Face value ∣ Power politics

摘要

He may be the chairman of a solar-power start-up based in rainy south Wales, but Bob Hertzberg has not lost the sunny mien of a seasoned American politician. A former speaker of California's state assembly and one-time candidate for mayor of Los Angeles, he is quick to guffaw, readily slaps backs and often speaks in asides, as if to an imaginary host of reporters: "I love this guy" is a frequent refrain. American state politics do not sound very pertinent to G24 Innovations, Mr Hertzberg's firm, which makes solar-powered battery-chargers for mobile phones, portable music-players and the like. But Mr Hertzberg's experience in politics, as well as his stints as an entrepreneur and financial lawyer, turn out to be rather useful for running a renewable-energy firm. Even more than other industries, he argues, renewable energy subsists at the whim of politicians.rnMr Hertzberg's time as speaker, from 2000 to 2002, was marked by chaos in California's partly deregulated electricity market, which suffered from spiking wholesale prices and repeated blackouts. Encouraging small, distributed forms of generation such as solar power seemed a natural response, because it would allow quick increases in generating capacity without adding much to the pressure on the rickety grid. But the system, Mr Hertzberg says, was hopelessly skewed in favour of the big utilities and the centralised form of generation they champion.