Minnesota's Green Technologies
By Alessia Leibert
December 2011
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Green technologies have the potential to contribute to job growth in Minnesota, according to the findings of a two-year study by DEED’s Labor Market Information Office.
As part of a two-year DEED study on green jobs in Minnesota, employers were asked to identify technologies and other advancements that could affect the types of jobs offered by their firms and ultimately unlock the value of emerging green markets.
The study found that several Minnesota firms already possess green technological strengths. Some of those technologies are “clean,” defined as leading to operational improvements that reduce costs, energy consumption, waste, or pollution. Others are defined as “green-enabling” because they are capable of increasing performance of green products.1] Here are some examples.
Biochemistry
Biochemistry research has helped develop two families of green products: biopolymers and green chemistry products. While Minnesota currently has limited manufacturing activity in these areas, increasing international demand might encourage growth.
Biopolymers are entirely new chemicals derived from biomass sources (corn or other agricultural and wood residues) that could revolutionize chemistry and open up new markets for plastic components, such as automobile parts, electronics, kitchen utensils, containers, and packaging. The biggest challenge will be developing competitively priced bio-based plastics that perform as well as those that are petroleum-based, and to expand from single-use (compostable plastic bags, for example) to durable-use applications. Minnesota has a strong plastics industry that could integrate biopolymers.
Products in the green chemistry arena, such as nontoxic personal care and household cleaning items, have market appeal because they have the potential to reduce environmental and health hazards. Getting these items to market, however, often requires complex eco-toxicological and regulatory reviews.
Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology
Other developments are occurring in the field of materials science. A few examples are coatings, nano-materials for solar photovoltaic panels, thin films and adhesives for semiconductor applications. These technologies reduce the carbon footprint and the need to use resources[2] As with biopolymers, materials science technologies generally take decades to move from the research phase to full commercialization. Because development costs are considerable, this technology might benefit from strategies to speed up the time it takes to develop a product and bring it to market.
Renewable Energy
Minnesota has much potential for generating electricity at small-scale facilities powered by solar, wind, biomass, hydro, and anaerobic digestion. Connecting these systems to the distribution network, however, can be technically and contractually complex. Combined heat and power (co-generation) distribution systems can achieve significant environmental performance by capturing waste heat. All of these technologies, called distributed generation, are promising alternatives to larger utilities.
Energy Generation, Storage, and Distribution
These technologies include advanced batteries, energy conversion, power management, and data storage. Minnesota has an established battery manufacturing industry that could expand its green applications if demand grows. Although it will take decades to implement the smart grid, these technologies are the building blocks of a well-integrated infrastructure to harvest and distribute wind and solar energy and to minimize power losses in the delivery of electricity.
Wireless and Control Technologies
These green-enabling technologies, although not developed to help the environment, are embedded in a wide variety of green products, including controls for monitoring greenhouse gas emissions and smart meters that allow utilities and consumers to track energy consumption in real time and improve decisions about energy use.
Transportation Technologies
These are already established in Minnesota and include manufacturing of exhaust filters, alternative fuel vehicles, and engine technologies that reduce emissions. Some are end-of-pipe solutions, such as retrofitting existing engines with pollution-control equipment. Others reduce pollution at the source, such as engines that eliminate pollutants before they are formed.
Potential Effect on the Labor Market
Technological innovation is critical to growth in the green economy for two main reasons. First, just as new technology can accelerate the adoption of green products, technological barriers can hinder the creation of markets for green products such as solar photovoltaic systems.
Second, the definition of green itself is subject to change as technologies evolve over time. When today’s best environmental solutions are surpassed by cleaner ones, some green activities might not be so green anymore. For example, retrofitting diesel engines with diesel oxidation catalysts to reduce emissions will stop being viewed as a green activity when a new generation of hybrid and electric-powered vehicles fills the roads. As the definition of green activity changes, the definition of green jobs will also change.
Many respondents in our study pointed to the need to upgrade the technical skills of employees so that they can work on evolving green or green-enabling technologies. The green economy relies more on innovation and technology than non-green sectors because environmental problems often require highly technical, one-of a-kind solutions. For example, cleaning up a contaminated site while simultaneously minimizing the negative effects of operating heavy equipment requires technologies that can respond to unique site conditions such as soil, groundwater, and native habitats. Because one size does not fit all, technologies are continuously adapted, customized, or re-invented.
Jobs that are more likely to require additional skills in the green economy include scientists, engineers, maintenance and repair technicians, technical sales representatives, and business operations specialists. For example, a green training development specialist might be responsible for training the sales force in energy efficiency technologies embedded in a heating, ventilation, and air conditioning system. In another example, a green engineer might evaluate the feasibility of new waste conversion technologies to help a municipality prevent waste from entering landfills.
In terms of industries, small, private firms in Minnesota reported green job openings from 2009 to 2011 in industries such as research and development and manufacturing, sectors that were hit especially hard by the recession. This indicates that green activities could be a source of economic resilience for the state.
Taking the Green Path
SAGE Electrochromics, a glass company in Faribault, and Segetis and Reluceo[3] two biopolymers firms in Golden Valley, are examples of companies dedicated to developing new green technologies.
Innovative green companies face the same hurdles that hold back any new technology. First, there are difficulties of capitalization, especially for startups caught in the double crunch of financing a manufacturing facility and moving to large-scale commercialization. Second, investing in green product improvements can be risky and costly especially when newer technologies haven’t demonstrated themselves in the marketplace and do not yet have the economic support of more conventional technologies. Just as many innovations are viewed as fads when first introduced, green technologies are sometimes viewed with suspicion.
Third, proving the effectiveness of green products is difficult without reliable and recognized metrics that customers can understand and use to compare products. Although there is plenty of evidence that consumers want improved environmental features in products, false or misleading green product claims — often referred to as greenwashing — have created confusion and skepticism among consumers.
For all of these reasons, some green firms in Minnesota are investing time and resources to educate and inform customers through sales consultations, creative communications, and the development of reliable standards, product labels, and certifications. Firms that view the term green as too vague prefer to use words such as “durable,” “energy and resource-efficient,” “healthy,” “organic” or “renewable” when describing their products. Other firms try to expand green to the broader notion of sustainability[4]
Innovative green firms are going well beyond moving emerging technologies toward commercialization. They are educating consumers, making it easier for them to distinguish green solutions from greenwash. This can transform the marketplace and accelerate adoption of other kinds of green products.
Minnesota has an opportunity to become an international player in this sector. Some of the technologies being developed in Minnesota, especially green chemistry products, are manufacturing intensive and have global demand. If companies wait too long before moving forward with green innovations, Minnesota might miss a chance to compete in a growing industry.
1]Wireless technologies, for example, although not developed with the purpose of increasing energy efficiency, are essential to the functioning of energy efficient products such as sensors and switches for lights and appliances and even to the implementation of the smart grid.
[2]Carbon footprint measures how much burning of fossil fuels with corresponding emission of carbon dioxide is needed for an activity, such as manufacturing a product, driving to work, or cleaning up a contaminated site. Carbon dioxide will accumulate in the atmosphere, contributing to global climate change unless it can be captured and stored by plants.
[3]Although these two companies do not yet have manufacturing capability, they are engaged in product development and commercialization with the aim of scaling up production.
[4]Green is about improved environmental attributes of products and services, while sustainability embraces economic and social elements. Sustainability means all future citizens should have the opportunity to enjoy lives as rich and meaningful as our own, and in a natural environment that is at least as clean, intact, and healthy as that which we enjoy today. (This is the definition used by the Minnesota 2050 Project and the Minnesota Statewide Conservation and Preservation Plan, 2008.)
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