A political activist and Missoula newcomer has drawn up a proposal to wean 12 communities, including the Garden City, off oil.
That is no small undertaking. It requires a lot of money, and already, it has critics saying the idea is wholly unrealistic.
Miller, whose resume shows a career focused on energy and the environment, knows the proposal is ambitious - even daunting.
“Some people can leap there a little faster,” she says.
Miller moved to Missoula in 2005 to be closer to family and begin work on the plan, called “High Ground Communities.”
As she sees it, this generation confronts two monstrous problems: Oil is running out, and the Earth is warming.
Last month, the latter topic flooded headlines around the world. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change sounded the alarm with a report saying global warming is an “unequivocal” reality. Then, the United Nations Foundation and Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society, released a report calling on policy makers to confront global warming. Last Sunday at the Academy Awards, Gore's PowerPoint discussion of climate change, “An Inconvenient Truth,” took two Oscars.
The issue is no longer on the fringe. It is pouring into the mainstream. There's another big issue, too, and this one is troubling consumers. Oil shortages mean high gas prices. To Miller, both matters are a call to action, though she believes oil depletion alone justifies her proposal.
Miller's plan is a draft, but it is anything but timid.
It includes setting up wind and solar locations for electricity. Miller wants Missoula to capture methane and use biomass pellets to heat homes. She wants buildings superinsulated. She wants hydrogen filling stations built so people can drive hydrogen-powered cars. She wants more food grown locally, too.
The costs of the project are astronomical - estimated at anywhere from $1 billion to
$2.8 billion for one city. Miller expects the costs would be offset later on because the U.S. would need to buy less oil. At any rate, money would go toward infrastructure, development rights for agriculture and subsidies for hydrogen vehicles, among other things.
She wants to see 11 other cities on board, too, and she suggests places she thinks would work well. Albuquerque is one - and last week government officials there were receptive, she said. Denver, Nashville, Spokane and Austin are possibilities, too. All have universities that could help manage data.
The plan could take at least a decade to implement - though a couple of supporters think that's an assertive schedule. The important thing, Miller said, is to design it. After that, policy makers and government officials can pick away at it.
“It's a year at a time,” she said.
Miller's proposal is challenging because it seems both far-fetched and in some respects inevitable. She discusses projects already in existence - but she takes them to a grand scale. She incorporates technologies still in their infancy, but the current costs are huge.
On the one hand, she sounds like a prophet, said Councilwoman Stacy Rye. On the other hand, it's difficult to consider costs in the billions of dollars.
Miller's sense of timing is also demanding. She thinks in terms of decades - and she points out that the current, gasoline-based system wasn't built overnight. Plus, it was built with “massive infusions of federal dollars,” and with corporate money.
Miller, who lobbied some 20 years on Capitol Hill, believes that sooner rather than later, Big Oil and the federal government will want to invest major dollars in a new energy system. Already, she is watching new technologies play out elsewhere. California has opened up more than a dozen hydrogen filling stations, she said. And oil companies are increasingly ready to invest in alternatives.
According to a spokesman for the American Petroleum Institute, oil companies invested more than $98 billion in “emerging energy technologies,” including renewable resources, from 2000 through 2005.
Miller said that when they're ready to invest in a comprehensive demonstration project, she's ready to deliver a plan: “This is how we think we could do it if the money was there.”
While Miller's vision is broad, discrete portions of her project aren't new. In one sense, she's simply bringing together existing pieces of a system based on alternative fuels. Some ideas already are alive in Montana.
Wind energy is in play in this state. Eight percent of NorthWestern Energy's electric supply comes from wind, according to spokeswoman Claudia Rapkoch.
At this point, the company doesn't plan to increase its use of wind generation. First of all, wind power requires backup for times the wind doesn't blow. And backup is costly, she said. Secondly, wind speeds are variable. The variability puts pressure on the company's transmission system.
Still, customers like the green alternative and NorthWestern likes having a variety of energy options.
“We believe it's (wind has) been a good product for us,” Rapkoch said.
In Missoula, a single windmill can more than power MonTech when the turbine is churning at full speed, according to Dick King, president of the Missoula Area Economic Development Corp.
In addition, Allied Waste knows how to capture methane and use it to heat homes - though the company hasn't been able to do that yet in Missoula, said Montana general manager Max Bauer.
He said Allied Waste captures methane here, but the landfill doesn't produce enough to use. The company is working on that issue daily.
“We would like for somebody else to be able to use (the methane),” Bauer said.
And in Montana, people working in the food system are boosting local production.
Demand is growing, and to some extent supply is up, too, said Neva Hassanein, associate professor of environmental studies at the University of Montana and co-facilitator of the Community Food and Agriculture Coalition.
Last year, Missoula added another farmers market: “That's an indication of growth right there.”
UM Dining Services spends roughly 13 percent of its food budget on food from Montana or surrounding regions. Of that, more than 80 percent comes from Montana.
There are challenges with production, too. The number of acres where crops were harvested in Missoula County dropped 20 percent from 1997 to 2002, according to a coalition newsletter.
“The biggest limiting factor I think we have in terms of promoting local food is we need to do more to protect agricultural land from development,” Hassanein said.
It's a factor Miller addresses in her proposal.
In many cases, though, Missoulians can't rely on locally grown food, said Bob Burris, who manages Rosauers Supermarkets. He buys locally when he can, but his supplier is in Washington state.
“I just can't change that,” Burris said.
He finds Miller's ideas interesting, but he isn't sure how far they'll go.
“I still think she's tackling a huge monster. I just don't know how realistic it is,” Burris said.
Alternative energy authorities see Miller's plan as aggressive - but not out of the question.
“Her vision is a big vision,” said Brian Kerns, a University of Montana alternative energy researcher.
Some of the wind-energy math adds up, but political will is much harder to gauge, Kerns said. Will people agree to place commercial wind turbines along ridgelines, for example?
The plan would take a lot of salesmanship and elbow grease, said Paul Williamson, who directs the University of Montana's H2 and Alternative Energy Research and Development Project.
And at this point, the federal government is not committed. It's against human nature to deal with something before it's a crisis, at least in this country, Williamson said.
Yet he said the technology is there, and Missoula is in a great location to lead the way. Here, energy demand does not outstrip supply. Cost is another matter, but society needs to move forward, he said.
“We need an elegant solution to our energy crisis,” Williamson said.
If the nation fails to take action, he said, American citizens will be at risk of having nothing.
It isn't everyone who can see the future.
When Bob Quinn started talking about building a wind farm at Judith Gap, he heard from plenty of naysayers. Today that farm is the one that provides NorthWestern's customers with wind power. Quinn sold that farm and he's working on other things now, like demonstrating that he can grow all the energy his own farm needs.
The important thing is to take small steps and keep at it, Quinn said.
“Don't ever give up. But be realistic about what the opportunities are and also the restraints,” he said. It's important to keep the big picture in mind, too, he said. That is something many political leaders lack: “It's having the vision of where to go.”
Miller doesn't need to worry about a lack of vision. A large scope is what makes her proposal unique - even daring. And she seems largely unconcerned with impediments, like cost. She knows her ideas will be a stretch for many people, but she couldn't sit back and do nothing any longer.
Miller has worked as a solar lobbyist and for the National Center for Appropriate Technology in Washington, D.C. She served as a planner for natural resources. Over the course of her career, she's listened to scientists talk about climate change and oil supplies.
“Wait a second. I have kids. This really is coming,” Miller said.
The plan she devised is a starting point that will surely change along the way. Miller said she doesn't want to suggest that hydrogen, for example, is the only answer, though it is part of her proposal. And cities can create their own road maps - ditching wind power for solar power, for example.
If the project begins to take shape - and, more importantly, attracts funding - she may very well create a job for herself. For now, Miller funds her trips across the country. Her next step is creating a steering committee.
Sooner or later, the whole system needs to shift, and the right approach is one step at a time, Miller said.
“In some ways, it's as simple as doing it,” she said.
She'll just need to convince the people who control the purse strings.
Reporter Keila Szpaller can be reached at 523-5262 or at Keila.Szpaller@missoulian.com
High Ground Communities
The proposal to get Missoula and 11 other cities off oil is available at http://www.highlandwinds.com
From the main page, go to “High Ground Communities Report.” The document outlines the problems of oil depletion, global warming and how cities can be a vehicle for change.
The plan's author, Peggy Miller, describes herself as a political activist and program developer in resource management and sustainable systems.
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