The famous German philosopher Schopenhauer wrote: ”There are always three stages in the introduction of an innovation to society. In the first stage, the innovation is denounced as ridiculous, in the second stage it encounters vigorous resistance, in the third stage it is considered a natural fact of life.” Renewable energies are already in all three of these stages simultaneously, depending on who is talking about them. But the potential and inherent logic of renewable energies will become more and more obvious; photovoltaic solar energy consumption will become a main carrier of the future global energy system - probably the most appropriate way to use energy at all.
Up to now, it seems to be the most expensive way to get energy. However, it offers many very flexible ways to environmentally sound energy. In my opinion PV is the most intelligent energy technology because of its numerous possible applications; PV will become the prima donna of energy technologies. But to realise all of PV’s possibilities, we need much more imagination concerning PV’s various related fields: in development, construction and design of conversion technologies and energy supply systems. We need more creative ideas to introduce PV and more knowledge and imagination to implement it.
In brief, we need a new way of thinking in terms of energy. We have to leave behind the conventional ways of supplying and consuming energy. The photovoltaic industry needs many supporters outside the traditional energy sector. Advocating PV requires thinking in totally new ways, embarking on new roads, using new economic calculations and new structures of energy availability. It is vital to let the scientists and developers in the industry and the political decision-makers become aware of the real potential of PV. To this end it is necessary that the people, who are, in their various roles, actively and practically committed to PV are aware of it themselves.
I am speaking to you today in three different capacities. First as chairman of this conference in order to formulate a message of this conference. Second as president of EUROSOLAR, the non-profit European Association for Renewable Energies, which has inspired several policy action programmes over the last 12 years. Third, as a member of the German Parliament where I helped initiate, and have had consistent impact on, the progressive implementation of renewable energies. For instance on the German Renewable Energy Feed-in-Tariffs-Law of 1991 which became the framework for the installation of 4,500 Megawatts of wind power; on the 100,000 solar rooftops programme, which started in 1999; and on the new Renewable Energy Law that came into force on the 1st of April which guarantees a feed-in-price of 99 Pfennige/kWh (or 50 US cents) for PV solar electricity. Based on these experiences I can speak from from a successful conceptual and practical point of view.
Commonly, the focal point of discussions about energy is the main difference between conventional and renewable sources of energy: renewables are emission-free. Over the course of the next years a second main difference will gain much more attention: the limited availability of conventional sources of energy, particularly petroleum. Because of pollution and the limited availability of conventional energies - two concerns that have been ignored by many so-called energy experts during the last decade - general discourse about energy is beginning to focus more seriously on the opportunities presented by replacing conventional energy sources with renewables. In this connection there are many pessimistic views which focus on the slow and small progress that the introduction of renewable energies has made in comparison with the rapidly increasing energy demand of the world's civilisation - one reason why there are many doubts whether the global community can succeed in meeting the 2010 targets set by the Kyoto Climate Protocol or whether the EU can meet its target of doubling the contribution of renewable energies from 6% to 12 % by 2010. But the ”business-as-usual” forecasts only become reality if there is no strong alternative business. This alternative business for renewable energies is still too weak. Actions speak louder than words.
In politics and economics there has not been enough action. This produces doubts about the ability and credibility of decision-makers. Programmes for renewable energies which are announced with a lot of fanfare, but never put into practice, such as the one-million roof programme in the U.S. and the 10,000 roof programme announced by the Italian government, inevitably lead to worse rather than good. This confirms the pessimistic views of the future.
The optimistic views are based on the tremendous natural potential of solar energy and the progress of its technological development. They range from scenarios which envision a 100% renewables supply, e.g., in a study by the French Groupe de Bellevue in 1978, in a recent study by the Wuppertal Institute, and in my book ”A Solar Manifesto”, to 50% scenarios by 2050 as noted in studies by Shell and BP. The general message must be: what has been proven to be possible should be acted upon without delay. There are two decisive advantages for everyone everywhere: solar energy is emission-free and there is an endless supply of it.
But no matter which scenario you look at, none of them are a law of nature. Even the optimistic views can’t be implemented by themselves. Obviously new practice in new and additional ways is necessary to balance the pessimistic views.
But which way is the right one? In my opinion, there has been misguided thinking, even in most of the renewable energy scenarios, whether they are pessimistic or not. Their main fault has been to try to meet energy needs with renewable energies in the same way that conventional energies have done. That means they try to copy the individual conventional energy offers with renewable energy offers, in order to substitute or replace conventional electric power supplies with renewable electric power supplies, conventional heat with renewable supplies and conventional fuel with renewable fuel supplies. The basic assumption is that energy sources come and go, but the structure of the economic energy sector will remain, at least in a modified way.
In my opinion this is a restricted view of the renewable energy alternative, mainly in the field of PV. And this restricted view leads to self-restricted concepts and strategies. This notoriously leads to an underestimation of the alternative and to misleading economic calculations.
This can only be explained by the third main difference between conventional energies, including large hydropower, and renewable energies. Conventional energies have a very long chain of supply and distribution: the more regional sources of conventional energies are depleted, the longer becomes the chain from the few oil and gas fields, the coal and uranium mines, to the places where people work, live and consume energy. This conventional energy chain ultimately became a global standard. It consists of between 10 and 20 links, from drilling to transport, to energy deposits, to conversion in refineries and power stations, to waste management and distribution everywhere.
Energy consumption is always decentralised. The supply of conventional energies is, beginning from its source, centralised. The global energy economic system, with its infrastructure and its transnational enterprises is tailored to the utilisation of conventional sources of energy. It would never have been established in its existing form without the fossil sources of energy. It is a coherent and consistent system for these sources. It is the basis for the patterns of the present energy economy, its rationale and its tools. It has its own rules for improving energy efficiency and productivity.
If past choices had been issued in favour of renewable energies, a different energy system would exist today. Renewable energies are supplied by nature everywhere, in different forms: some countries receive more of the sun’s rays, some have more wind, some more running water and some have better soil conditions for cultivating biomass for energy.
To use this renewable primary energy directly, or to convert it into another form of energy has less need of the conventional, transnational energy supply as more renewable energies are introduced. The necessity and opportunity of renewable energies is to change the energy structures, from the present split between the areas where energy is produced and the places where energy is consumed - the conventional system bringing both together.
The inherent economic logic of the conventional system is to continue to keep the energy infrastructure in the stronghold of a few hands. The inherent logic of renewable energies is to overcome the present need for energy supply infrastructures - to make them superfluous. The supplies of conventional primary energy will be substituted or will substitute themselves by suppliers of renewable conversion technologies. The most radical and widespread option for this is PV technology because it is so basic; the photons arrive at the PV module and electrons leave it. That’s it. If storage technologies are combined with it, there are no limits to its application. This is sure to happen.
All the costs for solar energy utilisation are costs for technology and its manpower. The renewable energy system we are heading toward is one with less and less interconnecting energy infrastructures. It represents a challenge not only for the present energy sector within the general economy; it is also a job for all related industries, such as the motor and glass sectors, the industry for electrical devices and information technologies.
In the long-term, the process of substituting conventional primary energy sources with renewables will mean the demise of the specialised sector for primary energy. The renewable energy system of the future will consist of many direct, individual solar energy conversion applications with short energy chains or without any energy chain at all. This is the main opportunity presented by PV. A comprehensive view is necessary to compare not only the effectiveness of high energy conversion technologies and its costs, but to compare energy systems.
The main remaining question is which concepts are adequate for this development. Over the last two decades the ways to promote PV and other renewable energy techniques were to implement public subsidy programmes introducing PV to the market. This was the case in some countries, and not in others. Even in those places where it happened, only a small proportion was promoted. It has been an ongoing process of stop and go with small promotion programmes and inadequate long-term prospects. This has led to a lack of confidence in the PV industry and is the reason for insufficient investment.
There has been a yawning gap of public programmes for mobilising the industry. The first programme intending to use photovoltaics for the U.S. army’s telecommunications in the late 70’s was blocked at the last minute. The second attempt was initiated four years ago in Japan which foresaw 5 Gigawatts by 2010. The third try was started in Germany with the 100,000 solar rooftops programme, which has recently been reinforced by the introduction of the Renewable Energy law. The impact such laws can have is demonstrated by our Renewable Energy Feed-in-Tariff Law which enabled the introduction of 4,500 MW of wind power within the space of seven years. That’s one-third of total world installation.
This law should encourage other countries to follow. If Germany remains alone with its high, special feed-in tariffs for PV power into the national electric power mix, the industry’s entire development will be biased.
The aim of the German programme is to mobilise the industry, not to absorb the world’s production capacities. That means the success of this initiative depends on corresponding initiatives in other countries and by additional, even larger steps towards PV’s introduction in non-grid-connected regions of Third World countries. Industrial enterprises must now take initiatives for the large-scale-production of PV materials. Without any such accompanying initiatives from other countries and from the industry, it will be difficult to continue this most ambitious political initiative in the history of PV. So as not to privilege German producers, it is not designed as a programme only in the interest of domestic industry. Therefore I appeal to the international PV scene to use this German initiative to motivate you in pressuring your national governments to take similar initiatives.
But to mobilise photovoltaics, a double-track strategy is necessary. The future of PV lies not only in establishing PV power stations for the general power needs of others. Solar home systems in rural areas of the Third World are a blueprint for PV applications in general, but are applied in a specific way. PV is a unique opportunity to integrate electric power production in all of our future buildings and, what’s more, in numerous electric and electronic devices, including communications equipment. The real potential of this second track is highly underestimated, even in the discussions of PV experts. A study by the German Federal Environment Agency indicates that 20,000 MW of the total of national 100,000 MW power consumption capacities are dedicated to various stand-by devices.
The more efficient these devices become, the more it will be possible to substitute all of these capacities by electric power from PV. Photovoltaics can make them really efficient. Producers in the sector of electrical equipment will be lost in the dark if they don't develop such PV-integrated devices in thousands of variations.
To integrate PV modules in mobile telephones or in laptops is not a matter of calculating the costs per kWh; it is a matter of making these things more attractive and more comfortable. It is not a matter of public promotion programmes, but of the creativity of industrial designers. This second track looks to avoid the delivery of power through grids and cables.
It corresponds with the fast development of information technologies. These technologies ushered in a new period of decentralised economic activity. There is a lot of buzz about the age of the information society. But communications technologies require central commercial providers. In contrast, the PV integrated equipment relies on the sun with no charge. PV is the key technology for a solar information society.
More than two hundred years ago the modern industrial revolution started in Glasgow when James Watt introduced his steam machine. This machine changed the world, made mass production and mass transport possible and established the sector of large power stations which still work with steam processes today. The electric power sector thus represents a technology from the 18th century, optimised only over the passing of time.
The energy needs for steam processes established the fossil and, later on, the nuclear energy which are the basis of today’s energy sector. All subsequent energy conversion technologies were then tailored to these energy sources and their rapidly depleting supply. Now mankind is living in the evening of this over-polluted era.
The success story of the steam machine and the subsequent fossil energy conversion techniques was rationalised by the increasingly monopolistic role of these energy sources and by the increased productivity of the conversion techniques. Now we have to think of productive conversion technologies without depending on fossil and nuclear fuels. The opportunity to make solar energy technologies productive depends not only on mass production in order to make them competitive with conventional technologies. The way to solar energy productivity is to avoid conventional energy supplying costs. Only 20% to 30% of all electric power costs are for production; between 70% and 80% are costs for transportation, dispatching and distribution.
More and more conventional costs can be avoided by developing and introducing solar energy applications. Even more than other renewable energy conversion technologies, PV offers the opportunity to avoid all the costs before and after the direct conversion of energy. It has the potential of converting energy. It has the potential to meet multifunctional needs.
The future of PV is not its integration into the conventional energy sector, but to overcome that sector with all its additional and accompanying costs. If we were to go down this road, PV will become more productive than nuclear or fossil fuels, when we consider all the real costs in a comprehensive way. Photovoltaics can then replace conventional energy in broader ways at a continuously faster pace. Photovoltaics will be the steam machine of a solar industrial revolution and leave in its shadow the dark age of the fossil industrial revolution.
This conference in the city of James Watt may well be the symbol for our change into the solar age. If James Watt was with us today, I’m sure he would prefer solar technology as a means towards self-production of electric power in devices, buildings, factories and regions.
