Pulling together for a renewable energy economy

By Vice Adm. Dennis V. McGinn, USN (retired)

As President and CEO of the American Council On Renewable Energy (ACORE), I recognize that America faces significant decisions regarding all aspects of our energy economy going forward.

How much of that economy should be electrified, including transportation, and what is the fuel portfolio that produces that electricity? How do we wean ourselves off the dangerous dependence on foreign oil and what does a sustainable home- grown biofuels industry look like? What is the synergy between natural gas with the newfound reserves and renewables? What infrastructure investments will we make in the power and fueling sectors, based on the options noted? How much should we seek to democratize the production and ownership of energy in the aim of opportunity, security, and equity?

Politics invariably enter into the debate about America's energy stance, and it's sometimes discouraging to see the tendency for a "go it your own way" mentality within the renewables spectrum that can have one industry competing in a less than useful way against another. The fact of the matter is that we must absolutely broaden our fuel portfolio using all sources of energy for a whole host of reasons—national security, economic prosperity, and community health and well-being to name just a key few. That fuel portfolio will include all three fossil fuels for some time to come, as well as far greater deployment of energy efficiency and renewable energy.

The good news about our energy resources is that solid progress has been forged in the U.S. on the deployment of renewable energy over the past decade. Examples include the 15 GW of new wind installed in the past two years, 250 MW of new solar installed in the first quarter of this year alone, and over 800 MW of geothermal and biomass projects in advanced stages of development. In 2010, renewables represented 10.3 percent of this country's electricity generation. That means, of course, we have tremendous room for growth.

The bad news that too often complicates the national debate about what our energy policy should be is actually not "news," but a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding surrounding the renewables industry. The myths include notions like, "Renewable energy is too expensive and far from reaching grid parity," to the misperception that renewables haven't been proven at sufficient scale and can't provide more than a small fraction of our overall power, to the belief that all renewables need baseload back-up power (Begging the question, "So why build the renewables at all?").

This same energy illiteracy helps direct consumer behavior as noted in a recent report issued by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory that consumers are now less likely to buy renewable energy than before.
As an industry, all the renewable sectors need to come together to help educate the American public about the benefits of renewable energy. There are many success stories that we could share about the jobs created, the economy turned around, and families benefitting from the deployment of renewable energy projects in communities around America—but those stories aren't getting told. Or are lost behind the big-budget marketing efforts of fossil fuel advocates.

While all of us can probably pretty easily recall the last ad we saw touting the importance of the coal, oil, and natural gas industries as job creators and security providers, we probably can't recall the last ad we saw touting renewable energy resources or technologies, much less the job creation and national security benefits they bring. The renewables industry is still in its infancy and while there are many great stories emerging, it is an industry still focused on development, and not one that has a large budget for public information campaigns, much less expensive advertising campaigns.

Along with education outreach, developing a policy platform that supports renewable energy is an extraordinarily important mechanism that can help make or break our industry's success. In the absence of action at the federal level, states have stepped up to the challenge and passed policies like renewable portfolio standards that have provided market certainty for both the producers and buyers of renewables projects. Additional laws such as net metering aid and abet a more decentralized and secure energy system, while still benefiting utilities.

A feed-in tariff law in Germany has resulted in solar capacity nearly eight-times what it is in the U.S. While these policies are in effect in a few places in the U.S., the opportunity exists to expand that number. To do so, the renewable energy community needs to come together to speak more strongly with a more unified voice. And now several U.S. states and locales have, or are considering, an Americanized version of this same rate structure.

The whole of the renewables industry will advance more surely and swiftly if all oars in the water are pulling in the same direction. The whole array of renewable energy technologies—whether a geothermal project, a biofuels plant, or a wind or solar farm—are the victory gardens of our time. Only by coming together as an industry across all these technologies will our voice be loud and clear enough to be heard by the American public. The development of a united industry voice that tells the stories of the benefits of renewable energy is what we aim for at ACORE, and we invite all sectors of the industry to join with us to help make that goal a reality.

Vice Adm. Dennis V. McGinn, USN (retired) is the president of the American Council On Renewable Energy (ACORE), a 501(c)(3) membership non-profit organization dedicated to bringing renewable energy into the mainstream of the U.S. economy and lifestyle through finance, market, and policy research and educational programs.

Visit www.acore.org for more information about ACORE.

September/October 2011

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Pulling together for a renewable energy economy