Karen Harbert, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Institute for 21st Century Energy, made the silver ammo analogy last week during her Energy Reality Tour visit to Alaska.

Much as we might long for that lightning strike of transformation on the energy front, the reality will be slower and thornier. The institute has more than 100 recommendations for shaping a comprehensive energy policy that includes increased domestic production of fossil fuels, clear regulations and faster permitting, tax incentives, massive investments in renewable energy technologies, the creation of a Clean Energy Bank to help launch market-worthy renewable energy projects in the United States, investment in transmission lines, smart grids and continued improvement in energy efficiency. And, of particular interest here, the institute calls for strong support by the president and Congress for an Alaska natural gas pipeline.

Harbert's aim on this tour is to launch a national discussion about America's energy future. Can it happen in this divided political atmosphere?

"Partisanship and the sharpness of political debate complicate things," she said. But in the national political standoff she sees an opening for business leaders, local governments and grass-roots organizations to drive the discussion.

In fact, that's what seems to be happening in the United States. Alaska hasn't waited for a national energy policy to set its own ambitious goal of 50 percent of its power from renewable resources by 2025. Iowa and oil-state Texas are leading the way in wind power. The national discussion may soon focus not on what to do, but how to do nationally what we're doing locally.

Harbert and others are right in pointing out that we need a comprehensive national energy policy, one that secures our energy supply, maintains our economic growth and ability to compete globally and protects the environment. Local efforts are not enough. And Harbert is right in stressing reality.

The institute wants a discussion about the possible, not the theoretical -- how do we build this comprehensive energy plan in the world as it is, not the world as we wish it was. Tremendous investment in research and development will hasten the day when renewable, clean energy powers more of our lives; at the same time the institute projects that in 2035, 80 percent of the world's energy will still come from fossil fuels. We're going to burn a lot of oil on the road to the future.

Realism also requires that national policy be flexible. Harbert pointed out that while Alaska's 50 percent renewable power goal looks doable because of our resources, in South Carolina that might be dreaming. But where national standards work, the institute likes them for the certainty they give to businesses and consumers -- for example, the institute generally backs national building energy-efficiency standards that caused such heartburn in Alaska in 2009.

Finally, Harbert argues for a transparent, no-nonsense assessment of the costs, risks and rewards of the decisions we make. What, for example, are the economic costs of shutting down Gulf drilling rigs, both in jobs lost and production facilities lost to other nations -- some of which fall woefully short of even the flawed environmental vetting that U.S. regulators provided before the Deepwater Horizon disaster. Could the administration have been more selective in its shutdown -- put rigs with dubious safety records on hold, let solid operations carry on?

What environmental risks are simply too great to take?

Harbert is optimistic the nation can make a comprehensive energy plan, if for no other reason than we must.

In the past, she said, the United States has weathered crises or met challenges because "we've gone deep into the well of innovation."

It's time to go to the well again.