Washington, D.C. – This week the Center for American Progress will launch American Clean-Energy Competitiveness Week, a series of events and other products highlighting America’s standing in the global clean-energy race and how we can take the lead.
The launch comes two days after news that China plans to have clean energy account for 15 percent of its total energy consumption under a 10-year renewable energy plan. China, Germany, Spain, and other countries are racing ahead in the innovation, production, and export of clean-energy technologies.
The United States, on the other hand, ranked 19th in a global country ranking of 2008 clean-energy technology product sales expressed as a proportion of respective gross domestic product. Germany came in third, Spain in fourth, and China in sixth. Worse, the United States comes in dead last out of 40 industrialized countries on how much it is preparing to make itself more innovative for the future.
CAP’s fast facts, events, blogs, and reports will focus on the policy prescriptions necessary to strengthen America’s competitiveness and accelerate the shift toward a clean-energy path.
Several of the upcoming events and products are featured below.
- Today the Center for American Progress released “Taking on the Toolbelt Recession,” which details how energy efficiency retrofits can expand investment in commercial and industrial energy efficiency and boost construction and construction-related employment.
- CAP will release “Out of the Running” on Thursday, March 4. The report examines how Germany, Spain, and China are seizing the energy opportunity and why the United States risks getting left behind.
- Also on Thursday, CAP and the Apollo Alliance will host a conference, “Picking a Winner: How to Make the U.S. a Leader in the Clean Energy Economy,” which will bring together policymakers, academics, business and labor leaders, and other experts to discuss what policies will help the United States become a consumer of clean-energy technologies and a leading producer of them. The conference will take place from 8:30 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. at CAP.
###