Episode #002 - Stefan Krauter

Stefan Krauter is a serial entrepreneur and professor. In the 1970s, while his friends went onto demonstration against nuclear power plants, he searched for something he could support. This is when solar power caught his interest and he has not left the solar industry ever since.

He is a co-founder of the first publicly listed solar module producer Solon and co-founder of the technical advisor PI Berlin. On Twitter, he tries to compete with Trump by using a job title usually limited to the CEO of the catholic church. Officially, he claims that a former student gave him the title “solar-pope” (@solarpapst).

You can tell that his agenda is on eye level with the mayor of the Vatican when he discusses the pros of his new concept of measuring time (spoiler: it is related to tobacco). 

Currently, he is a professor at the German University of Paderborn. He researches, all down-to-earth but always with-the-sun, innovative energy supply structures, energy efficiency, and load management. 

Interesting points covered in this episode for those of us on our own Solar Journey:

- Why is tobacco the centerfold of Stefan's new concept for time?

- Why did Stefan end up in the solar industry? 

- What is Stefan's major advice for founders?

- Why was the German feed-in tariff from the year 2000 THE major global milestone for the solar industry?

- Why is German national security the mother of the modern solar industry? 

- How did Germany lose its pole position of 50% market share in solar to China?

- Why is nuclear power 100 times more expensive than solar and coal?

- What are the biggest roadblocks for solar and wind?

- What can solar learn from Russian nuclear power plant giant Rosatom?

- Why should solar join forces with worker unions?

** Find this episode's transcript on The Solar Journey website > Blog > Interviews **