There was a really inspiring edition of Dateline on SBS last night dealing with recycled water, climate change and solar power. It is well worth a look. A podcast of the episode can be downloaded here.
The most interesting story was about the richest man in mainland China, Dr Zhengrong Shi, otherwise known as “the Sun King”. The Chinese-Australian scientist developed cutting edge photovoltaic (solar cell) technology while working on his doctorate at the University of NSW in Sydney and subsequent work with Pacific Solar.
After a lack of Australian industry foresight and support of the technology, he became frustrated and decided to take Suntech Power offshore. Dr Shi has now made a staggering 3 billion dollars in 6 years manufacturing solar electricity panels. He also has grand plans to give fossil fuel giants Shell and BP a run for their money in the future.
No doubt there are a lot of people in the solar power industry in Australia kicking themselves. As he said, if there had been more support, Suntech’s headquarters could have been in Sydney, not Shanghai.
I found this a spectacular example of Australia’s lack of vision for the renewable energy sector and our government’s current coal addiction.
If you do check it out, keep an eye out for the scene of the 3000 strong Suntech staff wolfing down dinner to a Mandarin dub of Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth !!
With the Chinese economy set to overtake the USA’s in the coming decade, there is no doubt solar technology will go a long way to reigning in the nation’s carbon pollution. Consequently, this will make a huge difference to us all.
By reducing global carbon emission, we have a better chance of keeping our planet habitable for future generations.