Correspondingly, governments must continue to play a role in developing and expanding the renewable industry. The development of this industry is a key environmental policy for the planet. Governments must continue to play a large role in opening the industry, continue to supply research and development capital, and look into developing long term capital to help the industry. Finally and most importantly, the information revolution is coming to the electric industry. The first network was the electric grid and it remains a very primitive beast.
Energy is moved around in thousands of megawatts and is steered by least resistance.
Information technology combined with distributed generation sources will create not only a new architecture but a new grid economics which will impact the cost of distribution and generation. Photo voltaic, small wind turbines, and fuel cells allow generation to be bought to the source of consumption. Just as importantly, excess generation from these distributed sources can be placed onto the grid, allowing every consumer to also become a seller of electricity. The rules to allow this are beginning to be implemented such as the net-metering laws which allow a person's meter to spin backwards when they are generating excess electricity. Secondly the information revolution will bring intelligence to our appliances.