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Thirty-seven of the world’s biggest developing countries are spent $557bn subsidising fossil fuels that year, according to new estimates by the IEA seen by the FT.

The 1GW station would involve four square kilometres of solar panels. It’s estimated to be about 2,000bn yen ($21bn) and 30 years away, and it would have to become much, much cheaper to get out there:

Many politicians are supportive, not least Barack Obama, the US president, who in October promised $3.4bn in grants to pay for smart grid equipment.However, an investment on that scale does no more than lay the foundations: a full smart grid for the US will require an investment that is orders of magnitude greater. The commercial and regulatory framework to deliver that investment has not yet been developed.

The epithet “smart” can be applied to a wide range of network technologies. But among industry leaders, there is broad agreement about what a smart grid entails: the use of intelligent devices at all points in the electricity network, from the high-voltage transmission lines to appliances in the home, that can send information and receive instructions.

Mitsubishi Electric, Toshiba and Showa Shell yesterday each unveiled plans to boost their solar panel production.Shigeaki Kameda, president of Showa Shell's solar subsidiary, said the company intended to become the world's largest producer of thin-film photovoltaic panels, with the business eventually rivalling its Y3,000bn ($33.6bn) oil-refining and petrol operations in scale.Mitsubishi said it hoped to produce 600 megawatts' worth of photovoltaic cells annually by the financial year to March 2012, up from 220MW.Toshiba, which makes residential solar-power systems, said it was aiming to take 10 per cent of the Japanese domestic market by the year to March 2013.

However, Mr Engel insisted the world would continue looking to wind as an alternative to fossil fuels in the long term and highlighted China among the strongest sources of growth. Vestas achieved record Chinese orders last year as the government poured tens of billions of dollars into green technology. “We have lost market share in China to local competition yet our sales are still growing because the market is expanding so strongly,” said Mr Engel.Chinese wind power capacity has grown from 6,050 megawatts in 2007 to an estimated 43,853MW last year, surpassing the US for the first time, according to Citigroup. It is forecast to more than double by 2013. Mr Engel said technological innovation was the key to staying ahead of competition, noting the company’s research and development workforce had increased from 300 when he took charge in 2005 to more than 2,000 today. “We are at the end of the beginning in this industry. From here, it’s going to be driven by technology.”

His assessment will damp expectations that advanced “second generation” biofuels will soon be able to make a significant contribution to the world’s fuel supplies, even though they have received heavy research and development support from Shell and other companies, as well as from many governments.

“I want us to be a world leader in offshore wind energy,” he said, announcing the national infrastructure plan