In a stunning example of what can happen when a countries leader is serious about renewable energy, the Prime Minister of Portugal, Jose Socrates, anounced today that he hopes to have 45% (!!) of all energy used in his country to come from renewable sources by 2010.
From here.
the target raises the government’s existing goal by 6 percentage points.
‘This … will place Portugal in the front line of (EU countries using) renewable energy,’ Socrates told parliament.
The government will also launch a micro-generation programme enabling householders to generate their own power and sell the excess to the electricity grid, Journal de Negocios online reported him as saying.
Power sources will include wave energy, which will be tested in a pilot project at Sao Pedro de Moel to be approved in cabinet tomorrow, Socrates added.
The prime minister’s statement came two days after EDP – Energias de Portugal SA announced plans to invest 2.910 billion euros in renewable energy by 2010, including 2.630 billion in wind farms and 280 million on other sustainable technologies.
When compared to Bush’s feeble attempt at reducing our gasoline usage by only 20% by 2017 (something he offered no plan for doing other than some numbers about biofuel) you can see that European countries are leaps and bounds ahead of us. America will need to rapidly increase its use of renewable energy or face the consequences.
What will happen when American cars are not allowed to be sold in other nations because they burn gas? What would happen if other countries started to embargo our good because we are not part of their co2 emissions cap and trade system? We can not allow America to become a technological backwater. If we wish to remain competitive we will have to continue to push our elected officials towards more and more renewable energy solutions to our energy needs.
Let’s just home he does what he says.
Glad to see Portugal on the international news scene… specially for a good reason other than soccer! :)
Portugal? Ok, I like to applaud progress (and so far this is just a good attitude press release), but as a country comparing this one to the US is a little misleading. Accoring to what I read they have 11 million people (isn’t that just a big city?) in an area just over half the size of Missouri. Or, about one third of the people in California on about one quarter of the land.
That said, I think they, having a large coastline in a sunny climate, are quite capable of deriving at least 50% of their energy needs from renewable resources. If their wine industry is as large as I imagine they probably have a good shot at biofuel production as well. Man, never import oil for nuthin’ – now there’s a goal.
I also feel most of the countries on the Mediterranean Sea have the same opportunity. We can only hope their political leaders can see the light.
Portugal also has the world’s largest solar installation. See:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/06/08/solar_plant/
Their interest is in some ways as much political as environmental. Many local mayors are communist and you can still see “This is a nuclear free area” signs. Wind energy projects are more easily approved since much of the land in the mountains is ‘common’ land i.e. held for the benefit of the local population so ground rent is not siphoned off to absentee landlords.
The article from Forbes does not quote accurately the Portuguese PM. The target established by Mr. Socrates in his original speech was “45% of the country’s consumption of electricity”. Although ambitious (the country has no plans to produce electricity from nuclear power plants) this target is reasonably realistic considering that about 1/3 of current consumption is guaranteed by hydoelectric power plants.
See also http://www.portugal.gov.pt/Portal/PT/Primeiro_Ministro/Intervencoes/20070124_PM_Int_AR_Alteracoes_Climaticas.htm
Just to answer to Rt “…but as a country comparing this one to the US is a little misleading”. This is just a question of scale wich means Kw… The principle is the same: ACTION. And the answer, for your information, is the the good news that the Portuguese national energy company EDP http://www.edp.pt buy the LARGEST AMERICAN WIND ENERGY COMPANY, http://www.horizonwind.com and plans to enter in Mexico with wind and solar plants. As you can see this is not a misleading, its a plan, a big plan to put Portugal as the world leader in renewable energy. The other part of the plan is biodiesel with GALP http://www.galp.pt together with PETROBRAS http://www.petrobras.com.br building plants in Brasil and Angola (former portuguese colonies). Other example is MARTIFER RENEWABLES http://www.martifer.com/renewables from the portuguese group MARTIFER http://www.martifer.pt with wind plants in Spain and Romania and with PRIO from the same group. This is just the beginning…