Advancing U.S. Leadership in Clean Technology InnovationFeaturing New York Times Columnist and Best-Selling Author of Hot, Flat and Crowded
January 25, 2010 | 4 p.m - 6:30 p.m.
Marian Koshland Science Museum of the National Academies
Washington, DC
As well as a distinguished panel of clean tech innovation thought leaders:
The United States must develop a successful strategic agenda that embraces the rapid development, deployment and use of clean energy technologies to keep pace with foreign competition. As the global leader in research and development, the U.S. is well positioned to drive this new energy future. Focusing on its comparative advantage - innovative capacity - the United States can compete and win. A critical determinant of success for U.S. leadership is the development of policies that create an enabling environment for the creation, deployment and use of new technologies to address global warming concerns and diversify energy sources.
How can the U.S. fully embrace this opportunity? Coming out of Copenhagen, what are the critical issues for U.S. leadership in clean tech innovation in 2010?
Event summary:The Global Innovation Forum on January 25, 2010 hosted 100 invited guests at the Marian Koshland Science Museum of the National Academies for Advancing U.S. Leadership in Clean Technology Innovation. Sponsored by IBM and Bracewell & Giuliani, the event featured keynote remarks from New York Times Columnist and Best-Selling Author of Hot, Flat and Crowded, Tom Friedman. Mr. Friedman’s remarks were preceded by a distinguished panel of clean tech innovation thought leaders: Kate Gordon, Center for American Progress; Kathleen McGinty, Element Partners; Jackie Prince Roberts, Environmental Defense Fund; Scott Segal, Bracewell & Giuliani; and Travis Sullivan, U.S. Department of Commerce.
Guests included small business owners and Fortune 100 executives, the investment and banking community, environmental groups, think tanks, and senior staff and officials from the U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives and across the Administration: State, Treasury, Commerce, USTR and Executive Office of the President.
Some highlights from the evening included:
Tom Friedman, New York Times, on Chinese pollution:
Every time I come to China young Chinese say to me, “Mr. Friedman, you guys got to grow dirty for 150 years – now it’s our turn.” And I say that I’m here to tell you, on behalf of all Americans, it’s your turn. Take your time. Grow as dirty as you want. Because I think my country just needs five years to invent all of the clean technologies you’re going to need before you choke to death. And then I’m going come over here, and I’m going to sell them all to you. And I’m going to clean your clock.
Scott Segal, Bracewell & Giuliani, on energy policy partisanship:
When I first started in Washington, the notion that energy policy was somehow ipso-facto partisan policy was completely ridiculous. It was regional. And people were just as mad at each other based on regional lines as they ever have been on partisan lines. And I look forward to the day when the enmity in energy policy can return to its proper balance in regionalism as opposed to partisanship, because it’s really a poor fit for partisanship… If it was just divided along party lines it would be easy to call balls and strikes and frankly, I think there would be a majority to do a price signal of some sort, and to do a more expanded government program.
Katie McGinty, Element Partners, on intellectual property protection and investment:
The intellectual property side is very relevant. You can only make the kind of multi-hundred million dollar investments that are required just to get a clean technology off the ground if you have some sense of staying power protected in that particular investment, so that’s an essential piece of the equation.
Kate Gordon, Center for American Progress, on importance of commercialization and manufacturing:
Even if we have the IP here, if we commercialize in China, the next stages of innovation that come out of that commercialization, that come out of the testing that gets done, that come out of the input from partners and other actors, and from the manufacturers themselves, those later stages of technology can often be owned by that other country. It’s also just an enormous number of potential jobs.
Travis Sullivan, U.S. Department of Commerce, on opening foreign markets for U.S. companies:
We’re spending a lot of time on [global markets] with the International Trade Administration to really prioritize finding U.S. companies that are developing good products, finding markets they can access, and ensuring that those markets are open and that they’re able to be successful in that marketplace.
Jackie Roberts, Environmental Defense Fund, on creating a price signal for carbon:
It’s very apparent to a lot of the entrepreneurs on the ground, a lot of the folks around, that we really do need this price signal on carbon. It is not a partisan idea. This is a huge success that George W. Bush signed into law, using cap and trade as a market mechanism to reduce pollution. We now need it on a different kind of pollutant than sulphur dioxide and others that we were looking at back then. But it is critical and something that has continued support from both sides of the aisle. The sense that this is somehow because it does have support from the current President – it also had support from his opposition in the campaign. Read the full transcript of Tom Friedman's keynote remarks here.
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