In California it’s San Francisco. In New England, it’s Boston.
Now, 2012 is proving that Georgia is rising as the cleantech epicenter of the South. This year we witnessed IKEA flip the switch on two large- scale solar installations and Quality Technology Services announce a more than $1 million investment in solar for their Atlanta and Richmond data centers.
Meanwhile, Georgia Solar Utilities emerged to propose building 90MWs of solar in Georgia, and selling it to Georgia Power, which itself has a 50 MW solar initiative.
Lehigh Technologies based in Tucker recently raised $5 million in investments for their method of recycling post-industrial rubber into new materials. GenAgain Technologies set up shop in Lithia Springs to convert mixed waste plastics into synthetic crude oil.
Savannah Technical College started offering new sustainable technology programs this year, a first of their kind in Georgia.
Another first in Georgia is the Savannah International Clean Energy Conference (Nov 11-13). It will play host to a prominent line-up of over 50 global cleantech speakers and an estimated 300 international clean economy executives.
The Georgian clean economy 2012 accomplishments are just the tip of the iceberg. Even during the worst parts of the Great Recession, clean economy jobs grew at a rate of 3.7 percent. Today they total over 83,000 jobs, more than 2 percent of Georgia’s total workforce. However, if Georgia is to lead the Southeast in green jobs, more must be done to ensure that companies and jobs flourish and stay in Georgia.
Supporting the clean economy starts at the early-stage, and the “godfather of Atlanta angel investing,” Sig Moseley, co-founded CTW Venture Partners this year to fill what he and his partners see as a critical shortage in the Southeast of seed and early-stage capital. Standing for “Change The World” clean-tech is one of the firm’s investment focuses.
With or without seed funding, companies still need business support and Georgia Tech has been doing an excellent job incubating and commercializing new innovations coming out of its programs. Additionally, the Global Cleantech Cluster Association is fostering early and later stage companies locally and around the world.
However, to truly rival Boston or San Francisco for cleantech status, the state must get serious about the four critical policies.
Currently, Georgia offers one them, financial incentives. The state should also encourage clean economic development by assessing policy options such as a renewable portfolio standard, energy efficiency resource standards, and options to allow for power purchase agreements.
Of our 50 states, 30 have mandated renewable energy standards and 7 offer voluntary goals. In the Southeast, North Carolina mandates a clean energy goal.
Georgia is on it’s way to solidifying it’s strong hold in the Southeast as a cleantech leader. But it can only capture that title through diligent public policy and building momentum by sharing its success stories.
At the Savannah Clean Energy Conference, Gov. Nathan Deal and others have a pivotal opportunity to impress on the international audience the strength of Georgia’s clean economy and its reliable potential for successful cleantech profitability in the 21st century.