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Why a World Council for Renewable Energy?

All people are entitled to pursue their desires for a world that is increasing in its bounty, improving in its health, and growing in its capacity to host life. Each person might wish that his or her presence on this Earth will leave it slightly better off than before. Yet the economic progress of the 20th century, based on fossil fuels and nuclear and large-scale hydro power, while advancing human society in many ways, also created a rising threat to those principles. As part of a global unrest with the status quo, and a world-wide call from every corner of the world for better solutions, the World Council for Renewable Energy (WCRE) has been established to defend, develop, and promote policies at the multinational, governmental, institutional, corporate, community and individual levels in favor of the wise and prudent use of solar energy, wind energy, biomass energy, geothermal energy, hydro energy, hydrogen energy, and all forms of natural and renewable forms of energy.

The WCRE, a globally operating independent organization, free of the vested interests of the present global energy system, will be the global voice for Renewable Energy in the concert of global energy discussion: a voice showing all the benefits of Renewable Energy for the quality of peoples life, for protecting the climate, renewing the industries, avoiding external costs and saving longterm costs and keeping peace; a voice challenging governments and international organizations to finally set their priorities on Renewable Energy and force the replacement of conventional energies; a voice to help translate the lip service often paid to Renewable Energy into firm and comprehensive practice; a voice for a political "grand strategy" for Renewable Energy and not for a development of conventional energy markets.

The previous negotiations at the World Climate Conferences demonstrated how much such a voice has been lacking so far: At these Conferences, Renewable Energy as the most important step towards the conservation of the global climate, played only a minor part.

The WCRE will change this situation. No longer must we speak about the economic burdens of climate protection but about the chances for the future global economy and civilization, offered by Renewable Energy. The WCRE must convince the global opinion of the potentials of Renewable Energy. It must show - without paying any tactical heed - the undesirable developments, the dangers, hidden costs and the damage to civilization, caused by conventional energy supply. It must motivate and encourage governments and enterprises to develop strategies for Renewable Energy. It must bring together the interests for Renewable Energy and forge the necessary alliances - integrating those parts of the conventional energy economy which accompany them on their way towards Renewable Energy without accepting conventional barriers. It is the world’s forum for the political and economic concepts allowing to introduce Renewable Energy most speedily.

Based on this the WCRE was founded on June 8, 2001. What is the role of this World Council in relation to the existing World Energy Council (WEC) organizing, every three years, the World Energy Conference which makes Renewable Energy a topic, too? What about the World Energy Council having published the report on "New Renewable Energy Sources" - with the cooperation of renowned academic promoters of Renewable Energy? This report itself is part of the answer to these questions: "Although there is broad public support for the concept of renewable energy, there is also the barrier posed by the existing investments and interests in fossil fuel and nuclear energy provision and use". Therefore even the World Energy Council recommends "a single organization to give international focus and leadership to the increased use of renewable energy".

It is hardly conceivable that from within the conventional energy economy can emerge a plan for a complete and quick replacement of nuclear and fossil energies by Renewable Energy - and the practical measures to translate it into practice. The conventional energy economy is based on. the theory that we cannot do without fossil and nuclear energy - in spite of the fact that this theory proved to be wrong. It operates within the established structures of energy supply. Therefore, the established energy economy cannot be neutral towards all energy sources. The fossil energy economy was developed and designed to provide today’s dominant energy supply.

Thus it must adapt, with its infrastructures, energy technologies and business organizations, to the specific flow of fossil and nuclear energies, from their sources at comparatively few sites on our globe to their being consumed everywhere in the world. Inevitably, the places where energy is consumed are more and more disconnected from those where it is generated. That is why a long energy chain developed, every single link of it depending on the other ones. It is this energy chain which shackles the actors of the energy economy.

Renewable Energies require different structures, as their energy flow is completely different. They are offered everywhere in the natural surroundings - or they are cultivated there and harvested as biomass. They do have, however, a lower energy density than fossil and nuclear energy. As natural energy supply - solar radiation, solar heat, water, wind, biomass potentials - varies depending on the site and there will be different foci and forms of use on our globe, from one region to the other, when Renewable Energy is used. But everywhere it will be possible to meet the energy demand with the regional energy supply. The sites where energy is consumed may become synchronous again with those where energy is generated. Fossil and nuclear energy sources are increasingly losing their role as they are replaced by free renewable primary energy or by bio-energy from agriculture and forestry.

Economic winners of this development are the producers and users of numerous and manifold techniques for conversion and use of Renewable Energy - in the field of electrotechnics, microelectronics, building technology, agro-technology, engine-technology, system technology, glass technology, and energy storage technology. Renewable Energy represents a chance for an ecological industrialization, for a regeneration of agriculture, and an independent as well as sustainable energy supply - and they are the most important pre-condition to save the environment. Instead of few large structures of energy provision they need many small complementary structures. They can be used in a flexible way, since any installed module can work separately. Thus they can be introduced fast, as they don’t need a long time for construction. In summary: they need different structures than those of the conventional energy economy - different technologies, different forms of use, different economic supporters, different political frameworks, and different education and training.

It is an absurd situation that Renewable Energy - by far the largest, most sustainable, and most ecological energy potential at mankind’s disposal - is underestimated whereas the nuclear and fossil energy potentials are overestimated, in spite of their long energy provision chains and their noxious impacts on the environment. This absurdity can only be overcome by a globally operating, independent organization - free of the vested interests of the present global energy system, an organization which needs not make allowances to governments and international organizations which are, in manifold ways, intertwined in the conventional energy economy.