Governor Perdue speaks on the future of sustainable energy and technology in North Carolina.
Representatives of more than 50 energy organizations attended the first Charlotte Energy Summit, sponsored by Duke Energy, the Charlotte Chamber and the Charlotte Regional Partnership.
“Let me put this straight: Green is gold in North Carolina and America,” Perdue told participants at the Hilton Charlotte Center City Hotel. “The state that gets green right will own the next 50 years in this country….”
The region’s manufacturing base and existing energy core could give Charlotte a head start — energy-related companies such as Duke already employ 21,000 people. The six nuclear reactors planned for construction in the Carolinas are drawing engineering and construction firms.
North Carolina’s requirement that utilities draw 12.5percent of their electricity from renewable energy by 2021, meanwhile, is luring companies that make power from the sun, wind and organic wastes. Federal support, in the form of stimulus dollars for energy-efficiency and renewables, is beginning to flow to the states.
But barriers to renewables’ growth include the oddball connotations of a single word.
“Nobody wants to be considered ‘alternative,'” said Maria Kingery, co-founder of Southern Energy Management, which does energy-efficiency and renewable-energy work in Charlotte and Raleigh. “I really like the idea of ‘sustainable,’ because it implies something that’s going to last.”
With a banking work force trained in assessing risk, Kingery added, Charlotte is a great place to foster investment in green energy.
Perdue’s prescription for growing energy jobs: Make smart state use of federal stimulus money for energy. Create a tax credit to reward entrepreneurs who don’t move their growing companies out of the state. Invest more in the state’s Green Business Fund, which makes grants to innovators, such as Charlotte’s Sencera solar-panel start-up. And provide job training for a growing work force, from engineers to technicians.
“If we get this right,” she said, “I believe we can make North Carolina the nation’s leader in renewable energy.”
The Charlotte Regional Partnership, a 16-county economic development agency, says energy jobs would add some healthy diversity to the region’s economy. Opportunities also exist here, said vice president David Swenson, to cross-pollinate related industries — such as energy with environment, and security with defense.
The partnership met with solar, plastics and other energy-related firms during a visit to California in late March. “When we showed our cost of living, and our costs of labor, to guys in California, it just floored them,” he said.
UNC Greensboro geographer Keith Debbage last year identified 519 manufacturers in the Charlotte region that could supply components for wind, solar, biomass and geothermal companies.
UNC Charlotte recently created its Energy Production and Infrastructure Center to supply engineers for the industry. Some estimates say that nearly half the energy industry’s engineers could retire by 2012.
If it leverages the region’s academic and business talent, said Duke CEO Jim Rogers, “the Charlotte region is sitting on an energy gold mine.”
