Peter Darbee

They said it at Brainstorm Green

April 21, 2009

FORTUNE’s Brainstorm Green began Monday afternoon (less than 24 hours ago as I write this) and my head has been spinning ever since. We’ve talked about Washington and the politics of climate change, Andy Serwer did a a great interview with Bill Ford, and I had a relaxed conversation with Paul Hawken during dinner that generated lots of nice buzz. This morning, we’ve done panels on nuclear power and cars. I can’t keep up with it all—you can find lots of coverage, including video, at Fortune.com. I’m about to interview execs for a panel that we are calling Green Superpowers—GE, Wal-Mart and IBM. For now, I’m just going to dump some quotes from my laptop into this blog to give you a flavor for what’s going on.

Better Place’s Shai Agassi, the dynamic electric-car entrepreneur who is making headway in Israel, Denmark, Hawaii and San Francisco: “If you’re wiling to give me what you pay for gasoline, I’ll give you a free (electric) car.” Electric cars will be dramatically more efficient that gas-powered ones as battery costs come down, he argues

Bill Ford, chairman of Ford, on the history of the auto industry: “We haven’t had a lot of revolutions but boy are we now. I love it.”

More from Ford, on how times have changed: “When I joined the (Ford) board, I was asked to stop affiliating w/ known or suspected environmentalists.” Ford now works with Paul Hawken and Environmental Defense Fund.

Hawken, on why a small-is-beautiful guy has agreed to advise Wal-Mart and Ford on sustainability: “I’m a slut for change.”

Ford to Ian Clifford CEO of Zenn Motors, an electric-car startup: “You guys are leading the charge, so to speak!” Ford really won over the crowd with his low-key charm.

PG&E CEO Peter Darbee, yet another electric car fan: “I believe the electric car will be one of the great areas of breakthrough that will change our industry.

More from Darbee: “The smart grid will be the key enabling technology for the electric cars.”

Peter Corsell, CEO of GridPoint, on the smart grid: “Current system was designed in an era when information was scarce, fuel was cheap and pollution was free.”

David Crane, the CEO of NRG Energy, another utility guy who likes electric cars: “The electric car is our savior, It is the air conditioner of the 21st century.”

Alan Hanson, exec vp of nuclear power company Areva, saying concerns about nuclear waste are way overblown: “I don’t know of any part of the electricity generating world that treats its waste as well as the nuclear industry does.”

More from Crane: “I’m convinced that there will e three nuclear power plants built in the U.S. in the next 10 years.” Whether they will be anomalies (supported by a limited pool of federal loan guarantees) or lead to a nuclear renaissance remains to be seen.

Crane, explaining why there is no political constituency for nuclear energy in Washington, where Waxman, Boxer and Browner are anti-nuke but eager to accommodate the coal industry: “Right now the dominant wing of the Democratic Party knows they need to accommodate the coal wing of the Democratic Party in order to get energy and environmental policy passed.”

More to come when I can come up for air….and I hope to dig into the nuclear issue in a more thoughtful way within a week or so. I’m convinced that environmentalists need to think anew about nuclear, in light of new circumstances and the threat of climate change.

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Google: “You’ve got to take a stand.”

March 4, 2009

America doesn’t have a national energy plan, but Google does.

The question is, why?

“You’ve got to go out and take a stand,” says Eric Schmidt, Google’s CEO.

To investors who say the company is overreaching, and not focusing on shareholder value—its core business is not energy, after all–Schmidt says that “shareholder value in a company is created at the end of everything we do.”

By that, he means that if Google focuses on creates great products, solving big problems and serving its customers, shareholders ultimately will benefit. Besides, getting clean energy right requires a lot of information—and that is Google’s business—and, he argues, renewable energy will over time become cheaper that fossil fuels.

“Green energy, done right, is more profitable that the old kind of energy,” Schmidt says. Google’s a huge consumer of energy at its data centers. “Lower costs cause more earnings for shareholders.” He spoke at the Wall Street Journal’s Eco:nomics conference in Santa Barbara, CA.

Google released its Clean Energy 2030 plan last fall. It says the country can generate 30% of its electricity from renewable sources, mostly wind and solar, by 2030, and in so doing replacing all coal and oil electricity generation, and about half of that from natural gas. Google itself has venture capital investments in start-ups in solar power, wind and wave energy.

But won’t the financial meltdown put all those plans on hold? “Change occurs when people are scared,” Schmidt says. “This is the time to have this conversation, set out bold agendas and go for it.”

Google says its plan would make the following reductions from today’s energy and emission levels:

* Fossil fuel-based electricity generation by 88%
* Vehicle oil consumption by 44%
* Dependence on imported oil (currently 10 million barrels per day) by 37%
* Electricity-sector CO2 emissions by 95%
* Personal vehicle sector CO2 emissions by 44%
* US CO2 emissions overall by 49% (41% from today’s CO2 emission level)

Much, of course, has to happen between now and then. A vital component of any clean energy plan is the smart grid, another Google project. The federal government must make it easier to build big power lines. “It takes two years to get the lines built and eight years to get the permits,” Schmidt says. “I’m not making that up.” A smart grid also enables big gains in energy efficiency. “You want to have a computer that talks to your dryer, and finds the optimal time to turn it on,” he says. For more about that, check out a software tool called the Google PowerMeter.

Cheering on Schmidt at the event was Peter Darbee, the CEO of PG&E Corp., which is aiming to generate 33% of its electricity from renewables. (He didn’t say by when.)  “It takes the right incentives and stretch thinking,” Darbee said. “The utility industry has not been known for that, historically, and we need to change.”

Schmidt is an optimist, perhaps because he’s watched Google go from a startup to a company valued at $100 billion (even in this horrible stock market) in about a decade.

“America is a great country because of our ability to solve problems and build great businesses,” Schmidt said. “We can do clean energy and we can do it at scale.”

Let’s hope he’s right.

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The Bills are coming to Brainstorm

March 4, 2009

No, not the Buffalo Bills. The exciting news is that Bill Clinton and Bill Ford have agreed to speak at FORTUNE’s Brainstorm Green conference, about business and the environment, next month.

Former President Clinton will speak on Wednesday, April 22–Earth Day, Wednesday. Bill Ford, the executive chairman of Ford Motor, will be with us on the opening afternoon of the conference, Monday, April 20. We’ll be at the Ritz Carlton in Laguna Beach, CA. Here’s the current agenda—always subject to change.

I’m feeling good about this year’s programs after months of planning. We’ve got some smart CEOs who are in the thick of the upcoming debate in Washington about climate change, people like Mike Morris of American Electric Power, David Crane of NRG Energy (who was terrific last year), Jim Rogers of Duke Energy and Peter Darbee of PG&E (another returnee, and a very forward-thinking exec). We’ll also welcome Fisk Johnson, the CEO of SCJ Johnson, one of the most progressive CEOs in America when it comes to environmental issues, and the pioneering Jeffrey Hollender, founder and CEO of Seventh Generation (and a board member of Greenpeace). Michael Kowalski, the CEO of Tiffany & C0., will describe the company’s pathbreaking effort to try to make the mining industry more responsible—no easy task. CEOs John Brock of Coca Cola Enterprises and Carl Bass of Autodesk will also speak, along with senior execs from GE, IBM, Wal-Mart, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, P&G, and Coca-Cola. We’ll have CEOs oif solar, wind and biofuels companies, too.

On our opening night, I’ll lead a conversation with Paul Hawken, one of my favorite writers on business and the environment. He’s always provocative, and his talk is being called, “Green is the New Business as Usual—and that’s a problem.” From the NGO world, we’ll have Fred Krupp and Gwen Ruta of Environmental Defense, Mark Tercek of The Nature Conservancy, David Hawkins of NRDC, Van Jones of Green for All and many more.

If past Brainstorm events are any indication, though, Clinton will steal the show. He came to a couple of the original Brainstorm events in Aspen after leaving the White House, and he was mesmerizing. Should be fun.

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