The clean energy revolution is happening

by Michael Williams

There are lessons we must learn from Europe.  Their efforts to address climate change have spurred domestic clean energy industries.  Travelling through Europe with the Heinrich Boell Foundation’s EU Low Carbon Economy Tour two things were apparent: long term clean energy policies and incentives drive innovation, and betting hard on clean energy production and manufacturing pays off.

Germany established a feed-in-tariff 20 years ago for wind and hydro, expanding it to include different technologies such as solar photovoltaic and biomass over the next several years.  Since that time clean energy production has accelerated rapidly, creating roughly 300,000 jobs.  Examples are abundant.  Solar panels adorn rooftops wherever your drive in Germany, a farmer starting a small biogas plant which now provides heat and electricity to his community in Reken, or the power plant that has shifted to biomass co-generation in the middle of Dusseldorf.  The long-term stability of the feed-in-tariff gave the citizens and the businesses of Germany the ability and the incentive to invest in clean energy.

The Czech Republic has also benefitted from clean energy policies, but mainly from those established and implemented by the broader European Union (EU).  Using revenues from the EU-Emissions Trading System (ETS), local governments were able to implement simple cost saving programs, such as retrofitting a school in the outskirts of Prague.  Meeting the demands of greenhouse gas emissions reduction under the EU-ETS has created opportunities as well.  The historic town of Trebic has shifted to 80% biomass for their heat, in great part thanks to the industriousness of a local businessman with the foresight to retrofit an old coal plant into a large biomass heat supplier.

To be honest, it was not a setting where I expected to see such excitement for renewable energy.  The Czech Republic and North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany are traditionally dependent on heavy industry and coal.  These are people who have toiled hard for generations in tough occupations.  They have done so with pride and humility, providing the products and energy their fellow countrymen needed to enjoy a decent life.  How could someone expect them to simply accept that this lifestyle must change?

The answer is that, in most cases, they already have accepted it.  But it is not as simple as, “You are no longer a metalworker.”  These industrious citizens have been put to work using their skills in manufacturing and trades producing and assembling solar panels in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, and manufacturing and operating biogas boilers in Trebic, Czech Republic. 

The American Midwest shares many of these same attributes.   This region of our country built the auto industry and supplied the world with steel for decades.  The workers and people of these regions and industries have every capability to transform America into a clean energy hub, but we need to truly dedicate ourselves to this goal.   We do not have long-term policies supporting and encouraging clean energy production or manufacturing.  Without these, we cannot cultivate the great work ethic and industriousness of the people of the Midwest and throughout America. 

The clean energy revolution is happening.  It will hit America soon.  Only with strong political leadership and consistent support from America’s workers, will it be enough for our economy and our people to fully prosper from it.
_____________
Michael Williams is Legislative Representative at the Blue Green Alliance. From September 26-October 2, 2010 Williams participated in the EU Low Carbon Economy Tour, a 7-day study tour that brought a diverse group of 4 US representatives from veteran-, religious-, labor- and agriculture groups to the Czech Republic, Germany and Belgium for discussion of low carbon growth strategies.

Watch a video interview with Michael Williams