[media-credit name=’HAILEY COHEN/Herald photo’ align=’alignnone’ width=’648′][/media-credit]With a recent resurfacing of public interest in energy conservation, the University of Wisconsin hosted a panel discussion Monday in an attempt to inform the public of global warming and its effects.

Panel members, most notably including Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz, expressed concerns for the current trend in energy consumption and discussed possible solutions to the growing issue.

"I feel the need to do something about global climate change, and our energy consumption is really important for future generations and especially the college generation," Cieslewicz said. "Because it's going to be the college student that will be most affected by its far-reaching effects."

Panelists said global warming stems from the many ways the world misuses its energy reserves, and concentrated on ways each sector of American culture can benefit from curbing this worldwide crisis.

Panelist Richard Shaten, an environmental studies professor at UW, said while the United States accounts for just four percent of the world's population, it also accounts for 20 percent of the world's energy consumption.

It is this energy consumption, Cieslewicz added, that is accounting for over-the-top expenditures on energy resources in the city.

With the ultimate goal of making Madison one of the country's most progressive cities in America, Cieslewicz said he has multiple projects working towards a healthier city. Madison has $200,000 in its capital budget over the next five years allocated to work on energy efficiency audits in all of the city's buildings, he added.

By doing this, Cieslewicz said he hopes to lower the city's spending on energy and ultimately use this money for further energy conservation.

And Faramarz Vakili-Zadeh, the associate director of UW's physical plant department, said the university is doing its part in energy conservation with the "We Conserve" campaign. According to Vakili-Zadeh, they hope to cut the university's energy consumption by twenty percent by 2010.

By appealing to the college crowd, Vakili added, he hopes to cut the campus and city's energy consumption.

"The college crowd is an intelligent crowd, [and] if they don't deal with this mess we've created, who's going to do it?" he asked. "It's the college crowd that will pay the price for inaction at this point."

Vakili-Zadeh added he firmly believes education is the key to energy conservation and said action will follow education in the race to curb energy consumption.

The other members of the panel focused on aspects of energy consumption related to economic benefits, personal health benefits and whatever benefits businesses would receive. Each member provided a strong case for how the community and the world as a whole can each contribute to the overall energy conservation effort.

The panel also agreed the general lack of information has left the public consuming more than its share of energy.

But Shaten said with the education provided and the multitude of organizations working toward a more energy-conscientious campus, the community could change its current overuse of the planet's energy resources.

"Instead of viewing energy consumption as, 'What's mine is mine,'" Shaten said, "we should begin looking more and more at these resources as, 'What's ours is ours.'"