Since the Trump Administration’s announcement in June of 2017 to withdraw from the Paris Climate Accords, state and regional leadership and public-private collaboration on clean energy have become more critical than ever. Here in the Northeast, our region continue to rise to that challenge through legislation and regulatory frameworks supportive of renewables as well as through the development and scale-up of entirely new clean economy markets and solutions.

The US Northeast is known for its clean energy and clean economy policy leadership, and it should be equally recognized for the efforts of states, cities, regions, universities, andcompanies in our communities all stepping up with innovative solutions to achieve a cleaneconomy. We see these efforts in the cities and towns that are innovating with new models for community-scale clean energy systems like multi-user microgrids incorporating smart buildings, energy storage, and flexible demand.

We see leading-edge projects that integrate new clean technologies and leverage the integrated systems of university campuses and major facilities like hospitals and stadiums to add resiliency to their neighborhoods. We see states, utilities, customers and solutions providers coming together to demonstrate and deploy a modernized electricity grid that effectively integrates and efficiently coordinates a much smarter network of clean resources and better integrates distributed energy and strategic electrification of transportation and building thermal energy.

We see dozens of new clean technology incubators, startups and their supporters helping to accelerate the region’s clean innovation ecosystem. We see cities and metro regions planning new, clean infrastructure for non-emitting transportation systems, net-zero buildings, and integrated utilities across energy, water, waste, transportation, communications, and other services. We see states designing procurement mechanisms for grid-scale renewables that are contributing to the launch of the new offshore wind market. We see new financing models, fund structures and the combination of public and private capital developing new approaches such as green banks. And we see most of the Northeast states supporting demonstration projects to prove the new business models needed to scale many of these clean economy areas, collaborating with cities, the private sector and other states to share these new best practices.

This spirit of innovation around clean economy models and partnerships is at the core of why the new Horizon18 conference has been created and launched here in the Northeast. Taking place on October 10-11 in Boston, Horizon18 is about bringing together clean economy solutions providers, customers, investors, and innovators to translate climate goals into solutions, deployments and partnerships. NECEC is proud to be a co-founder of Horizon18, along with the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center, and World Climate Ltd. We launched Horizon18, the new global solutions conference for the clean economy, to help connect and facilitate partnerships to accelerate clean economy solutions projects. Horizon18 is focused on sharing best practices and matchmaking between the leading clean economy solutions providers and customers, innovators and investors. Horizon18 is leveraging the innovation and experience of the northeast and bringing additional regions to scale global clean economy progress.

Join your counterparts and eager partners coming to Horizon18 and be part of the acceleration of the global solutions platform for the clean economy.