Fighting windmills? EU industrial interests and global climate negotiations



meant that the first oil crisis in 1973, where the oil price increased four-fold,
had a severe impact on the economies of EU member states thus forcing them
to develop new and more energy efficient technologies, see Darmstadter et al.,
1971 concerning the EU oil dependency. Second, the level of taxation, includ-
ing energy taxation, has generally been higher in the EU than in the United
States (OECD, 2002). Therefore, energy savings give a better return in the EU
due to a higher level of tax savings. Third, the geographical travelling distances
between home and work, etc., are generally higher in the United States than in
the EU. Therefore, Americans are more dependent on cars and cannot tax them
as highly as the Europeans can for political reasons. The petrol price of one litre
in the EU typically matches the price of a gallon (3.8 litres) in the United
States. It is a common everyday observation in the United States that politicians
do not dare to increase the petrol prices because their voters will be aggres-
sively aware of any such step. For these reasons, we find most ”green indus-
tries” in EU member states. For example, German car producers have devel-
oped the so-called ”3-Litre-cars” enabling a car to run 100 km on three litres of
diesel (Svendsen, 2003). Furthermore, numerous energy-efficiency and recy-
cling technologies are prevalent in the EU. Another example is the wind turbine
industry which we now turn to.

4. Wind Energy Market

The wind power share of world electricity generation was 0.08 per cent in 1996.
In the year 2000 it had tripled to 0.25 per cent and in 2010 the share is projected
to be 1.78 per cent, which is more than seven times higher than the 2000 level
(BTM Consult, 2001, p. 37). Economically attractive subsidy schemes listed in
Svendsen (2003) have promoted earlier shifts to wind energy and have fostered
rapid market growth. Table 1 shows that total installed mega watts (MW) have
almost been doubled in size from 1998 to 2000. Of course, the wind does not
always blow. In Denmark, for example, wind turbines produce electricity about
75 per cent of a year and only occasionally at the maximum level. Furthermore,

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