By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | Denmark may offer a peek into the future of energy in South Carolina.
The country of 5.6 million on the North Sea is similar to the Palmetto State. Both have about the same number of people. Both are a mix of urban and rural. And both are on the coast with lots of low-lying areas.
But Denmark has been working hard for more than 20 years to make smart investments to save energy, while South Carolina has only just started to embrace renewable energy with a solar farm in Colleton County and others announced in Hampton and Calhoun counties. Studies show there’s a bunch of wind energy offshore, but the state is moving at a slow pace to put test turbines in the ocean to test the viability of the kinds of units being used across the world.
Fortunately, the stars are aligned well for South Carolina to benefit from renewable wind energy — if it makes the most of its advantages, which include having the nation’s only major domestic wind turbine facility at GE in Greenville, infrastructure that is already in place to distribute wind energy and more.
“We’re uniquely positioned for this,” said Elizabeth Colbert Busch, director of business development at the Clemson University Restoration Institute in North Charleston, which is home to the world’s largest wind turbine drive train test facility. “We have the fuel, the infrastructure and the grid. Our transmission lines are so robust that we don’t have to change them.”
State Sen. Paul Campbell, who led a state task force on wind energy, added, “Between Winyah Bay in Georgetown County and Cherry Grove in North Carolina, we have enough wind to give us a sizable production of wind energy — and we should do that.”
Campbell said he envisions a 1,000 megawatt wind farm several miles off the northeast coast of South Carolina. More than likely, wind turbines wouldn’t be visible to beachgoers, but if they were, they’d look like toothpicks, he said. An added benefit: There would be a great artificial reef created for recreational fishing around the wind farm, he said.
“(Off) Myrtle Beach is a great place to put these things,” he said. “Think of all of the power we could bring into Myrtle Beach and we could use it right there. It’s just an ideal location.”
The Danish model
Soren Hermansen is a green energy evangelist from the Danish island of Samso. Several years back, the home to about 4,000 people lost its major industry, a meatpacking plant. The local economy went into a nosedive. Then in 1997, the island applied for — and won — a national competition to transform itself into a green economy, independent of foreign fuels. Today using a combination of renewable energy from wind and biomass, 100 percent of its electricity and heat for homes and businesses comes from renewable sources.
“The moral of the story is they have lost a big part of their economy and they found a way to recover, but it took buy-in from everybody — and it worked,” Colbert Busch said.
Hermansen, who visited with Clemson last week to talk about green energy and its potential, outlined how the Samso experiment showed that local municipalities — without state subsidies — could use local resources in creative ways to create pervasive green energy. Among the keys: a lot of cooperation, long-term energy planning, goals and targets, use of technology, and investment by the private sector to help fuel robust change.
“You do your planning in the long run to utilize all of the resources embedded in the system,” he said. Waste, for example, is looked at as an asset, not a liability. For example, water used for cooling at plants that turn biomass into energy by burning it is used to heat homes and businesses through a network of pipes in Samso’s small communities.
Having a master plan is key, says Hermansen’s colleague, Mette Lassensen of the Ramboll Group, an international Danish engineering and consulting firm.
“It enables you to be smarter about your choices,” she said.
According to a 2015 study by the Danish Energy Agency, Denmark’s economy has grown 78 percent in the last three decades, while power consumption has been almost stable:
“The Danish Energy Model has shown that through persistent and active energy policy with ambitious renewable energy goals, enhanced energy efficiency and support for technical innovation and industrial development, it is possible to sustain significant economic growth and a high standard of living, while reducing fossil fuel dependency and mitigating climate change.
“In a nutshell: energy savings, optimized manufacturing and investments in green energy technology are good value for money.”
Next steps
In South Carolina, policymakers in the General Assembly have two bills to consider that would provide economic incentives to businesses that seek to grow the wind industry.
“I want to see 1,000 Megawatts of wind energy off South Carolina’s coast,” Campbell said.
If South Carolina wants to grow its wind energy economy, it could pay off in a big way with up to 20,000 jobs, Colbert Busch said.
Former Columbia Mayor Bob Coble, who met with the Danes last week, said South Carolina could benefit and learn from Denmark’s model.
“Denmark has been very aggressive and innovative in using green energy,” he said. “They have made commitments to reduce their carbon footprint with wind energy. I think with the Clemson University Restoration Institute, South Carolina has a tremendous opportunity to take advantage of wind energy.”
Andy Brack is editor and publisher of Statehouse Report. Have a comment? Send to: feedback@statehousereport.com.
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