Directing Energy

One comment that I received multiple times from American friends and family in response to my coming to Tbilisi to work on renewable energy and energy efficiency policy was “we need that here.” Which got me thinking– what am I really doing here in Georgia, and wouldn’t my time be better spent working in the U.S., a country whose forays into renewables are most often left at the state level? How often have I cursed the streetlamps in Morningside Park, that seem to be perpetually on? How many times have I considered the myriad ways–small and large– to make my own building and my school’s buildings more energy efficient (again, the lights, perpetually on…)? And when I show up in Georgia, a country that derives the majority of its own electricity generation from the more environmentally acceptable hydropower and that shows remarkable restraint on an individual level when it comes to using lights, heat, a/c, hot water, etc (cars are not included in that mix…), that question becomes even more pressing. (Check out these graphs for georgia and the us1 that show how each country generates its electricity. Blue is hydro, purple is coal. Hydro is roughly 50% efficient, coal about 33%. The picture below is of one of Georgia’s hydropower plants.)

Aside from personal reasons including adventure, the chance to practice Russian, and good Georgian wine, is there a reason for me to leave friends and family to work in a country that by certain measures seems to far ahead of the U.S. in the renewable energy and energy efficiency sector? Yes, there is.

Policy, as I have come to realize, is created only in small part by the government. Sure, they do the final negotiating, trimming, and all-important voting, but the lead-up is done by other parts of society– by business, civil society, media, and public opinion. And true, the interests of those groups don’t always converge, and happen at different times in the process (or not at all, for some), but having those voices participate is essential to creating valuable dialogue about whether there is a problem and if so, how to correct it. A quick google search out of my own curiosity to see what is happening in New York regarding the Urban Heat Island effect and increasing the number of light colored roofs to reflect heat back into the atmosphere revealed several NGOs working on green roof initiatives, including one headed by a high school acquaintance. Interested in bike lanes? Check out Transportation Alternatives. For almost any cause, there is a group working to promote it and, as public opinion shifts (media helps here), a business able to profit. Universities and think-tanks help build the foundation with research. Together, these groups form a formidable phalanx that brings about change.

This system is weak in Georgia. For many reasons, including economic and political turmoil resulting from the collapse of the Soviet Union, Georgia lacks the business power, media freedom, and civil society to generate meaningful change. True, it takes awhile for these institutions to develop, Georgia has fairly liberal laws regarding formation of civil society groups, and as a non-Georgian speaker I am confined to the fringes of what is happening. But my experience with civil society development in Turkey showed that even with lots of international funding, either a mental shift is needed to inculcate empowerment among young people, or a cause important enough needs to come along (such as the high degree of civic organization in Turkey’s Kurdish areas). Right now, it seems that a lot of the business financing and civic development is being done with international help–USAID, KfW, EBRD, World Bank, etc– which is a good start, but is not yet at the level of (seemingly) spontaneous creation and integration that the U.S. enjoys.

The one commonality between the two countries? The political impasse. I alternate between frustration with New York State’s shooting down of both New York City’s proposed congestion pricing and bus rapid transit and what seems to be a similar disinclination to change the status quo here in Georgia (I hope to be proved wrong!). In the meantime, I’ll keep working for my USAID sponsored NGO, making the case for renewable energy and energy efficiency in a country that does, in fact, need work on in these areas for political, economic, and environmental reasons. And if politics is a universal truth, lessons learned here can always be applied back home…

All photos, except for the one of the hydro plant, were taken on a weekend hiking trip in the Borjomi region.

~ by cedoggart on June 24, 2008.