“The Solution to Europe’s Energy Security Challenges”
The Multilaw European Conference, Marker Hotel, Dublin - 6 June 2014 Address by Dr. Eddie O’Connor, CEO Mainstream Renewable Power Mr. Chairman and Delegates to the Multilaw Conference, I am most honoured at being asked to address this afternoon’s opening session on “Key Issues That Are Shaping Our Future”. I have been given the task of looking at Europe’s energy security challenges and coming up with a solution. My approach to this issue is that of a businessman who has spent all his working life in the electricity sector and who for the past two decades has been an entrepreneur in the renewable energy field, encompassing on-shore and offshore wind, as well as Solar PV. I first set up Airtricity as a wind energy company in 1997 and then six years ago founded Mainstream Renewable Power, which is now the world’s largest private developer of renewables with a pipeline of over 8000 MW in North and South America, South Africa, the Middle East and Europe. That’s the perspective from which I address Europe’s energy security challenge. Security Threat The solution to Europe’s energy challenge is actually quite simple. Go green! Replace fossil fuels with renewable energy. Europe’s energy problem can be simply expressed. We import:
- 88% of our crude oil
- 66% of our natural gas, and
- 42% of out solid fuels.