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The military protects America with guns, planes and bombs. But those aren’t the only tools our men and women in uniform use to secure national security interests. Solar panels, electric cars and biofuels are the wave of the future.

“We import a lot more oil than we produce, and most of the oil that we import is from unstable places in the world, and we send Marines and soldiers to fight in those places to ensure a free flow of oil,” says Col. , the top Marine Corps commander in Hawaii.¹ “We’re chasing energy all over the world instead of looking in our own backyard.”

Dependence on foreign sources for energy is in Rice’s “top three” list of factors that threaten America’s security. Extremism is another, though there are obvious connections between terrorism and oil. He didn’t name a third in an interview timed to coincide with Civil Beat’s coverage of the meaning of Independence Day.

“I’m not sure if (energy) is the most important, but I think that it links itself to a lot of other things. If we can become energy independent of them, you don’t have to go secure certain places or lines of communication for the import of oil,” he said. “I think it’s extremely urgent. I think if we keep our head in the sand, we’re going to continue to have the same problems we’re having.”

One of Rice’s goals is to make totally self-sufficient with renewable energy by 2015. It’s not just because he wants the Corps to save money or be good stewards of the fragile environment here, though those are factors. Being energy independent will be a boon for “national security from a strategic and tactical level,” he said.

Rice’s vision for the future of MCBH includes a number of renewable energy technologies.

Some 300 new homes built each year will be fitted with solar water heaters and Energy Star appliances, and a youth center will have a quarter of a million dollars worth of photovoltaic panels on its roof. Rice hopes that the base’s car fleet will soon be completely electric or use hydrogen fuel cells. And a request for proposals will seek projects that can provide about five megawatts of power — a third of the base’s electricity needs — with energy harnessed from the sun.

But the biggest project on the horizon is a 30-megawatt multi-fuel plant that could be online by 2013 or 2014, Rice said. The project could come to fruition through a lease that would give land to a company that can build and operate the plant, giving the Marine base favorable rates and first right to the electricity. Any excess juice would be put back into the grid.

While the plant would be able to combust many different fuels, “the drum I beat is that we need locally grown biofuels,” he said, because importing biofuels like palm oils from places like Indonesia and Malaysia doesn’t necessarily solve the national security issues related to America’s energy consumption.

“What we want to do to truly gain energy independence is to have locally grown biofuels to power our biofuel plant,” Rice said.

Hawaii is particularly dependent on fossil fuels — 90 percent of the electricity generated here comes from power plants that use crude oil products. The Marine base’s electric bill was $25 million in 2008 and dipped to a comparatively modest $19 million in 2009. Conservation made some of that dent, though the decrease in oil prices had more to do with it, Rice said.

“The price of oil is extremely volatile and until Hawaii goes to more renewable energy, we are really slaves” to the global oil market, he said. But Hawaii’s unique problems give it unique opportunities to change and get things done. “I think this is an opportunity like no other.”

He said too many of the photovoltaic panels available today are not American-made, and that the green energy industry provides a “unique opportunity for the retooling of the American industrial machine.”

“It’s important for the public to know that their Marine Corps is thinking ahead … setting the tone for security for the next generation,” Rice said. “That’s why this is so exciting.”