There’s incredible opportunity ‘in the clean tech space,’ Schneider Electric president says

Yahoo Finance's Jared Blikre speaks with Aamir Paul, Schneider Electric President North America on next generation industrial technology and investment in clean tech.

Video transcript

- Schneider Electric, one of the largest energy and power equipment providers in Europe and abroad, unveiling new research and corporate ESG efforts at its presentation in Las Vegas and finding while there is little intention from companies to do green and be green, actually a lot of that intention, there's not enough follow-through. For more we have Aamir Paul, Schneider Electric President North America. And thank you for coming here today. This is all part of your presentation at the Innovation Summit Las Vegas. Just tell us a little bit about the event and what we can expect from that.

AAMIR PAUL: Well, first of all, thank you for having me. And yes, we're here with 1,500 customers. About 20% of the Fortune 500 is here. And the conversation we're having is how do we move from an intent to action? There has been a lot of commitments made about getting to net zero. And that's great. More of those commitments are getting certified with science-based targets, which is an important next step.

But really deploying the technologies and learning by doing is how we're going to create innovation that we desperately need. And that's really what we're talking to our partners, customers, and broader strategic alliances about here. The thing that's most important right now is that we remember that sustainability is also an efficiency driver. So it's got a bottom-line positive impact. And I think that is going to be an acceleration point for all of the sectors.

- And a lot of the impetus behind the-- well, behind the clean air movement and clean energy movement has to do with government subsidies. Just wondering what the status of that is. We hear a lot about that with respect to Tesla and some of the other big makers, but there is a lot going on behind the scenes as well as we beef up our infrastructure.

AAMIR PAUL: It's government subsidies, for sure, especially for consumers. And it'll act as a catalyst for consumers to make the right choices. People want to do the right thing. And if it can be also providing a better experience, then these incentives are just going to make that transition happen faster.

Think about people buying an EV. Once they buy an EV they have an opportunity to put solar in their home. When they do that, they can add a battery. And then with technologies that we can work with the utilities to also make them producers of energy and maybe even sell some of that back in the right environments to the broader grid. So there's a real evolution where consumers are going to become prosumers. And we think this evolution is going to be catalyzed by things like the Inflation Reduction Act.

But I want to go back to my earlier point. Investment in clean tech is about also making environments more efficient, not just in terms of being more green, but operationally more efficient. So it actually saves money in the long term. And we've published research with the Schneider Sustainability Institute that in existing buildings, we can build payback periods under eight years, not only making the buildings more efficient-- and in places like Las Vegas, at the largest Hilton property in the world, we're demonstrating that as an active solution.

- What's some of the tech behind this what you call next-generation industrial technology that's being used to empower workers? Specifically how does this all fit together?

AAMIR PAUL: So look, one key element is to bring digital into this space. As consumers we've been living in the digital and internet era for about 20 years. But in the industrial space, data and digital assets are just being deployed at scale. And what digital does is it makes the invisible visible and brings all of that opportunities for optimization. What it also helps us do is take our scarcest resource, which is people, and help them focus on the most important places where they can innovate and be creative.

That is also going to create a lot of new jobs. We think there's an incredible opportunity in the clean tech space and solar, the number of electricians we're going to need. And we're investing. In addition to working with people like NECA, the National Association of Electrical Contractors, we're investing with community colleges to make sure the next generation is ready to work in this IoT environment.

Finally, we're also investing in manufacturing. We announced an additional $46 million invested in the United States to prepare for this wave of electrification. And that's on top of $100 million we invested in our factories last year.

- Well, appreciate your time here. I've got to leave it there. Aamir Paul, Schneider Electric President North America, thank you.