Ross Harding from the Herty Advanced Material Development Center believes people should start looking at trees as a source for fuel, even in their cars.
He told Hinesville Rotarians that a new alternate fuel source might be as close as their backyard during the club's Tuesday meeting.
"Energy stopped being an inconvenience and started to become one of the greatest geo-political issues that we're all going to have to face," said the business development vice president.
Harding introduced the "biomass" concept and advocated using trees for their cellulose to ultimately produce ethanol as a way to ease the international demand for oil.
He called the current propositions, such as drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, only "band-aid solutions." The idea he is supporting would use only surplus trees and waste wood. Capitalizing on Georgia's abundance of pine trees as a fuel source would give the state an advantage to also further its economy, since fuel sourcing has global impact.
"We can choose to ignore the issues around energy, but we will not escape the consequences of it," Harding said.
Harding is also on the cover of the current issue of Georgia Trend.