Ex-CIA chief spooked by fossil fuels

LAS VEGAS (CNNMoney.com) -- So maybe it was part of his job to be paranoid, but former CIA head R. James Woolsey takes no comfort in the nation's reliance on oil and other fossil fuels.

Speaking at a reception at a renewable energy conference in Las Vegas co-hosted by the American Council on Renewable Energy, Woolsey told an attentive crowd that the country's heavy reliance on oil has the two-pronged effect of contributing to global warming and helping to finance global terrorism.

"We have risks to our infrastructure and our lives," said Woolsey, who sits on the advisory board of the renewable energy council.

He said of the billions of dollars Saudi Arabia gets from U.S. oil purchases, millions find their way to terrorist organizations within the Middle Eastern country.

Woolsey said an attack last year on an oil processing plant in Saudi Arabia was the work of al Qaeda, and if successful would have knocked out 7 to 8 million barrels of oil exports a day for over a year, most likely causing the price of crude to jump to over $100 a barrel.

"We have to move toward renewables, in the interest of averting global warming and our terrorist problem," he said. He made his remarks late Wednesday evening.

Woolsey advocated biofuels and electric cars over hydrogen-powered vehicles, saying the latter were just too expensive.

Woolsey headed the CIA from 1993 to 1995 under former President Clinton.

Some of the biggest U.S. oil companies are Exxon Mobil (Charts), Chevron (Charts) and ConocoPhillips (Charts). British-based BP (Charts) has extensive operations in the United States.

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