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Green Light Distrikt
Green Light Distrikt is about entrepreneurship focused on the cleantech sector. Edited by Chris Williams with frequent guest posts from friends, experts and industry insiders from clusters across the globe. Our goal is to provide a place where cleantech entrepreneurs in various clusters across the globe can learn from one another. Green Light Distrikt is creating the "Hitchikers Guide to Clentech" to provide a resource for cleantech entrepreneurs. Read more
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Government Policy
April 18th, 2011
A Tale of Shale: Drill Baby Drill or Too ‘Fracking’ Risky?
BOSTON -In 2008, when National Grid and NStar started to offer 50% or 100% wind energy as an alternative to natural gas as an electricity source, I was thrilled. The apartment renter in me has always struggled with the surprisingly few options that I have to reduce my dependence on polluting, foreign energy sources. But then something strange happened. Over the ensuing years, my electricity bills remained low while the wind offset fee grew threefold. On Saturday at the Tufts Energy Conference, I learned that part of the answer was tied to something called shale natural gas.
According to Stephen Leahy, Vice President of Policy & Analysis at the Northeast Gas Association, natural gas prices have been slashed in half over the past decade due to the “staggering” numbers of shale drilling sites and estimated 2-8 million cubic feet of natural gas per day that are extracted from each site. American. Plentiful. Lower emissions than other fossil fuels. According to Mr. Leahy and fellow panelist David Rosner, Associate Director of the National Commission on Energy Policy at the Bipartisan Policy Center, shale natural gas is one of the few good news energy stories over the past few years. Or is it?
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April 11th, 2011
Lessons From the Field: Jeff Sachs Tells Universities To Take Leadership on Climate Change
TOPICS: BOSTON, CleanTech Events, Government Policy
Last week, I had the fortune to listen to hear American economist Jeffrey Sachs discuss the topic “Hurrying History: Can the World Adopt a Fast Path to Low Carbon Energy?” as part of the Harvard Center for the Environment The Future of Energy series. While the topic goes beyond the scope of this blog on marketing and the public good, much of the discussion was about staring the climate change crisis in the face and taking responsibility since it’s clear that Washington cannot be trusted for leadership.
Jeff Sachs has been interested tangentially on energy and climate for a long time; he’s been a leading spokeperson on why understanding energy is important to understand a path to ending poverty and reducing climate change impacts. He’s been particularly interested in how climate change affects the poor in developing countries. The following is a loose transcript on Dr. Sach’s presentation (note that I am not using direct quotes because it’s all more or less quoted):
April 6th, 2011
Geeks and Geysers: How to Maneuver Around UK Clean Energy Policy
TOPICS: CleanTech Events, Government Policy, London
Earlier this month I attended some industry events including the first Cleantech Cluster event outside London (in Bristol); the Economist Sustainable Business Summit; the Future of Utilities conference and a Lord Stern lecture among others. I’d like to give you a brief snapshot of some of the big picture discussions as well as how future UK cleantech prospects were presented at these events.
From Policy and Financing to Engagement and Collaboration
Many of the event speeches were directed towards recent and imminent policy developments such as the Renewable Heat Incentive, Green Deal, Green Investment Bank, Electricity Market Reform, as well as outspoken, though in my opinion over stated, ‘failure’ of the Feed-in Tariff. Almost all debates made reference to how these policy developments are influencing the financing of innovations and organisational strategy. This really elucidated the fundamental current state of the cleantech industry’s reliance on politics and ensuing effect on the fragility of financing. As politicians are in office for bouts of up to 5 years whereas a typical investment lasts for 5, 10, 15, 20+ years, stakeholders are becoming increasingly frustrated with continual moving goal posts. To the extent that one investor stated to a room full of expectant entrepreneurs ‘early stage [cleantech] funding in the UK is in tatters due to a disincentivised VC community’. I think he most likely ruined their evenings but this is an understandable yet worrying sign.
There was also a surprising amount of discussion on consumer engagement and collaborations / partnerships. Something I was not expecting but theses issues are vital for transferring knowledge, within the industry but more importantly to those external to it, i.e. the public. Of the people I met at these events Siemens (the world’s largest clean tech investors) were championing their role in engaging with the industry very effectively and were also working on many successful partnerships, providing a model others should follow.
March 24th, 2011
Towards a Greener Britain: Is There a Winning Technology?
TOPICS: Entrepreneurship, Government Policy, London
A few weeks ago, I attended an Economist debate between a diverse spectrum of speakers including, Shell, Academics, and Greenpeace to name a few. Despite their differences there as one point that gathered a consensus. There is not going to be one winning technology, but instead a mosaic of technologies.
The general theme was that green technology divides into roughly two aspects, energy and transport. Arguments were made for and against all the usual suspects within these categories, and rather than try and make the case for and against the many different combinations of technologies – I am going to pick out a few questions that were answered and other points of interest.
Q. What contribution is wind energy going to make in the U.K.?
A. Although the wind sector has been widely heralded, the general consensus was that growth after 2030 might not keep pace. It was also advocated that wind must be pursued fully, changing strict U.K. planning laws to allow onshore to be developed faster.
How to encourage the right technologies – It was suggested that the best way is to let the market decide the clean technologies. It was also proposed that the fair market enabling carbon price won’t be seen until 2030, but it will be too late by this point. If the market theory that government cannot choose the right technologies to be supported then how can we expect the best technologies to appear? It made me think of a book I read 18 months ago Structuring an Energy Technology Revolution a must read for energy policy maker, while based on the US it is applicable and critical for that every country takes note.
Exportation of technologies – An example was made about a U.K. electric van maker that has just gone insolvent, and that government procurement policies should be more supportive to U.K. firms similar to other European countries. Another speaker replied that we should just buy them (the Vans) from Renault. The original speaker made a retort that resonates with me, if a country imports all its green technologies it is missing out on a huge opportunity to develop skills and be able to export technologies around the world.
March 17th, 2011
Obama and the Politics of Greenwashing
TOPICS: BOSTON, Government Policy, Marketing
It’s rare that I get angry or buy into doomsday evangelism. But following the recent news that the House of Representatives is planning to revoke the EPA’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and movement to begin granting off-shore drilling permits and lift the ban on mountaintop removal, I couldn’t prevent my blood from boiling. Whatever happened to “change we can believe in” or “Si se puede?”
These thoughts occurred after I got home last week from witnessing the wreckage of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans. There were two specific events that reminded me why my work so often revolves around climate change.
