All this money spent will need to count for something.  Commentators often refer to Germany and Spain as examples of countries that managed to build new industries and create jobs via proactive government policy on renewable energy.  Indeed, according to the German wind energy association, German manufacturers of turbines and components have a 37% share of the world market, earning about six billion Euros in 2007 in exports, and employing more than 100,000 people.   But drawing a parallel with Belgium is difficult because we do not have a large home market.  Germany already has about 22,000 MW installed wind power capacity—that is about five times as much as Belgium will probably ever build.   However, it is possible to draw a parallel with the Danes.  Denmark isn’t a particularly big market but Danish companies are world leaders in the field of renewable energy because the Danes are pioneers.  They pioneered offshore wind energy and continue to innovate in biomass, geothermal energy, energy efficiency measures and much more.  Innovation is the key to making all that money count.  In that sense Belgium can build on several strengths.

 

It is important to note that innovation is a complex process—it is not limited to what goes on in labs, universities and research institutes.  Crucially, it is also about setting up real-world projects, both pilot projects and commercial projects that are pioneering in some way or other.  Thus, in wind energy Belgian companies have strong positions internationally in turbine components and in services (construction, dredging).  Already, initiatives are being put in place to build on these strengths via R&D programmes focused on the offshore concessions.Given the distance out at sea and depth of the water, this is pioneering work.   In solar energy, IMEC is the role model. Its success in micro-electronics more generally is due not only to its lab research but also to its large pilot manufacturing infrastructure. This also holds true for its activities in photovoltaics. IMEC is increasing its investment in photovoltaics and aims to create more spin-off companies that will seek their markets abroad. In biofuels and biomass, similarly there is much progress with the BIO-BASE pilot installation being built at the Port of Ghent. It will bridge the innovation chain from lab to large-scale manufacturing. In Smartgrids, there is expertise (for example at the University of Leuven) at the level of the lab, but the country is slow off the mark in actually building such networks. Although there is now some clarity on the planned investments for the coming years, other countries, including the US, will probably pioneer this path. This is a pity, because the real opportunity in this area is not so much the grid itself but the various applications and systems that need to be developed to run on the network (think of advanced energy management systems for homes and office buildings).  

 

This country’s buildings may not be energy efficient, but there is tremendous expertise we can build on: insulation materials (e.g. Recticel, Soudal), glass and window frames (e.g. Deceuninck, Reynaers Aluminium), ventilation (e.g. Renson), roofing (e.g. Derbigum), lighting (e.g. ETAP Lighting, Niko, Schréder Group) and much more.  However, given the challenge ahead—i.e. if we want to meet our climate policy goals for 2020 and certainly ahead to 2030 and 2050 then we will need to renovate the bulk of our housing stock—it is striking that not more is done to stimulate sector-wide R&D and pilot projects in this area. 

 

In transport too there is much expertise to build on. Umicore, for example, supplies one of every three car catalytic converters in the world and is developing advanced catalytic converters for trucks. And bus maker Van Hool developed the first zero-emission bus, based on a hybrid fuel cell drive system. Fuel cell technology itself is being developed in this country at SolviCore, a joint venture between Umicore and Solvay. Adoption of this type of technology could do much to clean up the air in our cities. We also, however, are missing some opportunities. This country is densely populated and has an exceptionally dense transport network (in other words, travel distances are short). As such, there is opportunity in developing the transport network and infrastructure of the future—for example, plug-in networks for electric cars, multi-modal logistical hubs, advanced pipeline systems, etc. To date, there are plenty of ideas in these areas and some projects, but surely we could be doing more.

 

In food too we appear to be missing opportunities, given our fascination with the stuff.  While the market for our national product beer is static at best, strong growth is seen mainly in the health segment. Clearly there is room for more companies along the lines of Alpro.The good news is that the sector’s innovation platforms (Flanders Food and Wagralim) are focused almost exclusively on health and sustainability themes. Also, the achievements of Univeg are noteworthy—here is a company that is to a large degree a logistics business, getting fresh produce (real ‘food’ as Michael Pollan would have it) to retailers across the world.  In agriculture, the Flemish green biotech cluster enjoys international repute.  his is an area where significant risk capital has been invested in, with good result. Key obstacles to the further expansion of the sector, however, are the regulatory limits on field tests with genetically modified crops. The debacle around the Flemish Institute of Biotechnology’s poplar field test is illustrative in this regard.     

 

The field of materials—both materials science (developing new sustainable materials types) and materials management (cradle-to-cradle recycling models)—is a strong opportunity for this country.  There is tremendous expertise in materials (e.g. Leuven Materials Research Centre, Umicore) and Plan-C is an exciting initiative that should lead to pilot projects in new materials management systems.  

 

Finally, there are a significant number of Belgian companies active internationally in the fields of water treatment, soil remediation and industrial air purification.  Waterleau and Global Water Engineering, for example, are key players in the treatment of industrial waste water.  Keppel Seghers Belgium builds and operates water treatment plants.  AppliTek exports its online water analysis stations around the world.  In soil remediation, Deep Green’s technology allows for the treatment of polluted soil without it having to be dug up.  The two dredgers, Jan De Nul and DEME, are also moving into soil remediation with their subsidiaries DEC (DEME) and Envisan (Jan De Nul).  In industrial air purification, The Sniffers is a key player internationally in emissions measurement and Hamon and Desotec develop and manufacture various types of filters and scrubbers that remove polluting substances.  

 

The breadth of ‘cleantech’ expertise that exists in this country is impressive.  In part it can be ascribed to our strong industrial heritage while simultaneously being subject to stringent EU environmental regulation.  However, there is more to it than that. Some industrial companies—e.g. Umicore, Solvay, Van Hool—have made rather fundamental strategic decisions to begin investing in clean technology.  It is companies such as these that are putting the Belgian cleantech sector on the map internationally.  Also, the Federation of Enterprises in Belgium (FED) is actively promoting Belgian eco-business abroad, and the regional governments have stepped up their ‘green’ commitments by allocating more funds for innovation and subsidies.   But more can be done—and will need to be done.  The job of cleaning this country up is far from complete.  In fact, one could argue that we are back in the starting blocks.  The age of eco-efficiency is winding down and the age of eco-effectiveness is about to begin, requiring a more radical transformation of this economy.   This is an opportunity to boost innovation in cleantech.  This country does not have the scale to single-handedly nurture world-class companies to full maturity but it does have the unique make-up to ‘incubate’ such world-class companies. In other words, we need to experiment more with new technologies, here at home.  It is pity that some companies mentioned here do practically no business at all in this country, when in fact this country should be the ideal place to pilot new technologies.