Energy: A sector study of the EMCP
U.S. and global energy systems are undergoing unprecedented changes and experiencing intense new pressures. The U.S. Energy Information Administration projects world energy consumption will grow by 48% between 2012 and 2040 , challenging existing supplies and strategic reserves of conventional fuels, as well as straining America’s aging energy generation, transmission and distribution infrastructure. Concerns about increasing demand, the climate impacts of fossil fuel emissions and rising long-term global oil prices support expanded use of renewable energy sources and nuclear power.
While energy is an economy-wide competitiveness linchpin, it is in its own right a formidable, diverse and transforming industry. With one of the most complex supply portfolios, the U.S. energy sector is an enormous driver of research, innovation and manufacturing across a broad range of technologies and applications.
For the last decade, the Council has been studying and bringing together experts across the energy sector to explore the challenges and opportunities related to the changing energy landscape. The 2008 Energy Security, Innovation and Sustainability Initiative (ESIS) presented a blueprint for America’s energy agenda to the private sector and to President Obama ahead of the 2008 presidential election. More recently, the Council’s long-term collaboration with the Department of Energy, including the Accelerating Energy Productivity 2030 Partnership and the multi-year American Energy and Manufacturing Competitiveness (AEMC) Partnership, has contributed to a tectonic shift in how the United States consumes energy and how our public and private sector leaders conceive of energy as an input to manufacturing and the competitiveness equation.
In response to continuing challenges around evolving consumer behavior and expectations and a changing regulatory landscape, the U.S. needs a more dynamic and resilient energy system in which emerging technologies lead to new business models, energy products and services. Efforts by both the public and private sectors to increase the development and deployment of clean energy technologies and alternative and renewable energy sources are accelerating at a record pace. An all-of-the-above strategy will be key to ensuring a reliable, affordable and sustainable energy portfolio to drive the U.S. economy—especially its manufacturing sector.
The public and private sectors must come together, with the nation’s academic, research, and investment communities, to overcome impediments to innovation and commercialization. And—critically—policymakers must build strategies to ensure that investments in innovation and R&D are captured and commercialized here in the United States.
On May 31, 2017 experts gathered in Chicago for a dialogue hosted by Exelon in partnership with Penn State University and Argonne National Laboratory to discuss the the challenges and opportunities related to the changing energy landscape and its impact on U.S. manufacturing. See the agenda for more details.
Key questions addressed at the dialogue included:
- What role are energy abundance and innovation playing in increasing the productivity and competitiveness of American manufacturing?
- How is demand for new energy technologies and sources (natural gas, biofuels, batteries/ storage, renewables, and efficiency technologies) impacting innovation, manufacturability and business outlooks for domestic technology manufacturing?
- How are sectors across the economy leveraging new energy resources, technologies and processes to increase margins and expand operations?
- What regulations and policy interventions could enhance innovation and accelerate the development and deployment of energy technologies and greater industrial energy productivity?
- What skills will define the 21st-century energy and manufacturing economy? How is the private sector communicating needs to educators and students?
- How are the tectonic shifts occurring across today’s energy landscape—as the U.S. moves from “energy weak” to “energy strong”—changing the decision-making processes and competitiveness propositions for domestic and foreign manufacturers?
- How is America’s energy abundance reflected in the competitiveness of sectors downstream from energy-intensive sectors of the economy?
- What investments in infrastructure are necessary to fully exploit the opportunity of America’s growing energy strength and innovation ecosystem?
- In efforts to optimize the nation’s full energy potential, how can policymakers and the nation’s business, research and labor communities come together to resolve conflicts hindering the build-out the nation’s energy infrastructure?
