Cleantech Friday by Steve Guengerich
If you are like me, whenever you’ve heard the word “China,”
your eyes have slightly glazed over in the past. “Yeah, yeah” your brain says
“I know there’s nearly 1.5 billion people living there and I ought to be
thinking about how to get my products (or services) in-country.” But then, the
next second, your brain says “but I’m still trying to figure out how to get in
front of the division VP of that Fortune 500 company headquartered in Dallas”
quickly followed by “and besides, even though I went to that ‘XYZ’ event last
year all about China, I don’t really have a clue where to begin.”
Well, I can help you with that last one. Write this name
down: Peggy Liu. Peggy Liu is the Chairperson of JUCCCE (Joint US-China
Cooperation on Clean Energy),
a non-profit, non-governmental organization (or NGO) launched in July this year
and dedicated to making a near-term significant impact on our energy crisis.
While JUCCCE’s main focus is China, what happens in China in
the next 10 critical years will affect everyone directly. About 2 billion
square meters of floor space are built each year in China. Every week, China
opens another coal-fired power plant large enough to supply all the households
in Dallas or San Diego. Smog and toxic emissions are not a localized problem;
they show up around the world.
Peggy was in town this week, meeting with various state and
local officials about JUCCCE, as well as selected parties from the cleantech
eco-system here, like Laura Kilcrease
of Triton, Kevin Klein of Freescale (who was one of the featured speakers at
this week’s CleanTX forum,
and Dennis Corkran of Corkran Energy.
Peggy was most recently COO at Mustang Ventures, an early stage venture fund in
Shanghai, China. Prior to Mustang, she was an Internet executive in Silicon
Valley, with companies like Symantec and NetManage. She is Chinese-American and
currently resides in Shanghai. She has a B.S. from MIT in Electrical Engineering
and Computer Science.
In fact, it was at an MIT-sponsored event in April of 2007,
where she and Austin’s Steve Papermaster, co-chair of President Bush’s
President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology or PCAST,
talked about ways to address the challenges in China, in partnership with both
the Chinese and U.S. governments, but not necessarily from inside them. JUCCCE
was born…and, five months later, is growing up fast!
Next week, Peggy and colleagues will be at the Clinton Global
Initiative annual meeting where they will be announcing the commitment to one of JUCCCE’s
first 10 stated programs: Swapping incandescents with 30 million compact
fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs) across cities in China for immediate energy
savings and a high educational impact. Figures are that 19% of all electricity is
used on lighting and while 79% is still incandescent, it only generates 8% of
light output. One million CFLs would eliminate the need for a 50MW coal-fired
power plant. (In other words, a $1.5 million investment in CFLs saves tens of
millions of dollars in avoided cost in another power plant.)
Rounding out JUCCCE’s other initial “Top 10” programs
include:
- Creating an energy documentary for China to mobilize
consumer awareness.
- Creating a series of public service announcements for
television/LCD/web, featuring top celebrities and directors.
- Enabling a series of five Green Building Excellence
Centers in different climate zones in China to spur local energy efficient
improvements.
- Creating a bilingual online map of who’s who in the
energy industry.
- Creating an influential online press information
resource with headlines, glossaries, interviewees.
- Creating an online marketplace for energy efficient
products for the China market (great opportunity to showcase US products).
- Enabling a mixed-use, new green community development
in China.
- Creating a database of best practices for energy
efficiency.
- Proliferating alternative fuel buses that have no
particulate matter and low GHG emissions.
Now, here’s where you come in, dear reader. Peggy wasn’t in
Austin just for the great bar-b-q or to check out one of new lofts going up
downtown. She is raising awareness, volunteers, and money for JUCCCE. If any
of those programs look interesting to you, then you’ve got a friend in Peggy.
And, you’ve got your starting point, in terms of where to begin in China for
your cleantech products or services. A few Austin companies, like Kevin’s,
already have several thousand people in China and are becoming more entrenched
every day.
But for those that don’t, remember Peggy’s name and make note
of this e-mail: PeggyLiu [the “at” sign] juccce [the dot] com. It could be
your best starting point to a China cleantech market entry
strategy.
