In an effort to reduce electricity consumption, General Electric Company is going to combine energy-efficient lighting and energy-efficient appliances with energy management systems and renewable power generators. The systems – named ‘Net Zero Energy Home’ – involves photovoltaic cells and thin-film solar cells as well as advanced energy storage products that help save energy.

General Electric said in a press release that it is working with utility and government partners to help improve the power grid – “which has not changed much since the days of Thomas Edison” – in ways that will not cause consumers to “compromise their lifestyles.”

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General Electric (GE) wants to know what Japan knows about being green. GE wants access to Japan’s high tech capabilities in areas of energy conservation and carbon emission reduction.

General Electric in Schenectady, New York

GE’s boss in Japan answered 6 questions:

Q: Why has GE has been strengthening technical collaboration with Japanese firms?
A: Outside the U.S.,in Japan, GE’s top priority is the pursuit of high technologies.

Q: What are your target areas?
A: GE proposed an idea called “Ecomagination” in 2005. The term, a combination of the words “ecology” and “imagination,” expresses GE’s resolve to develop and commercialize technologies for solving environmental problems.

GE has set forth objectives:

1. an increase in investment from 700 million dollars for 2005 to 1.5 billion dollars for 2010
2. the development of technologies for reducing global warming gas emissions
3. raising the efficiency of energy consumption.

Q: What exactly does GE intend to do?
A: GE’s research center has been dispatched to Japan to work as a bridge between Japanese firms and GE’s research center.

GE held a technology forum for small and midsize companies, soliciting technologies from five areas, including materials and energy conservation. GE also started soliciting technical themes over the Internet.

Q: What are the results from these efforts?
A: With Hitachi Ltd., GE is jointly developing technologies for next-generation nuclear reactors.

GE has also formed a tie-up with Konica Minolta Holdings Inc. on the development of organic electroluminescence technology for lighting.

Japan is not much of a leader, except when it comes to going green.

Image courtesy of Matthew Bradley