"I would call it energy efficiency, which means getting more use out of each unit of energy," says Dr. Walden, of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

"And so I would argue that we can set a more modest goal perhaps rather than energy independence, which many economists think is probably not possible in the short-run,to a goal of greater energy efficiency.

"And the good news is we are moving forward on that goal. For example, in just the last five years energy efficiency -- broadly measured across the economy -- has improved 12 percent. And in the last 30 years we have cut the amount of energy we use per dollar of economic output by 50 percent.

"So although this goal may sound more modest, we are making headway."