Particular ideas, interests, and institutions shape the energy problem frame. In doing so they also influence the way in which decision makers and the public see solar energy and its potential to solve energy problems. This chapter analyzes some of the core values that make up the remarkably durable official problem frame that dominated energy policy. That frame did change slowly over time, but at no time did it present a conception of the energy problem that made solar energy look like a solution.

The very notion that there should be an energy policy implies defensible reasons for the state to intervene in the energy sector. Just this notion was controversial. Out of the New Deal and World War II came a mix of ideologies: Some lionized government planning, others advocated government intervention for security reasons, and conservatives sought a return to less-fettered markets. Postwar volatility in markets for all fossil fuels made policy debates hard to resolve since policy makers had a difficult time deciding if they should be responding to gluts or shortages. Controversies such as those over the ownership of off-shore oil leases and the expansion of publicly owned electric utilities kept value-laden, ideological issues on the front burner throughout the Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson administrations, each having a different emphasis on the proper role of the state in energy policy, and each making at least some reference to the importance of private markets in the energy sector.