There are tremendous alternative energy sources here in the U.S. to replace that diminishing oil supply.

Quite simply, the U.S. is its own Green power Saudi Arabia.

Here’s one example. The state of North Dakota alone is capable of producing 25% of America’s energy needs from wind power, provided there are enough transmission lines and the locals don’t mind wall-to-wall turbines.

But drop environmental concerns, land use concerns and ignore areas where wind is consistently below 14 miles per hour, and North Dakota still has the potential to produce 1,210 billion kilowatt hours of wind energy a year, enough to meet the average power needs of 100 million American homes, according to a study by the federal Pacific Northwest Laboratory.

North Dakota isn’t the only prime wind state. Texas has the ability to generate 1,190 billion kilowatt hours annually, followed by Kansas with 1,070 billion kilowatt hours.

Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi are tied as the worst for wind, with no realistic wind power resources (the study didn’t examine the states of Alaska or Hawaii or offshore resources).

Whittle all that potential down to easily developable land, and that leaves wind resources nationwide to meet 20% of the nation’s total energy needs.

Of course, exploiting wind resources to its fullest is probably more than any of us wants to deal with. Good thing there is solar. Solar power is simply converting the sun’s energy into electricity.

Let’s look at the potential we all have access to. The typical square meter (or 10.8 square feet) in full sunlight gets one kilowatt hour of energy per hour. There are about six hours a day in which there is enough sunlight to trigger the typical glass solar panel to convert energy. That means there are 2,190 hours a year that square meter can generate a kilowatt hour.

The average photovoltaic panel now can convert about 16% of the sun’s radiation it receives into electricity, so that means our panel could generate 350.4 kilowatt hours annually. And that’s more than 25% of the average household’s needs–from just 11 square feet. Of course, there is bad weather and the fact you can’t cover the country with solar panels that production lowers that some more.

Yet still according to the Department of Energy, there is enough realistic solar potential in the US to provide 27% of total American energy needs.

The U.S. is also fortunate enough to have excellent geothermal resources–enough heat under the Earth’s surface to be able to generate steam or heat water to turn a turbine or transfer energy to an above ground application.

Total theoretical geothermal energy available to the U.S. is a jaw-dropping 30,000 years worth! But it’s unrealistic to tap anywhere close to that. What is accessible right now is enough to generate 59% of total American power needs.

The Department of Energy figures enough of that could be developed in the next 20 years to satisfy 39% of annual American energy demand.

So, combine the wind, solar and geothermal, we’ve got 86% of our energy needs covered in the next decade or two. What about that last 14%?

That could be pretty easily reached by adding a few more nuclear power plants and maybe adding some ethanol to the mix. But if nuclear scares you and ethanol’s effect on food prices worries you, we can instead cobble the remainder from a variety of other sources.

There’s tidal power–in which the coming and goings of the tides turn underwater turbines and generate electricity. That could power another 30,000 homes.

Burning more of our garbage in trash-to-energy plants would power another 20,000 households. Grabbing landfill gases that aren’t currently captured for energy would generate enough power for another 1,000 homes.

That still leaves us a few million households short, but we’re getting there. Conservation could easily make up the difference.