WCA September 2015

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74 Wire & Cable ASIA – September/October 2015
From the Americas
Energy
Firmly in agreement on the importance of
the smart grid, the USA and China commit
to promoting industry engagement
Smart grids and smart cities were very much on the agenda
during the seventh round of the US-China Strategic and
Economic Dialogue (S&ED), which ended on 24th June
in Washington, DC. Chaired by special representatives
of US President Barack Obama and China’s President Xi
Jinping, and attended by senior officials from across the
two governments, the Strategic Track signalled a renewed
mutual intention to build on earlier progress in grid-related
teamwork.
Barbara L Vergetis Lundin, the energy editor of
FierceMarkets, reported that, with the aim of expanding
institutional capacity for smart grids in the USA and China,
the two sides will place greater emphasis on industry
engagement and technical assistance. Additionally, the
US Trade and Development Agency (USTDA) will sponsor
a second study tour on smart grid this year, building on
the success of the first study tour of October 2014 that
attracted delegates from American electric utilities and the
National Energy Administration. (“US, China Leaders Give
Green Light to Further Smart Grid Cooperation,” 25th June)
The top-heavy project and agency titles with which the
Washington meeting abounded could not obscure real
forward motion in the joint enterprise. Progress was noted
on four collaborative efforts by the Climate Change Working
Group (CCWG) Smart Grid initiative. These included
the Irvine (California) Smart Grid Demonstration project,
which showed 60 per cent-plus savings in energy usage
and 80 per cent-plus reductions in electricity costs for
zero-net-energy homes with smart grid technologies; and
the development of functionality and application scenarios
for four subsidiary projects in the China-Singapore Tianjin
Eco-City.
Ms Lundin wrote: “The United States and China
also decided to enhance their cooperation on grid
modernisation, supporting the China Electricity Council
and the State Grid Corporation of China as they conduct
a feasibility study and pilot project on big data analytics
for the electricity grid.” This project will demonstrate the
use of big data analytics to provide run-time tracking and
optimisation of power distribution, consumption, and
outage management on the smart grid.
 The last round of the S&ED produced another
noteworthy instance of Sino-American cooperation.
The US Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC)
and the National Energy Administration of China
(NEA) pledged to share information about regulatory
experiences and practices in a series of digital video
conference discussions.
Topics will include power industry planning, electricity
pricing, electricity markets, renewable energy
integration, distributed energy development, regulations
for network technologies, and – of course – the smart
grid.
Two controversial visas
The EB-5 programme for foreign investors
in US businesses is criticised as an unfair
method of allocating ‘green cards’
With the next American presidential election more than a
year away, opinion for and against the contenders need not
detain us now. But an article this spring in the Milwaukee
Journal Sentinel on Wisconsin Gov Scott Walker, a
presidential hopeful, contained information of more than
usual interest on an immigrant investor programme that
puts foreign nationals on the path to US citizenship if they
commit at least $500,000 to an American commercial
project that generates or saves ten jobs over two years.
Known as EB-5, the programme is much favoured by
Mr Walker despite his strong anti-immigration sentiments.
In the view of Daniel Bice, the Journal Sentinel’s political
watchdog columnist, Mr Walker’s embrace of the “deeply
troubled” programme is itself troubling, as well as
contortionist. Because immigration policy bulks so large in
public discourse on the USA, EB-5 warrants a closer look.
As noted by Mr Bice, critics have called the “abuse-riddled”
programme a device for easing the way to permanent US
residence for the affluent and their families, with more than
80 per cent of those in the programme coming from China.
(”Critics Call Visa Programme a ‘Scam’ That Sells Green
Cards,” 17th May )
The programme has support from politicians in both
parties. David North, a fellow with the conservative Center
for Immigration Studies, told the Journal Sentinel that it
is not unusual for there to be financial links between local
politicians and those benefiting from or directing EB-5
regional centres. He said: “That’s the way it works around
the country.”
Mr North cited scrutiny and criminal probes into EB-5 in
Illinois, Louisiana, California, Texas and South Dakota. In
December 2013 the Office of Inspector General for the US
Department of Homeland Security, in a scathing critique of
the programme, noted incidentally that its administrators
were “unable to demonstrate the benefits of foreign
investment into the US economy.”
Another critic, University of Chicago law professor Eric
Posner, called for an end to the “ludicrous” immigration
programme. “It’s the worst combination of bad economics,
political cronyism, and unfairness,” Dr Posner wrote for
Slate. “Among other things, it’s almost impossible to figure
out whether a specific investment generates jobs rather
than reshuffles them from one place to another.”
 Beyond that, in the view of Mr North, the programme
is flawed in its premise. He said: “I think it’s immoral,
fattening, and otherwise unattractive to sell visas, which
is what we’re doing now.”
It is difficult to quarrel with that assertion. As observed
by the New York Times, the federal government puts
applications from EB-5 investors on a fast track to the
green card that enables a foreign national to live and