Christian Kjaer speaking at EWEA 2013
The European wind industry can beat its main competitors – other forms of power generation – “anytime” on a level playing field.
So says Christian Kjaer in his final Wind Directions interview before stepping down as CEO of EWEA on 1 April.
Free trade, the removal of subsidies for fossil fuels and nuclear, and a no carbon power sector are needed to create fair conditions, he emphasises.
Kjaer also warns that the double dip recession will affect Europe’s wind sector “badly” but that longer term its future is bright, especially because “you don’t have fuel costs with wind energy.”
Read the full interview in Wind Directions
Heikki Willstedt Mesa, AEE
For the last 100 days, wind energy has provided more of Spain’s power than any other source. Yet the government is cutting support for the sector and putting a major electricity provider – and domestic industry – at risk.
Heikki Willstedt Mesa, Energy Policies Director for the Spanish Wind Energy Association (AEE) explains why the government’s latest decisions are so dangerous.
Until last week, what was the situation for renewables in Spain?
According to Spanish law, companies must get a reasonable return on their investments in renewable energy, with the average being between 7 and 8%. Last year, the new government decided there would be no more incentives for new renewable energy installations after 2012.
That was a big blow for the future industry. But then afterwards, at the end of 2012, the government also approved a 7% tax on all existing power generation installations. It was supposed to be a law for the environment, but they were also taxing wind and other renewables. That meant not only future industry was impacted, but also already existing wind farms.
So what happened last week, and how has it made matters even worse?
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The European Commission needs to provide data to compare subsidies for renewables with the “far less transparent” subsidies for coal, oil, gas and nuclear, Irish Energy Minister and current EU President Pat Rabbitte says in the latest Wind Directions magazine.
Minister Rabbitte, who is one of the keynote speakers at the opening session of EWEA 2013 this morning, also warns that moving to a 2030 low carbon target would be damaging to the 2020 renewable energy target.
The minister also discusses energy security, highlighting the role of renewables in reducing future “volatility”.
Read the full interview and more in the latest Wind Directions
Ontario, Canada’s most populous province with a population equivalent to Ireland, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales combined, has decided to abandon coal-fired electricity a year ahead of schedule.
“The early closure is a result of Ontario’s strong conservation efforts, a smarter electricity grid and a diverse supply of cleaner energy,” Dalton McGuinty, Ontario’s Premier said. “Shutting down the last coal plants in Southern Ontario will significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions and save the province $ CAN95 million (€72.4 million).”
In a press release, the Canadian Wind Energy Association (CanWEA) said Ontario has reduced use of coal by 90% since 2003 while at the same time bringing online 2,000 MW of clean, emissions-free wind energy, up from 400 MW in 2006.
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Beyond an anaemic international agreement to extend the Kyoto Protocol to 2020, it is hard to see what positive momentum was achieved at the end of the two-week UN conference on climate change which ended on Saturday in Doha.
While almost 195 nations did endorse the proposal to extend Kyoto past 2012, no new targets for reducing toxic global greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels and no binding plan to keep global temperature rise to no more than 2 degrees Celsius were announced.
Even the Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Christiana Figueres, gave a luke warm response to the meeting.
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