Brian Detter, deputy assistant secretary of the Navy for Expeditionary Warfare, thusfar has dibs on the eyebrow-raising moment of the fourth annual Naval Expeditionary Forces Symposium in Virginia Beach.
Detter emphasized ways the Navy is going green. Not Army green, but environmental green. He addressed “the direction of the future” that included the use of flex-fuels, hybrid electricity and electric-only power to reduce petroleum use by 50 percent by 2015; the use of biofuels in surface vessels and aircraft by 2016 and plans to produce 50 percent of shore power by 2020 – an undertaking already showing its worth in China Lake.
These plans are not unknown, but perhaps you can imagine the gasp inside the room filled with 300 industry leaders trying to sell their latest and greatest items — very few of which are green.