Miller-McCune Magazine has published a question and answer with me about the clean energy race, "Throwing the Race for Green Energy," to discuss the growing global competition for clean-tech and what the U.S. can do to regain its leadership:
A few years ago, the news was that China was adding two new coal plants a week to its energy grid. Last year the narrative shifted: China was erecting wind turbines at the rate of one turbine a week.
In 2010, yet another narrative is at work: China, Japan and South Korea are pouring lots of money into research and development of green technologies (not that China has abandoned coal, which provides about 80 percent of its electricity). Because of these strategic investments, China is positioned to emerge as a global green tech leader, gaining first-mover advantage and diminishing the United States' chances of capitalizing on green manufacturing jobs and the fruits of technological innovation.
Among those who have addressed this concern is Teryn Norris, one of the authors of a paper titled "Rising Tigers, Sleeping Giant" released late last year by the Breakthrough Institute and the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. The authors conclude that the Chinese, Japanese and Korean governments will spend $509 billion on developing green energy from 2009 to 2013. The U.S. government will invest $172 billion over that same period -- if the American Clean Energy and Security Act is fully implemented.
Increasingly, proponents of more aggressive U.S. funding for green tech are framing the issue in competitive terms, some referring to it as the "Earth Race." With the topic getting broad coverage, including articles in The New York Times, the Guardian and Newsweek, and think tanks like the Center for American Progress weighing in, Miller-McCune asked Norris directly about the findings.
Read the
full interview here.
