Promoting Green Power in Canada - Centre for Human Settlements

Promoting Green Power in Canada Pollution ProbeBox 4.10 — Government SupportPays in the Long RunEuropean governments have givenstrong supported for wind, PV andbiomass over the past two decades,including funding for R&D, pilotprojects, and the creation ofmanufacturing capacity. As aconsequence:· biomass industries in Finland andSweden are among the mostsuccessful in the EU;· Denmark is the world leader inwind turbine manufacturing (morethan 50% of the world exportmarket in 1999);· Germany has a strong indigenousbiomass technology industry toservice the emerging domesticmarket; and,· Germany and the Netherlands areleading solar photovoltaic systemmanufacturers.[EEA 2001, p. 58]development of renewable power and energyefficiency [OAG 2000, p. 29f.]. TheSustainable Development Technology Fund,with $100 million over five years, might playan important role in the emerging renewablessector, but is limited since it does not onlysupport renewable energy technologies.Looking at past successes, it becomes apparentthat the dollar amount of support cannotexplain the differences in renewable powerdeployment among industrialized countries.In terms of per capita spending, Denmark hasfavoured wind energy more than any othercountry. Overall, the U.S. spent more thanthree times the total amount of money onwind power R&D between 1973 and 2000 thanwas spent by the most successful countries,Germany and Denmark, and U.S. researchbudgets were the highest throughout the1990’s [JLS 2001, p. 334]. Still, Danish windturbine manufacturers now hold 65% of theworld market, whereas the U.S. only has onemajor turbine manufacturer and accounts foronly 9.2% of the world market [ibid., p. 369].The reasons for these differences lie in highlyinconsistent funding in the U.S., whileEuropean funding programs have been farmore stable, research results were shared,and decision-making was decentralized, asopposed to the U.S., where decisions weremade centrally and inefficient designs weresupported. Utilities and small manufacturingcompanies were closely involved in Denmark’sresearch program, participating in funding,whereas large aerospace corporations thatlater abandoned the wind energy sector weresupported in Germany. The focus in Denmarkwas on small incremental improvements andsmall-scale demonstration projects, ratherthan radical changes in the technology, aswas the case in the U.S. [p. 332]. The Danishexperience indicates that a bottom-upapproach in research can be far moreefficient than a top-down system in whichresearch is carried out without the closeparticipation of utilities and manufacturers.Government purchasing may be the mostneutral “subsidy” to renewable power. It hasbeen very effective in creating demand forrenewable power throughout Europe and, forexample, in Pennsylvania, where newly builtwind capacities have been quickly bought upby governmental and institutional buyers[PA 2002d]. The Government of Canada hascommitted to purchasing 20% of its electricityconsumption from emerging renewable lowimpactelectricity by March 31, 2006, underAction Plan 2000 on Climate Change.Whereas subsidies are often seen as unfairwith respect to competition, they continueto be paid to conventional energy sources infar greater amounts than to renewable power(see e.g., [CEC 2001, p. 36]). To put things inperspective, conventional sources of energycontinue to receive the vast bulk ofgovernment subsidies. In the EU, total96