Tom Kiernan, CEO of the American Wind Energy Association, and Rhone Resch, president and CEO of the Solar Energy Industries Association, joined together to speak at Automation & Power World 2015.
ABB Automation & Power World 2015 (APW) is ABB’s bi-annual customer conference and exhibition, being held this week at the George R. Brown Convention Center in downtown Houston. Currently, more than 7,200 people have registered for APW to this point.
In their 90-minute session on Tuesday morning, March 3, Kiernan and Resch shared firsthand insights on the renewable energy market in the United States and what trends and innovations to look for in the ever-changing energy landscape. They will also highlight the fact that solar and wind combined make up nearly 60 percent of our new energy developed in the United States in 2014.
Resch and Kiernan also addressed questions around the new Clean Power Plan, the future of Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) and the PTC and ITC tax credit incentives, the reliability of renewable energy, the role of energy storage, the vision for renewables integration over the next several years and the need to build out more transmission lines.
Kiernan, who has served as AWEA CEO since May, 2013, and Resch, who has been president and CEO of SEIA since 2004, were joined onstage by Dennis McKinley, ABB’s Director of Wind Power, North America, and Bob Stojanovic, ABB Director of Solar Power, North America.
“Solar and wind have made major inroads into the American energy conversation over the past decade, and there’s no doubt that renewables will play an even larger, more significant role in tomorrow’s energy landscape,” said McKinley. “We are thrilled to welcome Tom and Rhone to ABB’s Automation & Power World event as they talk openly about what their organizations, AWEA and SEIA, are doing to ‘harness the power of change’ in bringing clean energy to the grid and strengthening America’s energy independence.”
