New Energy World Network: Connecting Investors, Innovators & Deal-Makers worldwide
New Energy World Network: Connecting Investors, Innovators & Deal-Makers worldwide
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Earlier this month, a remote monitoring system in Hawaii recorded the first time in human history that the daily average for carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere hit over 400 parts per million (ppm). Crossing the 400ppm line is not inherently meaningful, other than reminding us that we are on a path to a place we don’t want to go, writes Daniel Vermeer, executive director of the Center for Energy, Development and the Global Environment at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. 
World smart grid sales climbed to $36.5bn in 2012 a growth of 30 per cent on 2011 and M&A activity reached $19.5bn almost doubling the value of deals in the previous year, according to memoori’s latest report. This confirms that solid progress has been made in the last three years but other findings show that all is not well. 
World smart grid sales at installed prices climbed to $36.5bn in 2012 a growth of 30 per cent on 2011 and M&A activity reached $19.5bn almost doubling the value of deals in the previous year, according to the latest report from sector specialist Memoori. 
As the roll-out of smart meters takes place across Europe, governments have to make a decision on the primary communication technologies that will be used to connect the meters to utility companies. The choice of infrastructure will have significant short and long-term effects on the cost, efficiency and carbon footprint of the smart grid and its ability to deliver enhanced customer value. Nick Kamen, head of energy and utilities sector, with Vodafone, discusses the options being considered to facilitate smart meter connectivity. 
Researchers at the US Department of Energy's (DOE) National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have long understood that using energy more efficiently can be just as beneficial as finding new ways to produce energy more efficiently. 
As the year of the water snake slithers into 2013, it seems quite fitting that investors are once again shifting their focus toward water-related themes, writes Junwei Hafner-Cai, analyst with RobecoSAM’s Sustainable Water Strategy. 
2012 was a seminal year for three industries that share some fast moving technologies and vertical markets, Electronic Security, Energy Management and the emerging Smart Grid, writes Allan McHale, author of smart grid blog Memoori. 
Development needs data: water security, oceans governance and food security need data, information, knowledge, networks and imagination to shift power in the public interest, according to James Cameron, chairman of Climate Change Capital, who shares his perspective on climate change. 
The UK is facing the rising risk of an energy shortfall within three years, Ofgem has warned as electrical generation will plunge to four per cent spare capacity from its present level of 14 per cent. Allan McHale, author of smart grid blog Memoori, says this should be the wake-up call government needs to push forward both distributed power and the smart grid. 
‘Greed’, said Gordon Gekko, the villainous investment banker played by Michael Douglas in the 1987 film Wall Street, ‘is good’. He went on: ‘it clarifies, cuts through and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.’ With companies that actively work to reduce their environmental impact making more money, it seems sustainability and greed go hand-in-hand, writes Andrew Ure, managing director of OgilvyEarth. 
America’s shale gas revolution has led some to think that similar transformations could unfold in Europe and China – where significant shale gas reserves exist – or that the US becoming a net exporter could result in a global gas glut and low gas prices for the foreseeable future, writes Ben Caldecott, head of policy at Climate Change Capital. 
Sometime in 2018 or shortly thereafter the UK will experience a crisis. Electricity supply will not be enough to meet electricity demand. When this happens people will look back to the week of the Diamond Jubilee in 2012 and find that the celebrations masked a coming together of policy decisions whose combined effect is simply disastrous for the UK, writes Barry Gardiner MP Special Envoy on Climate Change and the Environment to the Leader of the Opposition and member of the Energy and Climate Change Select Committee. 
In order to tackle climate change, governments will need to leverage a share of the $117tr of assets managed by private investors. However, various barriers and risks have prevented private sector capital for climate change mitigation projects to flow at the scale required, writes Steven Gray, head of UN and international policy, carbon finance, and Nicholas Tatrallyay, senior analyst at Climate Change Capital. 
Most Americans don't have to think much about energy reliability. We plug in a computer and it powers up; we flip a switch and the lights come on. But while very reliable today, the US electricity grid is old and has gone at least five decades without a significant technological upgrade. 
India could be a world leader in low-cost, renewable energy technologies if it adopts the lessons on fostering innovation put forward by the US Bell Labs or the German Fraunhofer Institutes, writes Tobias Engelmeier from local consultancy Bridge to India. 
The UK Energy Secretary Ed Davey had two key messages alongside the Renewable Obligation bands announced. The first, that exploiting the UK’s natural gas resources to their full potential would be a priority going forward, was clear. The second, that government would support onshore wind at a reduced level of 0.9 ROCs until 2017 unless an upcoming review showed this should be altered, was less so. 
In early June, the UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) published the results of smart-meter field trials, concluding that ‘in some cases there was little effect on home comfort, as actions focused on unnecessary consumption, while in others the effect was noticeable – for example, a colder and darker home’. This reveals a stark truth: smart meters do not, in themselves, provide a value proposition to consumers, writes Ian Rose, professional services director at PassivSystems. 
Offshore wind is a source of great potential for investment over the next ten years. Many countries expect wind power to account for a large share of their renewable-energy investment to meet energy and climate goals - but offshore wind technology is not cheap. Terry Pratt and Jose Abos, credit analysts at Standard & Poor's, discuss the challenges of financing offshore wind projects across Europe. 
The issuance of ‘green bonds’ may pave the way for increased private investment, but investors must be made aware of exactly what the risks are, says ratings agency Standard & Poor’s on its return from the Rio+20 Summit. 
The literal meaning of the expression The King is Dead – Long Live the King' is that the king has died, and it is hoped that the new king will live a long time. But the reasoning for the statement goes deeper. Reflecting on what has happened in the smart grid business over the last two years this expression does strike a chord, writes sector specialist Memoori. 
