A Glimpse of the Future

Posted on | May 21, 2010 | No Comments

The company Better Place is, based on a well-defined strategy and action plan, building a transportation system of the future. This company is setting its sights on becoming one of the leading service providers in the electric car industry of the future. With generous funding from visionary risk capitalists and a global financial institution, Better Place will not intentionally replicate any success formula from the existing car or transportation industries. Instead, it is looking to become a provider of car transportation miles for consumers and large car transportation companies.

http://www.betterplace.com/

With electric car and battery technologies in their infancy, Better Place has identified some of the key hurdles that need to be overcome in order to achieve large scale transformation of personal transportation. The customer will buy its own electric cars, and Better Place will provide batteries as part of a subscription for mileage for the car. Additionally, Better Place will provide re-charging services via strategically located charging posts at home and at work in combination with battery-switching stations along major roads for longer trips.

While most of us have an exceedingly vague picture of the future structure and components of the transportation systems of the future, the success of Better Place will be built around a well-crafted strategy for the overall expansion of electric car transportation. This, in turn, is built on a deep understanding of the function of the various components of an electric car network. This strategy identifies the key success factors of a large-scale launch of an electric car system, and the company has developed its overall strategy based on a strategy for each of the key components.

Even the focus markets of the launch have been carefully identified. One of them is Denmark, the country in the world with the highest taxes and fees on the purchase and ownership of fossil fuel cars. In order to facilitate the rapid penetration of fossil free transportation systems, the Danish government adopted a visionary method for business development on a national level that, since the 1970’s, has taken Denmark to the global forefront in wind turbine technology and has made electric car purchases tax-free until 2015. This will provide a basis for the penetration of electric cars in the Danish market. The subsequent growth of vehicle and battery volumes and concept and systems development to a level where electric car systems will become competitive make it possible to launch into markets that do not have the unique tax advantages for electric cars shown by Denmark. With head-quarters in innovation-friendly Palo Alto, California, Better Place is focusing on other markets with unique launch and early growth potential such as Israel and Australia.

With experiences from the wind turbine industry, where companies located in countries with wind-power friendly governments and systems for supporting this technology such as Denmark and Spain, other countries need to expect that the countries that focus on electric cars at an early stage, and the companies that grow strong based on the policies of these strategically aware governments, will become more than transitory phenomena in the global markets for clean technology. Instead, countries without well-developed strategies to support clean technologies may permanently fall by the wayside and become faced with the difficult task of catching up to compete against the strong and well-established global competitors that are now entering the market in these countries.

Every week we encounter another fantastic formula that brings us closer not only to the truth that Global Energy Transformation can be accomplished but that there now exist important groundbreaking endeavors which show that it is underway.

Creative Spearhead Technologies

Posted on | May 14, 2010 | No Comments

In order to transform energy systems on a large scale we need to develop and make creative use of spearhead technologies. Of course there are such technologies that are under development, but that have not yet proven their potential in reducing our dependence on energy for economic growth.

I came across one such technology a few weeks ago when I visited the Swedish shipbuilding company Kockums. This company has been building ships in the city of Karlskrona for 200 years and in the past thirty years it has developed applications for carbon-fibre constructions for ships and other heavy constructions, that demand more stability than applications in airplanes, yachts, cars and other previous applications.

http://www.kockums.se/en/

Kockums builds the hull and the other main parts of the ship in carbon-fibre, which results in a much lighter, and more energy efficient, ship than in the case of aluminum.

The previous ships have been purchased by the Swedish Navy, for example the series of the stealth coast corvettes of the Visby series. These navy orders have rendered the company a unique competence in building full scale ships that cannot be matched by any other shipyard in the world.

Now Kockums has developed a series of workboats and passenger ferries under the brand name of Carbo CAT. These offer superior life cycle cost and energy efficiency compared to existing aluminum ships.

Visionaries in the ship-building and carbon fibre industries talk about the future “Carbon Fibre Crusade”, which might replace aluminum, concrete and other materials as construction materials for large scale structures.

One vision of an energy-saving transportation system involves the use of light-weight carbon-fibre ships for coastal freights. These ships could, as opposed to heavier steel or aluminum vessels, go into city ports and load and un-load goods close to city centers. This could give rise to entirely new energy efficient transportation systems, where trucks run on renewable fuels could transport containers and pallets the short distances from these ports to the destinations in the cities. This could dramatically reduce the energy use for medium distance transportation. Carbon fibre could also be used in order to build superstructures on large freight ships, that increase the loading capacity and improve the energy efficiency of sea transportation.

In order to make these things happen rapidly, and on a large scale, authorities on a national or regional level need to decide to implement new transportation systems based on carbon-fibre ships. If a number of such systems were planned, this would also lead to the development of ancillary technologies for loading of ships, IT-applications for the management of these systems, and the development of trucks, loading docks etc for the city transportation solutions. In the absence of such large scale projects the growth of carbon fibre will be slower and we will wait longer to reap the benefits of this potentially ground-breaking technology.

We need to find ways

Posted on | May 2, 2010 | No Comments

New plans for wind farms all over the world are meeting with resistance from inhabitants, environmentalists and other lobby groups.

The first US off-shore project in Nantucket Sound is only one example.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/28/cape-cod-wind-farm-first-_n_555211.html

We need to find ways to get the priorities right. Increasing the supply of renewable energy in the face of peak oil is a matter of global interest, and the expansion of resources for wind generation of electricity is one effort that needs ramping up.

The Drop That Erodes the Stone or a Blinding Flash of the Obvious?

Posted on | April 25, 2010 | No Comments

More and more people in high level positions recognize the need for a large scale energy transformation program, as I have been telling about in previous postings. The information that this will become necessary may turn out to be like the drop that erodes the stone, and soon enough a fully fledged transformation program will emerge in a country near you!!

However, this may not be the way things turn out to happen. The alternative is that the supply of oil after the global peak in production will gradually be reduced to a level where economic growth will not continue despite otherwise favorable conditions. (The International Energy Agency has warned that this might happen.) In such a case the realization will come upon us like a blinding flash of the obvious! Erupting volcanoes are not the only cause of economic woes, and peak oil will not cause the global economy to come to a stand-still.

We will simply find that oil prices go through the roof and that economic growth becomes increasingly difficult to attain.

Through this blinding flash of the obvious we will suddenly realize the value of a strategy and a plan that helps us prioritize ways to reduce our dependence on oil, and we will wish that we already had a program organization that could help us jump-start a mitigation program.

The Building Blocks of an Energy Transformation Program

Posted on | April 22, 2010 | No Comments

The Obama Administration is putting the building blocks of an energy transformation program in place. The RE-ENERGYSE program is a national education program that will train the students that will drive and participate in the energy transformation program of the near future.

With the key institutions of a strong coordinated innovation and implementation system in place the United States will soon forge ahead and pass Europe in its quest for the leadership in clean tech sectors.

The RE-ENERGYSE program will not only involve energy technology education. I get the impression that it will also comprise courses that will teach the management skills that will be necessary to drive the program forward on a high level.

http://leadenergy.org/reenergyse/resources/

Peak Oil – A Slow Volcano

Posted on | April 18, 2010 | No Comments

Volcanos are a reality. The complex and finite mechanism that is the Earth is doing what it has always done: Operating under its own rules with what it has at its disposal. When pressure builds, it bursts. When something it owns or has cultivated is gone, it’s gone. Comparisons to the Titanic are not overstatements: “God Himself couldn’t sink her.” Wrong. God, in the form of one of Earth’s natural offspring did just that. And such cockiness and overconfidence continues today. Have we, with all of our bluster, ever stopped a hurricane, tornado or, most recently, a volcano? The sooner we learn that there are certain unshakeable tenets to our global landlord, the better. As much as we can’t stop what is there, we can’t find and use what isn’t. But this time, it can be different. Unlike careening toward an iceberg or cowering in our collective bathtubs at the advent of a hurricane, the future of our energy needs can be planned…

We are now in Europe and all over the world experiencing the consequences of a volcanic eruption, a reality of nature that could not be foreseen. Due to cancelled flights and a complete closing of all airports in Northern and Central Europe companies and shops do not receive supplies, and business people are unable to go on business trips to visit customers, deliver services and strike deals. The companies that have been worst hit by this so far are the airlines, but if it continues other companies will suffer losses in various forms.

Hopefully, the volcanic eruptions will soon cease and all will go back to normal.
Another problem with similar effects is mounting not too far into the future, but the consequences will not come over us as rapidly as in the case of this unexpected volcano.

Nevertheless, we can learn from the present situation. The global peak in oil production, which we are probably past by now will reduce the volumes of oil that are available, and we do not yet have large volumes of renewable fuels to replace it with. Most likely, and due to the huge volumes of oil that we use on a daily basis, it will take several years to build large production resources of renewable fuels.

In order for the global economy to not suffer from a gradual decrease in oil supplies, which will cause global transportation and production systems to gradually come to a stand-still, we need to start now with the rapid and focused build-up of production and distribution resources for them.

Excellent Book “Structuring an Energy Technology Revolution”

Posted on | April 8, 2010 | No Comments

In 2009 the book “Structuring an Energy Technology Revolution” appeared, written by the distinguished Professors Charles Weiss of Georgetown University and William B. Bonvillian of the MIT Washington Office. The book deals with the complex issue of how a large scale transformation of energy related systems, or an “Energy Technology Revolution” should be organized, managed and to some extent financed. The book, written by two prominent Professors in the field of innovation and public policy, takes the perspective of the US Government and outlines its role in making this effort a success from the perspectives of US society, business and economic growth.

Early in the book the authors state that “…market forces alone cannot provide the pace and scope of innovations required to meet the urgent need for improved technology for energy supply and efficient end use, and to overcome the huge built-in preferences for existing energy technologies.”

The authors suggest a four-step approach to the development and implementation of new energy technologies:

Step 1: Assess new energy technologies for present status and for the obstacles they are likely to encounter in the marketplace.

Step 2: Define packages of relatively neutral policy measures based on each projected technology and its launch path.

Step 3: Identify and close institutional gaps in the “present system of government institutional support for energy innovation that will hinder our ability to achieve steps 1 and 2.

Step 4: Implement public- and private-sector interventions to fill these gaps. A number of new institutions may become necessary in order to fill these gaps, that are the focus of particular subchapters in the book:
- Translational R&D: Create a DARPA for energy.
- Developing an organization for engineering demonstrations.
- Filling gaps in financing support for manufacturing processes, production scale-up, and building efficiency.
- Closing the “Collaboration Gap” by developing roadmaps in order to facilitate technology collaboration between public and private sectors.
- Motivating research and development talent to take on challenging development tasks in energy related sectors.
- Develop a package of incentives and mandates to speed up the deployment of new energy technologies.

The book represents an important contribution to the debate on energy transformation. Through its focus on the high level management issues, and on the need for strategy and action plan (“roadmapping”) development by governments in order to speed up the development of new energy technologies, it reinforces the case that demand side (market based) action will not be sufficient to transform energy related systems on a large scale and with speed and cost effectiveness.

A must-read for decision makers at all levels in the public sector and in companies in energy related industries.

Implementation of Third Generation Energy Sources for Transportation

Posted on | April 2, 2010 | No Comments

If vehicle, fuel and transportation companies rename renewable fuels as “3rd Generation Fuels”, it will suddenly become obvious for policy makers that the implementation process will require a strategy and that it needs to be managed on a high level.

1st Generation: Human and Animal power
2nd Generation: Fossil fuels, primarily petroleum
3rd Generation: Renewable fuels

For the implementation of 3rd Generation mobile telephony telecom companies managed to persuade governments that this process had to be managed, and many countries made a huge profit from the sale of concessions.

Why don’t the incumbent companies in transportation put forward a similar argument in favor of 3rd Generation Fuels? Nobody will benefit from energy insecurity, and those of us who know about the causes and the possible remedies need to help with the mitigation process.

Wanted: Country (or Bank)

Posted on | April 1, 2010 | No Comments

We may analyze the challenge of implementing renewable fuels on a large scale in the light of recent systems transformations in other areas and learn from them. Several countries in Europe, when they implemented third generation (3G) mobile telephony networks, arranged large scale bidding competitions between companies that wanted to establish such networks. Why did they do this? Well, countries made a lot of money by selling concessions, but they also knew that the probability that telecom operators would start to make investments in this new technology would increase significantly if the rules of competition had been analyzed and laid down in advance. In this case companies were prepared to invest billions of dollars over a few years in order to rapidly establish a 3G infrastructure for mobile telephony. As a result we now have a number of telecom operators in every country in Europe that offer 3G services.

In comparison we now have a need to rapidly, with precision and cost efficiency implement renewable fuels systems for transportation. What do nations do in order to facilitate the rapid implementation of renewable fuels systems? In these hare-brained schemes they calculate the overall need of future capacity in renewable fuels, only to encourage the most inexperienced of farmers and local entrepreneurs to invest in the establishment of units for biogas production, experimenting with a number of different technologies and plant sizes. Advocates of renewable fuels argue with fervour that small scale experiments are the only way to start a market. While governments that have managed the implementation of 3G mobile telephony systems have access to the knowledge that it is possible to establish through analysis what a viable future structure needs to look like.

Regardless of the differences between telecom and renewable fuels it will be possible to develop strategies for the large scale implementation of renewable fuels that identify a viable future structure, probable investors in different parts of the systems, risk profile of investors, necessary incentives for investors, and the management tools needed in the implementation process.

There seems to be a wide consensus across Europe that biogas is likely to become a component in the future renewable fuels systems of the future. This is to a large extent because it is produced based on raw materials, such as biological waste, of which the energy content is currently not used. Yet, early investors get no help in selecting the production technologies and sizes for early production plants from the perspective of the likely future competition in these markets. Because of this different entrepreneurs are investing in different plant sizes and technologies, believing that all additions to the biogas infrastructure will be viable for the longer term.

It is probably the case that the only plants that will become competitive in a future system are the largest ones that take substrate from a wide range of suppliers and that are strategically located in relation to biogas refineries and the future supply chain and distribution pipe-lines. While this is probably the case, we cannot know until we have done the analysis. While governments, large companies, and business consultants all know that only particular structures of biogas production and distribution networks are likely to become viable in the future, and that these structures are possible to identify through analysis, governments insist that entrepreneurs, farmers organizations, and authorities need to spend the next decade experimenting with investments in technologies and structures with no future. Above all, we know that the structure of the biogas system, or any other system that will eventually emerge, will be more robust and cost efficient if we run the implementation as a managed process.

At best this will lead to a decade of small scale experiments with different technologies and solutions for biogas production and distribution, and technologies and systems for other renewable fuels in parallel during which we will gradually identify the technologies that work. At worst, the investment waves in renewable fuels technology cause one or two severe “investment bubbles” that cause large losses for corporations, individual investors and the banking system, and a general doubt in the viability of renewable fuels and the possibility of implementing viable renewable fuels systems on a large scale. Such a development would only underscore the “eternal truth” that markets need to be managed.

The development of strategies for the large scale implementation of renewable fuels is not a very complicated or costly endeavour. Compared to the cost of ten years and billions of dollars in failed investments these strategies and management efforts come cheap (or sheep, as we have now learned to say in Sweden, following the large scale advertising campaign of the telecom operator Tele2, which is able to run such campaigns because telecom markets are well managed).

http://www.tele2.se/erbjudande.html

Global Energy Transformation Institute estimates that a strategy for any county of up to 10 million people the development for one biofuel could be done at a price in the area 1 million dollars and for any country of up to 100 million people the same type of strategy could be developed at a price in the area of 2 million dollars. For more details, please ask Global Energy Transformation Institute for a quotation. For a complete strategy for renewable fuels in transportation we estimate that the price will arrive in the area of 3 million dollars for a country of up to 10 million people and 6 million dollars for a country of up to 100 million. Please ask for a detailed quotation.

We’ve Got It All Wrong!

Posted on | March 25, 2010 | No Comments

The environmental movement has been telling us for decades about the need to change to renewable fuels and reduce our dependence on energy. In promoting their ideas they have contributed to start many important small scale initiatives and demonstration projects. These have been necessary in order to start the development of renewable fuel technology and develop systems that make us less dependent on energy on a small scale.

Now, the tables are turning, and we need to learn new ways of looking at energy:

- We have arrived at the global peak in oil production and we need to rapidly develop renewable fuels in order to replace fossil fuels that are in decline. The logic of why we need to do the transformation is changing and we need to change our arguments to reflect the new reality.

- We need to move from small scale projects to large scale Global Energy Transformation. Some of the methods we have applied in small scale change need to be replaced and up-graded.

We need large scale financing of projects, large scale efforts, and coordination of efforts and coordination between countries, projects and technology areas in ways that we have not seen before.

It has been a massive task for sustainability alarmists at all levels to inform people about the threat of climate change. Arguing that we need to develop renewable fuels in the face of peak oil will be more straightforward, if we take into account the evidence. Nevertheless, the task of informing about the new situation is also massive.

If you care about sustainability, affluence, and are concerned about the plight of the poor in this world, you need to show it.

The only way we can deal with the massive challenges that are facing us, of which peak oil has only added one more issue that we cannot get around, is by taking them head-on. We need people, transformers, who dare see the reality and say the necessary words: “We need large scale energy transformation programs!.”

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