This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2007, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

DEADWOOD, S.D. - While many Americans see global warming and the country's dependence on oil as impending disasters, there are those who view finding solutions to these complex problems a colossal money-making opportunity.

"When there's a big unsolved problem or a huge market opportunity that advanced technology can solve, the venture capital industry has been there," venture capitalist Ray Lane told the conference of the Western Governors' Association. "The world's climate is changing and so is the energy business in the Western states. This is a serious challenge to civilization and a staggering business opportunity for the West."

The governors gathered for three days to discuss the West's energy resources and the nation's needs, and Lane told them one thing they already know: "Political pressure from the American public for action is rising rapidly . . . political will is solidifying."

A parade of experts briefed the Governors' Association, composed of leaders from 19 states plus representatives from western Canadian provinces and American Pacific territories, on clean energy solutions from wind, crops, solar energy and the region's enormous reserves of coal.

On Sunday, the group kicked off the conference by formally calling on the federal government to pump billions into energy research with a focus on coal. The West, as one speaker said, is the "Saudi Arabia of coal."

Utah's Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. said the nation's energy needs and the economic development opportunities are the "yin and yang" of the same issue. "Entrepreneurial business opportunities will be created through this," Huntsman said. "I can't think of another time in recent history that we have stood at the doorstep of such opportunity."

Lane, a partner in the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers, said the opportunities for venture capitalists in the West will dwarf those of Silicon Valley during the rise of the computer and the Internet, with one big difference: Government, at all levels, will have to be a full partner.

"Without policy changes and incentives, we will take too long to bring these technologies to commercial scale," Lane warned.

"The energy crisis is exerting the pressure to move forward on technology," said South Dakota Gov. Mike Rounds, outgoing WGA president. "But the opportunities are there for states within the growth of those industries."

John O'Donnell, president of the solar energy innovator Ausra Inc., told the governors that government, including the states, will have to join in the risks by guaranteeing loans to energy start-ups, if not by lending money outright. In return, pioneering states will see high-tech energy industries bloom within their borders.

But the venture capitalists and the entrepreneurs seemed to part ways from the governors on research emphasis. The states want to focus on development of technology to use coal reserves, whether it be by converting them to cleaner-burning gas or by pumping coal-burning plants' carbon emissions underground or by some other, yet to be discovered, method.

Lane called for thinking beyond the "conventional wisdom" of using coal.

"Instead of high-cost, high-risk approaches [of coal technology], we need a source of zero-carbon electric power that won't destroy the economy while saving the planet.

"Western wind, solar, geothermal and biomass resources are the solution," he said.

"The Western states and western Canada have an economic opportunity unparalleled in history to power the world in the 21st Century."