→ Special Issues

Hermann Scheer talks about designing environmental policies that promote effectively renewable sources of energy and that could possibly overcome the entrenched interests of conventional energy suppliers, about the Copenhagen climate conference and states that renewable energies bring the opportunity of connecting directly the spaces of energy sources to the places of energy consumption and energy production. The logic underlying new energies is decentralisation.


Pavlos Hatzopoulos: What do you think it has to be done in order to overcome the obstacles imposed by entrenched interests against the transition to renewable sources of energy and distributed energy generation?


Hermann Scheer: It is necessary to establish the special renewable energy market and to give priority to renewable energies. This implies that renewable energies have to be based on a legal framework; renewable energies must get priority access to the energy grid and in addition, as we have managed in Germany, to give a guaranteed fee to renewables because only then it would be possible to overcome the obstacles raised by the conventional energy suppliers.


P.H.: On which level would you give priority for the implementation of such policies, on the European, on the national level, or on the global level?


Hermann Scheer: The most effective way is to design policies at the national level. It is possible to introduce this principle at the European level, as a principle, but the guaranteed fee to renewables must be implemented on a national level. To target for more than the introduction of the principle on a European level, is not fundamental… The levels of the fees must become designed along the very different natural supplies of indigenous renewable energy sources and the different power service structures. The main task, however, is how to justify these energies policies. The principal argument, in this direction, should be that the value of renewable energies is higher than the value of conventional energies, it’s a social value.


Renewable energies are crucial for any society because they are clean energies: they avoid environmental costs, they avoid possible externalities that damage society. All social actors who don’t make this distinction, all market rules who don’t distinguish between conventional energies and renewable energies are misleading, because conventional energies create hidden costs for societies which are not directly inscribed in conventional energy prices. The main costs of conventional energies are not to be found in the energy bill, they are paid by societies in multiple hidden ways.


P.H.: In the context of this political project that you are describing, should we differentiate between different types of renewable sources of energy?


Hermann Scheer: It is necessary to promote all renewable energies in order to arrive at a comprehensive energy mix of all of them in the future. The various options of renewable energies are today at different states of development, but since we will eventually need all of them, it is necessary to differentiate the guaranteed fees that apply to each renewable source of energy.


P.H.: Would you say that we need to rethink the idea of the national energy grid, where all types of energies are incorporated into it? Would you say that we need to move towards more than one electricity grid on a national level?


Hermann Scheer: A grid is like a street. You cannot make one extra street for every kind of car that moves. I think that, like streets, the energy grid should be in public ownership. A local grid must be in local ownership and a national grid should be in the ownership of a public national company. We could have and should have private energy production, but also a public energy grid, equal for all suppliers and all customers.


P.H.: What would be your argument for the public control of the national grid or of local grid infrastructures?


Hermann Scheer: In between the solution of the privatisation of the grid and a directly state controlled company there is the possibility of having national grids directly controlled by ministries, but this is too bureaucratic. I think the grid management must be done in an efficient way, that means the grid company can have a private legal status but the ownership must be public. It must be controlled by a public board, that should not only represent the respective government. It should have a wide public board that encompasses environmental organisations and consumers associations, that means groups who represent special public interests.


P.H.: There are several large scale projects for generating renewable sources of energy on the political agenda, these days. I was thinking of the DESERTEC project and I wanted to ask you, out of all of these which ones do you think have a more democratic orientation?


Hermann Scheer: It makes no sense to envision a super centralisation of solar power produced in Africa and then distribute it to European countries. There is more sun power in the Sahara, but there a lot of worse investement conditions with this grandiose project, like the construction and the costs of powerlines , the resulting dependency from some super companies. DESERTEC will result to the transition from dependency from fossil fuels to a different type of dependency.


Renewable energies bring the opportunity of connecting directly the spaces of energy sources to the places of energy consumption and energy production. The logic underlying new energies is decentralisation. Look at the numerous Greek islands: wind and solar power make it possible for each island to become autonomous by exploiting renewable energy production. Energy production and distribution can be controlled by the community of the island itself, This is what energy autonomy is all about.


In this framework, it becomes possible to save all delivery costs, to do without all the long line infrastructures. A Greek island has so many opportunities to produce green power and solar power, to become dependent on some large power station in the Sahara.


P.H.: Coming to your writings and your notion of a solar world economy, with two hundred energy autonomous societies. ..


Hermann Scheer: …And not only that! Hundred thousands of autonomous cities and regions. This is not only a concept of nationalization, but mainly a concept of localisation and regionalization..


P.H.: How do you think the gap between the developed and the developing world plays in your vision concerning energy autonomy?


Hermann Scheer: It’s the best way to overcome the economic and social discrepancies between different countries and regions. Renεwable energy present an opportunity, a possibility for development everywhere. And before we start debating about solar production in the Sahara, it is much more useful, intelligent and practical to think about a program for north Africa, to produce new energy for its own needs. The presence of an international structure is only necessary in relation to conventional energies, since in the framework of conventional energies there are few countries where energy resources are located. You don’t need a similar structure, however, for the production and distribution of renewable energies. It is a big mistake to copy the centralized conventional energy system with renewable energy.


P.H.: You have mentioned Greece and the possibility of creating energy autonomous islands in Greece, for example. Why do you think this type of national societies like Greece, have been so reluctant thus far in utilising solar and wind energy?


Hermann Scheer: They believed for too long in false information about it.. That renewable energies could never be enough to meet demand, that they could not be reliable, that they would be too expensive. They believed in the restricted use of renewable energies, a view influenced by conventional energy interests, who are the principal losers from the possible widespread use of renewable energies. These energies will lead automatically to the disappearance of the fuel business, because it’s impossible for a vendor of coal or gas or uranium to become a seller, a supplier of solar radiation or wind power, because it’s not possible to privatise the wind or the sun.


With the shift from commercial to non-commercial fuels , the conventional fuel sector disappears and a new energy sector appears step by step in its place. The new energy economy is similar to a technology economy because the only cost of renewables is the cost for technology, nothing else, with the exception of bioenergy.


P.H.: If you were to explain to your constituency, and I am sure you already have, how a sustainable electricity system will look like in twenty years from now, how would you describe it?


Hermann Scheer: I think that in twenty years it is possible to arrive at 100% renewables based on an mix of solar power, wind power, of biogas (much biogas coming from the organic waste), also hydropower (the small hydropower potential is totally underestimated). How a specific electricity system might look like depends on the situation, on geographical conditions mainly.


P.H.: And a final question, since we are on our way to the Copenhagen summit, how much hope do you place on the results?


Hermann Scheer: No hope. I never had any hope because I think that the Copenhagen conference -all the climate conferences- operate with the wrong premise: that the shift to new energies and to more energy efficiency would be an economic burden. This leads automatically to a big bazaar of burden sharing among states: the hidden principle is ‘all or no one’.


We can prove, on the contrary, that each step towards new energies and energy efficiency would lead to the creation of economic benefits for a national economy. We have to realise that macroeconomic benefit is not the same time with microeconomic benefit for all suppliers and consumers. .


Our political responsibility, therefore, is to design policies that take these distinctions into account. Macroeconomic benefits must be translated into microeconomic incentives, and a new socio-economic dynamic can be created. In other words, what we have to organize is a new technological revolution towards new energies. Take a look onto the history of the last 200 years. …Were technological revolutions based on an international treaty? The answer is no.


In 1992, the Rio climate conference had the motto, ‘think globally, act locally’. The unwritten motto of the Copenhagen climate conference is ‘talk globally, postpone nationally’. I don’t expect that this climate conference can lead to any sufficient result.


P.H.: Where will this technological revolution spring from, then?


Hermann Scheer: No revolution breaks at the same time at all places. Look at the various technological revolutions: some have set the example and others have followed. There were no international agreements, no international treaties…there were frontrunners who pushed it ahead and then it created precedents and new dynamics ways and these precedents and new dynamics spread to all countries and all people. It is a dynamic process…we need a dynamic process.


P.H.: Who do you see as the main social actors, the main social dynamics that will move forward this energy revolution towards renewables?


Hermann Scheer: Our main task is to show that the way to the new energy is 100% possible and to explain this to the people. As soon as the people recognise that this path is possible, this realisation will de-legitimate all the arguments in favour of conventional energy production – that the world needs more nuclear power, for example. All these proposals are postponing proposals, postponing the real energy shift because conventional power suppliers want to wait. They have built a coalition of postponers, an alliance of postponers. They know that their end will come eventually, but they want to postpone it as long as possible.

Special issue: p2p energy
Tags: clean-energy, energy, Greece, Hermann Scheer

|  Print This Post

• del.icio.us
• Digg
• Furl
• Netscape
• Yahoo! My Web
• StumbleUpon
• Google Bookmarks
• Technorati
• BlinkList
• Newsvine
• ma.gnolia
• reddit
• Windows Live
• Tailrank