Renewable Cities Conversations — 100% Renewable Energy, How Cities Can & Are Leading, &… Just Follow The Money

I’ve been meaning for months to get back to covering all of the one-on-one conversations between cleantech experts that the Renewable Cities team organized during the Renewable Cities Global Learning Forum. Thanks to Christmas weekend, I can finally get to these! Below are six more of these conversations, followed at the end by my conversation with Stefan Schurig (which I shared months ago but you very possibly might have missed). Enjoy these conversations, and share with friends!

In this first video, José Etcheverry of York University and Manual Valdés, Deputy Manager of the City of Barcelona, discuss 100% renewables — particularly, how cities like Barcelona are leading the way to 100% renewable electricity. They also discusses unexpected renewable energy leaders like Uruguay, and the potential and opportunities in the developing world to leapfrog fossil fuels.

“We’re at the cusp of a revolution.” Indeed. CleanTechnica thinks so.

Claire Havens of Renewable Cities and Anna Leidreiter of the World Future Council further the discussion of how local, provincial, and national governments can advance renewable energy. They also focused on the very practical, action-oriented approach of the Renewable Cities Global Learning Forum, something I thoroughly enjoyed and aim to take forward in our own CleanTechnica-organized events.

Leshan Moodliar, and electrical engineer in Durban, and Danielle Murray of Austin Energy (a municipal utility) get deeper into the details — discussing the low and competitive cost of renewables today, the value of solar, grid defection, and electricity pricing, among other things.

Copenhagen, Denmark, and Vancouver, Canada, are without a doubt two of the leading cities pushing clean electricity and clean transportation forward, so the following discussion between Brian Hansen, Head of Citywide Strategies at the City of Copenhagen, and Sadhu Johnston, Deputy City Manager of the City of Vancouver, was one of the most interesting one-on-one discussions I’ve seen regarding such topics. Luckily, they were chatting right after Stefan Schurig of the World Future Council and I had our chat, so I was sitting on the couch behind the cameras listening and watching. It was great hearing Brian and Sadhu talk about how they are increasing energy efficiency in buildings, renewable energy production, and various clean transportation solutions — and what they each thought of the other’s city. Most interesting to me was hearing Brian talk about his experience bicycling around Vancouver, which he said (but is not included in this video) reminded him of a European city. Watch the conversation here:

Krista Milne of the City of Melbourne and Mark Brostrom, Director of the City of Edmonton, similarly discuss specific policies and programs they’ve been using to advance renewable energy in their cities, as well as hurdles and potential solutions they’ve been considering. It was interesting to see these two get into the nitty gritty a little bit, and how different that discussion was from the one above.

The line by Bob Dixson, Mayor of Greensburg, Kansas, to kick off the following video between Dixson and David Chernushenko, Ottawa City Councillor, is one of my favorite — “If you follow the money now, renewables work. ” I need to remember to use this one! Dixson and Chernushenko have an interesting sociological conversation regarding how to get people to adopt renewable energy. There are a lot of useful insights in this conversation. Have a watch:

Here’s my chat with Stefan Schurig again:

Hope you enjoyed these. Share widely!

CleanTechnica was a Renewable Cities Global Learning Forum media partner.