Phase II of Renewable Energy in America

National Policy Conference

November 28-29

Cannon Caucus Room, Washington, DC

American Council On Renewable Energy (ACORE)

Well, good morning.  I'm really honored to be here.  I thought I was invited to a renewable energy conference, but it turns out to be an energy conservation meeting. <Laughter> The Europeans at least, we are all freezing here.  No.  This can happen.  And last week we had a similar conference in Bonn at the former parliament and we had the same problem for heating.  So, it is not only here that these things happen.  So, let me, as an introduction, just make a few comments about how the United States is positioned in this global development of renewable energies we just heard so well presented by Janet Sawin.  I'm an old horse in these things, and when I started my job in renewable energies, I came very often to the United States, and I was always inspired by the things which happened here.  I remember in particular, in the end of the '60s, I met at Princeton a Professor Martin Wolf.  And he had on one sheet of paper certain drawings to show what is possible to replace the current energy system completely by renewable energies, 100 percent renewable energies.  And I was working at the time in the space business.  I said, "What is this?"  So, I was really so excited about the ideas certain people had already here in the United States.  In Europe, nobody was thinking about these kind of things.  So, this was-- the United States was for us Europeans, always for new technology and inspiration.  And nowadays, it is so said.  The European Union, the council and the parliament, the parliament under the leadership of Mechtild Rothe and we had the honor to have her with us, which is really an honor.  They decided to have 20 percent renewable energy by 2020, and in 13 years' time this is an enormous challenge, because right now we have at about 8.  And for this, we have to mobilize in particular the bioenergy field.  Now, let me come back to this point, how the United States is situated in this whole game.  The real start of all this what the Council of the European Union and the parliament called when they decided these new targets at the beginning of the year in the German presidency, they talked--these 27 heads of states talked about industrial revolution when it came to renewable energies.  We have in Europe those targets.  We don't have targets for nuclear, for oil, gas or coal.  We only have them for renewable energies.  And it was very difficult to achieve because at that time, you'll remember at the beginning of the year, there were problems with Poland and with the United Kingdom and so forth, but it has been done.  But I remind you the pioneer for wind energy, which is now the big boomer in the renewable energies, this was the United States, in particular California, under Carter's presidency.  And it has been done, and this brings me to the point that this global game is always a thing of cooperation.  It has been done by the Danish wind industry, which was the first to start worldwide with the development of new wind turbines.  At the time they came up with 20-kilowatt machines and then 50-kilowatt and so forth.  And now we have reached 5 megawatts for one single machine.  So, and then when it started, when it became important, the international dimension increased very much.  I give you one example again on wind energy.  GE from the United States bought some years ago Tucker in Germany.  And so they became important in the game because Tucker had an important technology portfolio.  Recently, Suzlon of India bought a major part of REpower, which is a leading producer in Germany, and then Arriva, which is a world leader for nuclear power.  I had a discussion with one of their directors, early of the year.  I said, "If you think you are really also interested in renewable energies, you should get involved in wind turbine manufacturers.  Hey, here they are."  They were fighting against Suzlon to get a part of REpower.  So, see, REpower became very expensive indeed.  And then they didn't succeed, these Arriva people from Paris, so they took another German company which is specialized in the development of large turbines of 5 megawatt.  And at the end of the game, because the German market is shrinking, most of the German production is now exported because we have a good industry.  It is an international industry, and most of the production is exported.  Now, Germany was a leader--it is always said Germany is leader for this and <inaudible>.  Germany was a leader for wind capacity production, well, more installation, but from last year--it happened last year already--the United States took over.  This year it will be 4 gigawatt that will be installed here, and in Germany it will be less than 2 gigawatt, and this trend is expanding.  The United States took over the leadership for biofuels from Brazil.  Brazil used to be the big leaders.  They started in '75 already and now the United States is taking over.  Now, all this has to do with the way the legislation gives the opportunity to do all this, because it didn't just come out of the air.  Mike Eckhardt asked, "Why is the feed-in tariff so successful?"  The answer is very simple.  You make money with it.  Those who invest in renewable energies in the countries that have feed-in tariffs, they make good money, and the feed-in system is structured like that.  So, now 50 countries have adopted this as the system, and it can also work without feed-in tariffs.  The development of wind turbines in the United States goes without it.  But still, it is certainly something which is worth considering.  It has not invented by the Germans.  It has been invented for wind energy by the Danes and for photovoltaics by the Swiss--that is not so well known--in conjunction with car racing.  I have now the pleasure to introduce the first speaker.  This is my friend Li Junfeng.  He is the chairman of the Chinese renewable energy industry association.  And he's also a colleague from the 121 group, which we heard about just before and they are doing all this analysis where we are right now with the renewable energies worldwide.  So, please... <applause>