Five European delegates visited the Center for Advanced Materials at UH in an effort to discuss energy technologies, energy policy and energy utilization.
Invited by the State Department, the delegates visited CAM under its International Visitor Leadership Program, Climate Change and Clean Energy on Sept. 20.
“This is the fourth delegation sent to the Center for Advanced Materials by the State Department in the past three years: from Japan – Renewable Energies and Energy Security; Central and South America — University Technology Transfer; Iraq — New Technologies for the Future,” said Alex Ignatiev, director of CAM in an e-mail.
Some of the objectives of the visit were to expose participants to the players in U.S. energy policy formulation at all levels and to a range of views in the public, academic and private sectors, according to a CAM news release. Additionally, CAM wanted to demonstrate the effective actions taken against climate change by the private sector and U.S. federal, state and local government authorities.
UH professors Alex Ignatiev and Alex Freundlich were sent CAM personnel to attend the delegation alongside ministers and vice ministers from Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany and Poland.
Specifically, the ministers were: Spiridon G. Aleksandrov — head of Monitoring and Reporting Department and Ministry of Environment and Water from Sofia, Bulgaria; Pavel Gebauer — director of Energy Section and Ministry of Industry and Trade from Prague, Czech Republic; Elizabeth Caroline Florian Hagemann — special advisor of Ministry of Climate and Energy from Copenhagen, Denmark; Mario Tobias — secretary-general of the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies from Potsdam, Germany; and Wojciech Jacek Saryusz-Wolski — head of cabinet of Ministry of Environment from Warsaw, Poland.
The delegates said they were provided with excellent points of view on future energy development and understand that renewable and alternative energies are important, according to emails provided by Ignatiev. They also want to develop international collaborations on clean energy generation.
In addition, members of previous delegations held at UH have returned to CAM for discussions on international collaborations.
“The continual sending of delegations to CAM by the State Department is a strong indication of the high level of regard that CAM has garnered within the State Department program,” Ignatiev said.
“The consistent praise of the CAM presentations by not only the State Department, but more importantly by the delegates themselves, clearly indicates the quality and success of the visits.”
Cool. Wish I knew ahead of time. I would’ve love to have seen this.