Questions asked (and some of them answered):

1. 90% of VC dollars are invested in California and Massachusetts, yet university research and therefore, theoretically, innovation, is more evenly distributed geographically. How do more effectively find and fund innovation in the rest of the country?
2. You mentioned the important role of universities as the source of many innovations. What has been your experience with the nation's federal laboratories?
3. How can venture capitalists help with the issues you mentioned regarding education gaps, esp. K-12 and STEM?
4. Would you describe a day in the life of a venture capitalist?
    

Overflow and continuing discussions and questions:

1. (Starting with my own 100% naive question): Why can't high-voltage transmission lines be buried along gas pipelines? Wouldn't that be cheaper (even assuming payments to the pipeline and land owners), faster permitting, less public objection, etc.?

Overflow and continuing comments and questions

Overflow and continuing comments and questions:

Overflow and continuing comments and questions:

Overflow & continuing comments and questions:

Overflow comments and questions:

Overflow comments and questions:

Overflow questions and comments

Panelists:

• Karina Edmonds
• Richard Adams
• John Argo
• Brian Cummings
• Russ Hopper
• John Mott
• Joel Serface

Panelists:

• Nancy Tuor
• Robert Atkinson
• David Gold
• Alice Madden
• Kevin Smith

Panelists:

• Eric Drummond
• Loyd Drain
• Eric Lantz
• Bruce McCormick
• Michael Picker
• Jim Tarpey

Panelists:

• Geoffrey Morgan
• Elise Brown
• Michael Knotek
• David Mohrbacher
• P. Craig Taylor
• Bryan Wilson

Panelists:

• Jeff Anderson
• Doug Macdonald
• Tom Price
• Joseph Welch

Panelists:

• Eric Westoff
• Sunil Cherian
• Don Gillispie
• Bryan Hannegan
• Michael O'Halloran
• Michael Patterson
   

Post your questions and comments for these panelists:

• Wendolyn Holland
• J. Charles Barbour
• Nolan Browne
• Steve Buelow
• Dana Christensen
• Erik Stenehjem

Please post your questions and comments for the panelists here (register first):

• Marianne Kah
• Bob Cavnar
• Kurtis Haeger
• Tisha Conoly Schuller
• Marc Smith
• James Zadvorny

Here are the questions captured at the end of the session (more to come):

1. What is the best method known for on-site treatment of fracking production water?
2. Can you expand on Colorado's approach to surface water and cement casing (possible transcription error)? Some believe Colorado has the best environment solution.
3. It seems we are not very good at projecting future energy prices. What other "disruptive" resources or technologies could significantly affect natural gas prices between now and 2030?
4. Re the forecasted large increase in energy demand globally, what's the export potential for U.S. gas? What would be the impact and benefits of exporting gas?
5. Is the U.S. likely to become a net exporter of natural gas?
6. Power prices per source: how do they compare when the cost of CO2 emissions are added?
7. Would you comment on the percent growth if natural gas attempts to fill all the uses being advocated (electric generation, transportation, etc.)? Based on growth rate, how many years for this resource, including "peak gas."
8. Can you elaborate on lifecycle GHG emissions from fracking?
9. What are the environmental risks of fracking and what specifically is the industry doing to mitigate them?
10. When one claims that natural gas is the cleanest fossil fuel, are the extreme methane emissions released during hydraulic fracturing taken into account?
11. How much methane is lost to the atmosphere through the production and transportation to market?
12. Do you believe the benefits of natural gas outweigh the negative environmental impacts and human health issues that are a result of hydraulic fracking, such as extrextreme methane emissions from the extraction process and the contamination of ground water from fracking fluids?
13. Do you believe there are ways to improve the process of hydraulic fracking to completely eradicate or possible negative environmental impacts and human health issues?
14. You showed a water footprint chart and mentioned land, air pollutant and CO2 impacts. Does COP factor these environmental life cycle issues into their project economics?
15. Do you see the capex ($/KWE) of NGCC, wind turbines, nuclear and coal plants decreasing, increasing or staying flat in the US between 2011 and 2030?
16. How many KHWs of firm/dispatchable capacity has Xcel built to integrate the 16% of energy generated by wind?
17. What efforts are your organizations putting into supporting natural gas mobility?
18. Do you foresee a redefinition of "baseload" for the future of generation portfolios? Clean energy & emissions, wind, nuclear/coal future, other changes?
19. What is your assessment of the feasibility of employing gas to liquid technology to produce gasoline from natural gas?
20. A recent Time Magazine article was critical of the water contamination in eastern US. Have you read it and what is your perspective?
21.  
22.  

Please post your additional comments and questions here (register first). Dan Arvizu has promised that NREL will join Foorum and he and/or his staff will address all of these questions. Here are some that were submitted at lunch, but which he didn't have time to address:

1. China and India's economies in PP GDP capita terms are going to be 3 times that of the U.S. by 2030. Energy is the largest growth area. What are we (ed. assume writer means the U.S.) doing to have increased business in energy from emerging markets?
2. First Solar is a success story, but they left the country. What can NREL or any national lab do to influence policy (or other) to entice these industries to stay?
3. Can we survive on innovation alone without ramping up installation and manufacturing?
4. How are emerging waste-to-energy technologies playing a role in the larger renewables portfolio?
5. R&D speed to market: how is NREL part of the conversation/policy to see the development of jobs within the same generation that technology is developed?
6. What tangible role can local governments play in the development of renewable energies?
7. Dr. Arvizu said thin-film PV has lowered the cost 10-fold from silicon-based panels -- yet the total cost of PV remains high, because we still need people to climb up on every roof. What innovations are on the horizon or needed to produce an order-of-magnitude reduction in the cost of installation, so that the real-world cost of solar comes down?

Post your additional questions and comments here. Listed below are the questions submitted but not answered by the panelists in the time available.

• Sean Ebert
• Timothy Considine
• Rob Gardner
• C. Michael Ming
• Dave Neumann (substitute speaker Suzanne)

1. Can clean-coal  technological breakthroughs reduce the pace of renewable development?
2. Would the Tres Amigas project solve the problem of wind generation at times when it is not needed? Can wind generation be used in other regions of the country?
3. Over lunch it was suggested that biofuels from algae were 5-10 years away. But companies such as Algenol say they are ready to go to market with biodiesel from algae within a year.
4. Suzanne: What timeline do you estimate to solve the +/- 30% parasitic problem with carbon capture from the exhaust stream? (Forgive the garbled question. Would the writer please clarify?)
5. Suzanne: Regarding the advancement of clean coal technology, do you think the Obama administration research program is a sensible approach? Could it be improved?
6. Sean: You showed a cost curve for liquid fuels. Do you have a similar curve for gas including conventional, shale, unconventional, CBM, hydrates, biogas, etc.?

Post your questions and comments for the panelists here. (Both you and they must register first -- it's free.)

• Bart Taylor
• Bill Bellamy
• Jeffrey Fulgham
• George Kast
• Larry Patterson
• Andrew Wolfsberg

Post your questions for the Tribal Energy panelists here (need to register first). Panelists will answer (once they've registered.). From the program:

• Carolyn Stewart
• Todd Hooks
• Douglas Pierce
• Rob Thompson
• Bruce Valdez

Many people (including me) assume that the proposition is true. My position is based on the history of other communications infrastructure commitments: railroad, telegraph, telephone, interstate highway, and the Internet itself. But there's always resistance, and in our current era of constrained budgets and weak economy and perhaps especially in our rural and traditional state, resistance to the idea of universal broadband seems higher than usual. What benefits can you think of, and what new businesses can you imagine could be created if we had universal broadband?

The turn of this century saw China take over the World's manufacturing and they did so by dramatically ramping up their infrastructure, especially in the energy sector. 70% of the world’s new energy installs in the last 10 years were in China. Their energy consumption grew a mind blowing 2.5 times in 10 years (USA took 30 years during the growth period). In 2007 alone, China installed 107 GW of power, mostly coal based. In 2010, their energy consumption exceeded our country (USA) energy consumption.

Just when we thought the Chinese were going to choke in their own smog generated by excessive coal consumption that is more than double that of USA, they installed 16GW of wind power in 2010, beating USA numbers of 10GW installed in 2009 (USA wind installed reduced to 5GW in 2010) and they have at least 4 companies in the top 10 wind mill companies (they had none a bare 5 years ago). They supply more than 50% of solar, and the list goes on... 

Many Economists and global Experts project that China's PPP(Purchase Power Parity) GDP will cross USA GDP by 2012 and be 1.5 times by 2020...   Will the 21st Century see China as the Dominant Super Power? Is that a foregone conclusion? 

Will our kids become 2nd class global citizens? 

Is Third World America by Arianna Huffington an alarmist view?

Why Giants Fail by Jim Collins a fairytale? Yet, we have seen that happen with the Roman Empire, the British Empire.... 

On the other hand, everyone thought that Japan was going to take over the world in the late 80's... 

Perhaps General Yamamoto, the Japanese General said it best just after he engineered the devastating bombing of Pearl Harbor.... "I am afraid we have woken the slumbering giant...”

What will it take for USA to wake up again & retain the Global Leadership? 

How important is Energy Security, Energy Transition and Sustainable Growth to America's & our next generations' future? 

Can America thrive even as China becomes the largest economy in the world?

What about the rest of the BRIC? (Brazil, Russia, India, China). Are they a threat or an opportunity for economic growth and sustainable jobs for the masses in USA?

What does USA need to do? 

We'd like to hear from you. Whichever side you take, what is your logic and reasoning?

With the not unexpected report this weekend that rural areas of New Mexico lag behind the (few) cities, what could help them grow? (If you have really powerful ideas, you should attend the Rural Economic Development Forum in Gallup April 27-29!)

The usual way to strategize about growth, whether for a region or a company, is to look at resources, capabilities, trends and customer needs -- not necessarily in that order, of course-- as well as weaknesses. So rural areas, to generalize, have scenic beauty, wide open spaces, low populations, lower educational levels, poor or non-existent Internet infrastructure, and probably poor other infrastructure...

So we can imagine:

1. wind and solar -- if you have access to power lines." "
2. Tourism, if there are facilities.
3. Provision of infrastructure, especially with government funding. 

What else?

Just a short note to welcome all new members of the REDI Green Business Cluster on our Web Hub.  Please use this discussion forum to bring up questions, ideas, and suggestions for growing a healthy green business cluster in northern New Mexico.

Hi... We're glad to have you here.  As one of the founding partners in putting this platfomr together, we're hoping it can provide a way to cut through and across some of the silos and barriers we've seen among groups and sectors.  We're also still working out the balance between what we do here, through other channels, and on other sites.

That's why we need to hear from you. How would you like to use our space here -- and what can we and the FoorumNM team do to help?

Assignment #2 challenged you to think like an entrepreneur and identifying opportunities. Often significant change means significant disruption in the minds of most people, however, for entrepreneurs change is breeding ground opportunity! You are asking your best shot at identifying an opportunity that would leverage the coming high-speed Internet capacity – anything from a modest startup to a BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal) like a Facebook type of undertaking. In this discussion let's share our thoughts and ideas and provide fellow students with feedback.

Assignment #1 asked you to define "Entrepreneur," if you research only one definition the task would've been simple enough, however, the more definitions you looked up the more complex the task. As a self-employed individual the same or different than an entrepreneur? Can entrepreneurship take place within a corporate setting a similar is a social entrepreneur an oxymoron? In this discussion let's share our thoughts and what we've learned.

A center piece of the Obama Administration’s economic development strategy for rural America is the goal of 98% internet connectivity.  This will take significant investment, coordination and time to realize – but not for the Upper Rio Grande Region!  Thanks to a $60M USDA grant, not only has funding been secured but instead of a mix of inferior delivery solutions (DSL, Cable, Wireless) we will enjoy a Fiber Optics infrastructure providing 10-100x more speed in some cases.  What does this mean to our regional communities from an economic development standpoint? What opportunities if any will this provide our business community and entrepreneurs?  Was the Obama Administration correct in funding this investment?

What questions do you have for GNES panels?  

Here is a list of panel topics (descriptions and panelists can be found at http://gnes.rmtech.org/Agenda.php):

• Natural Gas
• International Panel
• Research Labs
• Integrated Systems
• Cooperative Policy Making
• Research Institutions
• Tribal Panel
• Water/Energy Nexus
• The Future of Fossil Fuels
• Transmission Regulation
• Energy Policy Leadership
• University and National Laboratory Technology Commercialization
• Transmission
• Impact of  Large Corporations Energy Markets and Policy
• VC's and the companies they've funded
• The Market for Smart Grid
• DOD Energy Leadership
• The IPO Market
• Smart Grid Projects
• Competing to Win
• IB/Project Finance Panel

Please state what panel your question is directed to.

Your input will help us determine particular topics of interest both for the Summit and for continued discussion afterwards.

(This is a reprint of Probir's original question.)

Probir Ghosh

As a Moderator for the International Energy Policy and Markets at the Global New Energy Summit, what would you like to see the panelists discuss?

Here are 10 topics, you can add your own views to the topic and/or add additional topics:

1. Where does USA stand in relation to other countries for energy leadership in innovation, manufacturing, installations?
   
2. How can US based entities increase exports to emerging energy markets such as China, India, Brazil, others?
   
3. Can breakthrough innovation alone provide us global leadership in energy? Do we need to recapture leadership in manufacturing?
   
4. China and India have plans to dramatically increase their Nuclear energy capacities. Is Nuclear still viable given the recent Japan experience?  Which are the top three energy initiatives for the future?
5. How viable is the 80% clean energy by 2030 goal set by the US President? What does it do for US?
   
6. Which countries will experience most of the net new energy infrastructure growth?
   
7. Has USA lost leadership for viable clean coal technologies, be it CBM or CCS?
   
8. Does it make sense for USA to export coal to countries like China and India, who are currently importing coal from Indonesia and Australia?
   
9. Is China Dominant Economy a foregone conclusion or is there hope for balanced growth economy where US still retains global leadership?
   
10. Arianna Huffington recently published a book titled "Third World America" Is that an alarmist view? What can we do to prevent our future generations from becoming second-class global citizens?

On March 30, the Obama Administration released the Blueprint for a Secure Energy Future, which President Obama outlined during a speech at Georgetown University.

The plan consists of three main areas:

• Develop and secure America's energy supplies
• Provide consumers with choices to reduce costs and save energy
• Innovate our way to a clean future

The document proposes the following (there are many more in the document):

• Incentives to spur rapid development of oil and gas leases on public lands
• Encourage fuel-switching from oil to natural gas
• Reducing oil use with bioenergy
• Building a new international framework for nuclear energy
• Accelerate the transition to clean energy technologies
• Encourage alternative fuels and mass transit in developing countries
• Oil imports will be reduced by 1/3 by 2025
• 1 million electric vehicles on American roads by 2025
• By 2035, the US will generate 80% of electricity from clean energy
• Investments in high-speed rail and infrastructure projects of economic significance
• Tax incentives for building energy efficiency
• Setting a new standard for clean energy while protecting consumers from rising energy  bills
• Investments in and deployment of smart grid
• Advancing new nuclear technologies
• Eliminating fossil fuel subsidies

The full document can be found here:  http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/blueprint_secure_energy_future.pdf

Questions for discussion:

• Do you believe his words are consistent with government actions?  If not, do you believe he will push for government alignment with these newly stated priorities?
• Is  this strategy feasible or is it not aggressive enough?
• If implemented successfully, in what ways do you see this transforming energy markets?

Other thoughts are welcome as well.

Thank you!