ABSTRACT
Why do you think the African countries deliver electricity at a favorable price and not for more? Dr. Czisch replied that in his opinion they are providing well-priced electricity not only as a means for Europeans to obtain cheaper electricity but it also benefits their own country, for instance their unemployment rates are lowered. Therefore, it is not just well-priced electricity for Europeans but advantageous to the African countries as well. If wind energy technology is installed in huge amounts in their countries, producers will sooner or later leave the expensive European markets or production sites, and install their production facilities in Third World countries as well, which happened for instance in China and India, which are now two of the biggest players in the wind energy sector. This will happen as soon as there is a perspective, which is above approximately one or two gigawatts. Then, immediately, production in these countries will start. According to Dr. Czisch, this can be seen as a new possibility for a totally different developing perspective involving renewable energies. And, therefore, both sides will benefit. Furthermore, Dr. Czisch added that the above mentioned is
not a universal process: it does not apply to the oil system, for instance. Their installation is very cheap and the oil market is quite a monopoly. There are only a few suppliers and the number of suppliers is dropping further as time goes by. For Dr. Czisch, it is imaginable that in 20 years’ time, gas will only be supplied by Russia and two other countries. Thus the using countries will strongly dependent on just a few supplier countries, which in turn could force them to pay any price. In the renewable energy market this is different: huge numbers of sites where energy can be produced are available and, therefore, diversification is possible to avoid dependency.
