Here we go again.
In the wake of turmoil in the Middle East and the nuclear accident in Japan, we're hearing pleas for national energy policies to reduce our dependence on foreign oil and make America energy secure. As President Obama observed today, every leader since President Nixon has said he was going to do something about our energy challenges. And yet here we are once more.
One thing is certain: if we continue to do nothing, we'll get higher gas prices. Doing nothing will threaten our nascent economic recovery and the troops who defend our national security. And doing nothing will ensure that clean energy jobs and investments go elsewhere. And they are.
A report out this week from the Pew Charitable Trusts entitled, "Who is Winning the Clean Energy Race?" shows that in two short years, China has solidified its position as the world's clean energy powerhouse. China attracted a record $54.4 billion in private sector clean energy investments in 2010 -- a 39 percent increase over 2009 and equal to total global investment in 2004. Germany saw private investments double to $41.2 billion and was second among the Group of Twenty (G-20) Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors, up from third last year, which tells you that it's not just about labor costs. The United States, which maintained the top spot until 2008, fell another rung in 2010 to third place. Hooray -- we're number three!
Why this drop for the U.S.? Because China, Germany and other countries have adopted policies to ensure they snag the clean energy market. China is now making half of the world's solar panels and wind turbines because they have a national commitment to deploying renewables, and are making a strong business case for manufacturers to locate there. America is doing neither.
In less than a decade, clean energy has become the mother of all markets, witnessing a whopping 630 percent growth in private sector investments in the G20 countries since 2004. In 2010, worldwide finance and investment grew 30 percent in one year to a record $243 billion. We have not seen this kind of growth in one sector since the advent of the Internet. But this is bigger, the boom will be around longer, and the future for new energy jobs is wildly promising. Millions of jobs are being created; the only question is where the jobs and investment will be.
And unless we have a pragmatic, national clean energy policy, it won't be here.
As the former governor of Michigan, I know first-hand the impact that pragmatic clean energy policies can have on job creation. Because of incentives and a modest renewable energy standard, in less than two years 47 companies invested $9.4 billion in Michigan that is projected to create more than 89,000 jobs. Smart energy policy and government assistance to the auto industry spurred economic growth. And recently, the Gallup organization found that Michigan had the most improved job market of all states in 2010. This would not have happened without policy. The bottom line: policy matters.
Absent national policy and clear roadmap, it's not surprising that we find ourselves in the same soup as Nixon and every administration since.
Will America miss yet another opportunity to change the status quo? Circumstances may have conspired to make things different this time, but only if we take advantage of the moment. The president has challenged us, advocating pragmatic policies that should garner bipartisan support. Indeed, polls show that 84 percent of Americans -- including 75 percent of Republicans -- want Congress to adopt a national energy policy that encourages both energy efficiency and the use of alternatives to make us energy independent.
More fuel efficiency. More electric vehicles. More clean alternatives. And, by the way, more jobs. It's hard to imagine an issue with broader support. Let's push Congress to act, and show the world that we can make a commitment worthy of a great nation to address this critical challenge.
Indeed, let's strive to become number one again.
Follow Gov. Jennifer M. Granholm on Twitter: www.twitter.com/govgranholm
Nuclear power supplies about 14% of the world’s electricity. The average age of the world’s approximately 443 nuclear power plants is 27 years. While today the U.S. leads the world in installed nuclear power generation capacity, the U.S. is behind the curve in planned capacity expansion. The U.S. has only two new nuclear reactors under construction. Prior to Fukushima, countries with planned or under-construction nuclear power plants by expansion capacity percentage were: U.S 10%, Canada 27%, U.K. 21%, France 4%, Finland 25%, India 115%, China 600%, Russia 75%, Japan 25% and South Korea 52%. (The Economist, March 26, 2011)
Nuclear power expansion is necessary in America for economic, security and environmental reasons. The energy from one pound of uranium is equivalent to 1.3 million pounds of coal energy. Nuclear power produces none of the greenhouse gases associated with global warming.
It means that the cost of feeding one kw into the grid from renewables is equal to that of fossil fuels kw. Check it out. Hawaii is there japan is very close to it.
Anybody commenting? There is a lot to comment on this of course. GE NBC will never ever even report this .
Nassim Taleb subtitled his book The Black Swan: the impact of the highly improbable.
See Moving Beyond Oil and other posts at www.aesopinstitute.org to see how we can greatly accelerate replacement of fossil and Uranium fuels.
Little known and less believed future technologies are Black Swans. Some promise to turn future cars and trucks into power plants when suitably parked. They will sell electricity to the local utility - perhaps enough to pay for the vehicle.
Imagine what a 24/7 program to validate, develop and produce revolutionary breakthrough technologies can achieve.
The attack on Pearl Harbor had bombers rolling off an assembly line every 59 seconds within months.
There is no good reason we cannot ramp up and dramatically reduce the need for fossil and Uranium fuels.
In Germany we have had a very clear alternative energy program for many years. It has been a commitment on the part of the German government to make Germany a center of alternative energy for the world. We are succeeding.
If the US made such a commitment in deeds rather than just in words then it could be #1. But that is very unlikely to happen given the lack of political will and the power of the oil, nuclear and energy lobbies in Washington. In the US, money drives policy. It is your greatest weakness and the rest of the world is finding that out very clearly since the US caused the crash of 2008. We have also learned that it is very important not to be dependent on the US as a customer or partner. Bush taught us that.
You did a great job as governor. You should really run for Senate. You could win in 2012.
Best wishes.
In the meantime, work on the smart grid so we can tie decentralized sources to smarter demand. Build more plug-in electric hybrids... there's really no reason we should need so much oil for transportation.
Our first energy source priority, should be geothermal. It's price competitive with coal, and can serve as a baseload. MIT found with about 0.5% of the subsidies that we currently pump into fossil fuels, we can ramp geothermal up to about 10% of our supply by 2030. With more investment, we can do even more... especially with Enhanced Geothermal, which can be put all over the country. It has a low footprint, is always on, is quiet, and we can use drilling technology currently employed by oil companies. In fact, we can use old oil wells according to Blacksmith (SMU). Next on the list should be tidal and wave... again, always on (don't have the same problems as wind and sun). Finally, invest the intermittent sources... but in areas where there's a good resource (i.e. the Mojave Desert, etc), not just on rooftops or in backyards. It can be done without killing off endangered tortoises. Nuclear should be an absolute last resort, and should be thorium reactors if anything. Although we really should wait for fusion.
Wish you were still the governor...God Bless.
I especially like the part that stats with "show the world..." Thee are lots of steps needed to make that happen, but I truly believe that the first is to BELIEVE it can and will happen. Optimism is a self-fulfilling prophesy. Congress, while it should represent us, is not the only means for change. Change must come by any means necessary.
What happened?
Reagan happened.
Too bad for us.
with immediate benefit (not big outlay up front, and you get your
payback in ten years provided the new technology really lasts and
you don't move, and you own your home, and, and) you'll never win
the paycheck-to-paycheck crowd. Let alone the used-to-have-paycheck
crowd.
If it made economic sense we wouldn't be having an endless national
conversation.
Step one is to eliminate every subsidy for fossil fuel production and
exploration and distribution, every tax break for multinational oil
companies of any kind. That at least levels the playing field as well
as fixing a financial black hole of stupid.
But you still have the finite areal input, cost of land and material
problem - "green" is fundamentally low density.
But getting people out of cities and living where they could be
energy self sufficient, would be swell. Too bad nobody has an
interest in people not paying electric bills. So it's all about
Big Green already. GE will sell us the sun, with interest. Yay.
And prices will come down. True that subsidies for traditional technologies are skewing the market. But so is the infrastructure they've built up over the years with said subsidies, as well as development and economies of scale. The longer we wait to invest in renewables, the longer prices will take to come down. R&D, scale, and infrastructure change everything.