Let’s Take the Word “Alternative” Out of Alternative Energy
June 22nd, 2009 by Carolyn Parrs & Irv Weinberg, Mind Over Markets
What a difference a word makes. With news out of Washington on the waffling on the Alternative Energy front, it occurred to me how much further this effort might be moving along if we weren’t dealing with the term “alternative” as in just another possible way instead of the most intelligent way to create new and reliable sources to power our future.
Maybe the new term, which I offer up gratis to all of you, should be Absolutely Necessary Energy, or even Can’t Live Without It Energy. Then maybe a sound energy policy would already be in place and people would understand that we can’t live without it.
As a marketer, I know how we label something has a profound effect on its acceptance. I find it incredible that with all our brilliant sunshine shining down every day and all our abundant wind blowing freely, instead of being captured and harnessed, we’re still dragging our feet on getting out and demanding a sane, inexhaustible and clean supply to power our nation. The jobs it would create and the national security this would engender, not to mention the cleaning of our air and water supply, would be the greatest gift this or any Administration could give our country and the world.
So let’s change the name and change our direction on this or someday the future generations will look back on us and shake their heads in disbelief.
June 23rd, 2009 at 2:20 pm
This is a *really* good point!
Where we are in our cultural story, “alternative” still evokes ideas from the hippie days.
The term has certainly evolved. While it has become more mainstream though, I think right now it means something like “that funny 20 or 30% of Americans who have decided–partly because they can afford to–to purchase _specialty_ products and services.”
So you’ve got Safeway that sells regular groceries, and then you’ve got Whole Foods that sells alternative groceries.
You’ve got standard, normal energy — e.g., coal, dams, or whatever-the-heck-it-is (I don’t know actually) — and then you have got alternative : wind, solar, etc.
I think I hear what you are saying.
From the perspective of a hundred years hence, or even fifty, the idea of calling the forms of energy that CAN ACTUALLY HELP SAVE ALL OF OUR LIVES, and stop society from destroying itself, “alternative”… now let’s see… what would be an analogy?
Let’s say, I come back from the woods and I have a badly broken my leg. In great pain, I wander into the emergency room. The nurse who greets me tells me, “well, our normal treatment, in cases such as yours, sir, is to prescribe you a large bottle of these strong pain pills… we find that those really make the symptoms a LOT better.”
You say, “well… shouldn’t you RE-SET my broken leg?? It’s in two pieces!!”
The nurse says, “well, .. that is AWFULLY expensive, sir. And, it’s very ALTERNATIVE. My father had a broken arm, and the pain pills worked fine for him.”
July 4th, 2009 at 9:48 am
Thanks Chris for your comment. Keep them coming!
July 22nd, 2009 at 8:07 am
I agree that the word ‘Alternative’ does not do the cause any good, but it does for most people infer at least that these forms of energy are genuine other ‘options’. Unfortunately the ‘truth’ is that this is probably not the case. For every story about wind, wave or the sun being a genuine energy alternative there are 10 stories explaining why it isn’t – at least not a truly mass scale. For the time being I am content with the phrase as it keeps the perception of a mass scale eco alternative, when the time comes that we actually have a proven one then I will be happy to campaign for a name change. At that stage everybody needs to made aware that it should not be not be an alternative but in fact the 1st choice. I just don’t think we are there yet.