Industrieinitiative Dii würdigt Lebensleistung Hermann Scheers für die Erneuerbaren Energien (Deutsch, PDF)

Dii, the industry initiative devoted to realising the Desertec vision, is dismayed to learn of the death of Hermann Scheer.

Hermann Scheer, President of Eurosolar and General Chairman of the World  Council for Renewable Energy, passed away on Thursday, October 14th. In 1999, Scheer had been awarded the Right Livelihood Award for his "indefatigable work for the promotion of solar energy worldwide”.
 
Paul van Son, CEO of the industry initiative: “Hermann Scheer’s commitment and efforts to realise renewable energy technologies were unequalled. Even so, he was held to be one of the leading critics of Desertec in Germany because he feared that our vision of clean energy from the desert would impede the further development of Germany’s domestic solar energy sector. Several weeks ago, I spoke with him and pointed out that we in fact share the same goal, namely to realise a sustainable power supply for the local populace, regardless of where that may be. I am deeply saddened that Hermann Scheer will no longer live to witness the worldwide development of renewable energies. We will miss the critical dialogue with him.”
 
Rainer Aringhoff, COO of the industry initiative: “Hermann Scheer was always a model and an inspiration for us pioneers of renewable energies to continue to fight unflaggingly for the further development of renewable energy sources, even back in the days when we were still being marginalised by most politicians and representatives of the power industry. Ironically, this marginalisation of solar-thermal power-plant technology continued even up to the time when the SPD/Greens project began, and it was Herrmann Scheer, actually a proponent of photovoltaic technology, who with the Greens sprang into the breach against the then government, and now, only six years later, this technology has become the hottest of all of the world’s renewable energies options. Thank you for your fighting spirit, Hermann!”