A truly pan-European energy market, with the grid infrastructure to support it, would make renewables a more attractive investment and help bring down the continent’s carbon footprintThis was the central message of Georg Adamowitsch, German Minister
turned EC grid guru, when he spoke at the BWEA offshore wind conference
on Thursday.
Mr Adamowitsch, European co-ordinator of interconnection, said the
growth in renewables, and offshore wind in particular, was akin to a
new industrial revolution but was being stifled by the lack of
infrastructure that would allow energy to be effectively transferred
between countries.
He said that wind, by its nature, was intermittent but if you cast
the net wider, these localised dips in energy production could be
softened, as it was always likely to be windy somewhere in Europe.
An international grid could take the spikes in energy production
out of the picture, he argued, and this would make wind energy much
more attractive to investors.
It would also allow for easy international trade of renewables,
helping to address the issues of surplus energy and shortages across
Europe, helping to address problems faced by many individual nations.
This would, in turn, lead to far greater carbon cuts than were
likely to result from the European Emissions Trading Scheme, he
claimed.
“Transmission is the key for reducing carbon emissions,” he said.
“Trade can only happen if there’s a net.”