’re all doing is helping to have an impact on climate change. So on behalf of the Navy, thank you for taking a leadership role in this. We’ll be where we’ve always been: out front, in front of energy change, in front of innovation.
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This is a excerpt from remarks made by the Honorable Ray Mabus, Secretary of the Navy, at CDP’s North America spring workshop this year. To find out more details about the US Navy’s participation in CDP’s expanding supply chain program, please read here.