Hermann Scheer is a Social Democrat member of the German Bundestag (Parliament), President of EUROSOLAR (The European Association for Renewable Energy) and General Chairman of the World Council for Renewable Energy.  In 1999, Scheer was awarded the Right Livelihood Award for his "indefatigable work for the promotion of solar energy worldwide".

As a member of the German Parliament and founder of the European Association for Solar Energy (1988), he became a principal organizational force in renewable energy policy in Germany and throughout Europe as a whole. He developed and successfully implemented Germany's million solar roof program and the mandatory solar energy feed-in law. The latter legislation helped Germany become a world leader in the generation of wind power.

In 1997 and 1998, EUROSOLAR organised international conferences on 'Financial Renewable Energies' and the European conference on "Solar Energy in Architecture and Urban Planning", which attracted hundreds of participants. Scheer received the World Solar Prize at the 1998 World Conference on Photovoltaics in Vienna, and, in 2009, the Karl Böer Solar Energy Medal of Merit.

Sources

• Cleveland, Cutler (Lead Author); Peter Saundry (Topic Editor). 2007. "Scheer, Hermann." In: Encyclopedia of Earth. Eds. Cutler J. Cleveland (Washington, D.C.: Environmental Information Coalition, National Council for Science and the Environment). [Published in the Encyclopedia of Earth March 8, 2007; Retrieved June 25, 2009]. <http://www.eoearth.org/article/Scheer,_Hermann>
• Right Livelihood Award, Hermann Scheer (Germany), Honorary Award (1999).