I’m writing this week’s column from San Francisco during an Energy & Climate Change Select Committee visit to find out about the success they’re having on the west coast of the United States in deploying more renewable forms of energy generation. California is arguably leading the world in doing this and it is clear that the benefits of doing so extend well beyond achieving their decarbonisation goals.
Greater use of bio-fuels and an aggressive push on electric vehicles is reducing air pollution and starting to tackle the smog that so famously blights the southern part of the state. It’s having a positive impact on public health too. Supporting the deployment of energy storage and demand management technologies has attracted businesses from all over the world to come here, to invest and to create jobs. To even the most ardent climate change sceptic, there can still be no doubt that these technologies represent the future; bringing us closer to a zero marginal cost of energy and with it an enormous leap in productivity.
Yesterday we were in Sacramento hearing from the policy makers, today we’re meeting companies engaged in energy storage and demand side response, and tomorrow we see Google and Tesla down in Silicon Valley. Green Tech is a huge part of the Californian economy and there is no reason why we can’t copy that in the UK. Last week I spoke about our future energy system twice in Parliament – it is all a bit wonkish but exciting nonetheless. It is a central part of the digital revolution and the reasons for supporting these technologies extend way beyond saving the planet.