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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

PhotobucketI’ll never forget the first time I heard this expression — which is, of course, a rather crude way of asking if a certain product or service has appeal to one or more target market segments. I was sitting in a meeting with a few of my clients at IBM when someone asked me for my opinion on the subject.  I tried to conceal that I felt vaguely insulted, as I had built my career around the process of asking and answering this question – and I guess I wasn’t flattered by having it reduced to level of unrefined simplicity.

But I urge readers to develop and implement processes that get at these market basics. As yourself tough questions:

Who needs what I’m selling? Exactly why? What are the gut-wrenching needs of my target market that are addressed uniquely by my product or service?

Once those basics are in place, get at higher levels of refinement:

How should I position my product or service? I.e., how should I communicate my offering in a word or two that will generate an immediate and positive association in the mind of the market?  What exactly is my brand — and what’s the best way to express its meaning? 

An electric vehicle company near Atlanta called Tomberlin has a sport buggy called the “Anvil.” In the very name of the product, they’ve positioned it as a heavy, low-tech object – normally stationary – which, when it happens to be in motion, usually brings to mind falling to earth, causing injury. To say the very least, I would have recommended against that. (You may think I’m making this up. I’m not; check it out here.)

Yet the process of deriving correct (or incorrect) positioning is seldom as clear-cut as this. Excellence in this space is critically important, but it’s not a straightforward task. In any case, if you’d like help on this — or any other aspect of marketing your clean energy product or service, please don’t hesitate to call or write. CONTACT US HERE.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

PhotobucketWe see a great deal of social criticism, lambasting us Americans for being fat, lazy super-consumers. In that vein, frequent commenter Dan Conine writes:

Most of the electricity people get (including myself) isn’t necessary. Most of the activities we perform are useless to the future and only serve our entertainment … and our pollution of the world.

I don’t dispute that. But where’s the solution here? Change hundreds of millions of people’s way of thinking about their responsibilities and their overall lifestyle choices? Sounds like a challenge – getting through to a nation of people who are busy driving their SUVs out to Walmart to stock up on Budweiser and guacamole for the Super Bowl.

There is no doubt to you, me, and most other 2GreenEnergy readers that Americans’ indolent lifestyle cannot sustain itself. I think we’ve already proven that with our child cancer rates, financial bailouts, ceaseless wars, obesity, school test scores, etc.   And if you want to see some real social chaos, wait until you see what happens when the world (especially the US with its sense of entitlement) comes face-to-face with the impact of peal oil in the not-too-distant future.

But again, I ask: Where’s the solution? I like to think of myself as a man of action. I like to solve problems. So when I look at this energy problem and all its implications in public health, national security, global climate change, empowering evil, and so forth, I look for a big, broad solution – and that’s renewable energy.

All I’m asking is that *we the people* put pressure on our elected officials.  Force them to create legislation that levels of playing field on which renewables compete against fossil fuels. As I’m fond of saying, take away the subsidies and get everyone to pay to true and full costs of the energy we produce and consume — and see how long coal and oil last as industries.  They’ll be gone in an afternoon. 

In any case, we either make a lot of noise and create a difference in the trajectory of energy-related policy, or we’ll get exactly what will have so richly deserved.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

PhotobucketIn response to my rant on a few recent Supreme Court decisions, frequent commenter Dan Conine writes:

“… The government we have is the government we deserve. Though you are correct per se from your point of view, I disagree with both counts to some extent. First, the Supreme Court’s job is to interpret the legality of laws written by Congress, etc.. It is now up to Congress to right the wrong of 100 plus years of corporate personhood. Now that an impotent attempt at campaign finance has been shot down, Congress should look deeper into who the constitution is written to protect: individuals from bullies/mobs. They won’t, though, as long as we keep giving more money to corporations every day than we keep for ourselves (savings) or give to the constitutional power (taxes).”

You always amaze me.  You’re 100% right that Congress could do something about this, but won’t — and for the exact reasons you’ve named.  That is why this is such a terrible conundrum — and the reason that I blog; without a grassroots effort to call attention to our broken poltical processes, we’re doomed.  

Dan continues:

Second: The dependence of renewable energy’s future upon federal government intervention shows that renewable energy proponents are not much different than the corporate power proponents: both are trying to make profits through coercion of the government Gun.

“We will be ready for renewable energy when people stop using so much nonrenewable energy. Not before. Until then, local control of rights-of-way is the only way to counteract corporate control of rights-of-way because the corporations own the federal government. When you advocate for federal decisions over local decisions, you are advocating for the biggest corporation to decide your future. You might as well just go to Little Rock and ask Wal-Mart to start selling power grids.”

Here I’m not so sure. 

First, I’m not asking Congress to help renewables — only to level the playing field.  Remove the subsidies, force everyone to pay the full price of the power they’re producing and consuming, and see what happens.  We’ll have renewable energy in about 10 minutes.  Btw, you often mention that you’d like to see less consumption of power overall; this action will achieve that goal in a big way.

Secondly, I point out a matter of political philosophy.  Though I felt different about this as a younger man, I’m currently convinced that we need to impute some moral goodness to government — and make sure that goodness happens.  Without it, we’re really dead — worse than dead, actually; we have a dystopia along the lines of 1984 or Brave New World.  But you’re certainly right in what you said above: we get the government we deserve.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

Earlier this week I wrote a post expressing my disgust over the US Supreme Court’s announcement that it had found major provisions of campaign finance reform to be unconstitutional.  This paved the way for corporate and union money to mute the voices of individual citizens like you and me.

Later in the week, the justices dealt another punch to the gut to the forces of progress.  This came with the decision that rendered the federal government impotent against state and local decisions regarding rights of way — for things like power lines.

Many of us are — or were — hoping for long-distance transmission of electrical power.  This would have made feasible the development of forms of renewable energy that are prevalent in certain areas of the country, e.g., solar thermal in the southwestern desert, wind energy in the plains, and geothermal in the mountains.  As of this week, however, such things will require the buy-in of dozens of state and local bureaucracies.

It hasn’t been a good week of news from high court.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

PhotobucketHere’s a post I wrote on Renewable Energy World on president Obama’s State of the Union address the other night.

I like to support Obama for his efforts along a number of lines, especially a progressive energy policy. But to me, all the pandering to the masses in that address served more to confuse people than to enlighten and motivate them.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Science

Readers may have noticed the pro-nuclear comments of Frank Eggers. Responding to my request for guest bloggers, Frank wrote:

I’m not sure that there’d be much point in my blogging on this site.

The only information this site about nuclear energy is very obsolete.  The olde objections to nuclear power no longer apply.  There are solutions to the problems which were formerly a valid concern.  For example, there are reactor designs that do not require enriched uranium; natural uranium and thorium can be used as fuels.  Also, there reactor designs that produce very little waste because they use the fuel more than 100 times as efficiently than the pressurized water thermal reactors which, unfortunately, are too common.   Moreover, the waste they do produce decays much more quickly and needs to be sequestered for only about 500 years rather than tens of thousands of years.

It seems that up to date and correct information on nuclear power is censored from this site.  Also, any information that questions the practicality of wind and solar energy is also censored.  That is very unfortunate because unless nuclear energy becomes a major part of our energy mix, we will become even more dependent on coal and the serious problems that coal creates.

Considering the above, there would be little point in my writing blogs for this site.

My original response was:

I understand.  Thanks for writing back.

But I woke up this morning with a different take, as follows:

Frank:  You know, been I’ve thinking about this further, as, in truth, we don’t censor pro-nuclear or any other ideas.  If you want to write a blog on this subject, expressing a divergent but legitimate viewpoint, I would actually encourage that.  It can be passionate (I can see you have plenty to offer in that department) as long as it’s respectful.  I’m more than open to your ideas.

We’ll see what happens.

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by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

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I had no fewer than six really good discussions with readers today on the subject of guest blogging — each of whom I expect to come on board — and who knows what tomorrow will bring.  I really think this diversity of viewpoint will add a great deal to the discussion.

Perhaps more than any other subject, renewable energy lends itself to this diversity, as there are:

  • So many technologies
  • At so many levels of maturity
  • Appropriate for so many different climates and topographies
  • Appealing to so many different business interests
  • Cutting across so many different political idealogies

    • Again, if you have something you’d like to say to the thousands of people who visit us here at 2GreenEnergy, please let us know. Click here to CONTACT us.

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    by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Business

    PhotobucketI’m hoping that readers of my upcoming book on renewables will enjoy my conversation with Matt Simmons, arguably the loudest voice on the issue of peak oil. And, although the subject remains controversial, it’s probably a good deal less so today that it was last week, now that two extremely senior automotive industry executives have come out with statements that support it.

    In particular, note the recent comments of GM’s Bob Lutz, global climate change skeptic, who is nonetheless a strong proponent of the Volt and the electrification of the automobile. Lutz argues that continued dependence on oil as demand inevitably increases will simply exacerbate boom and bust economic cycles. He notes that, in 20 years the China auto market will equal the rest of the world combined and adds, “At that point we have to have alternative drive systems, which to me have to be electric.”

    And check out the remarks of Jim Lentz, President and COO of Toyota Motor Sales. He apparently stunned his interviewer during a recent Commonwealth Club event, in which he stated unequivocally that Toyota believes that peak oil will occur sometime in the later half of this decade.

    Peak oil – just one of the many reasons for the rapid migration to renewable energy.

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    by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Electric Vehicles

    PhotobucketJim Stack writes in:

    Nissan is taking care of this for EVeryone with their new Nissan LEAF. It’s made in the far east, Smyrna Tennesse …. They are much safer that gas cars; you don’t die from fires when gas explodes or burns after an accident…

    Jim: I’m with you all the way.

    I was down in Santa Monica a couple of weeks ago interviewing Rick Sikes (their fleet manager) for my book on renewables. If you didn’t know, Santa Monica is an extremely progressive city in a lot of ways – and one of them is the city fleet, which is 87% alternatively fueled.

    In any case, I saw all those tanks of CNG, propane, and hydrogen, and I asked about safety. In his answer, which I found more than satisfactory, he pointed out that, on average, 6 people burn to death in gasoline-powered vehicle fires every day. It’s a phenomenon so common that we don’t even report it — like cats getting stuck up in trees.

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    by Craig ShieldsPosted on Posted in Renewables - Politics

    PhotobucketThe other day I wrote a post on my Renewable Energy World blog which garnered a number of interesting comments that I thought I’d pass along. I began the post by indicating that important events in the world generally happen because powerful people make them happen, and that these actions tend to be indifferent to the wellbeing of the vast majority of the world’s population. As an example, I cited George W. Bush’s fixation on removing Saddam Hussein from power and how, in the process, the real threat to world peace and our national security that was developing next door in Afghanistan and Pakistan went unnoticed.

    I pointed out that, according to this theory, that although the migration to renewable energy will happen – it will occur for reasons that have essentially nothing to do with the health and safety of our planet, of our nation, and of its people. I provided short explanations of what I see the true drivers: peak oil, public outcry, corporate embrace of renewables, the advent of the smart grid, increases in efficiency of mature clean energy technologies, and the maturation of new technologies.

    Of 20+/- comments, most were quite positive. But I was amused by a commentor who wrote:

    Do you lefties have to be such drama queens and continue to bring up G.W.? Some of us would like to forget his nonsense. It’s not really much different than what the far right did to the Clinton presidency. Besides, is continuing to make RE a political topic really going to help?

    The answer, as I told him, is yes, renewable energy is, in its very essence, a political topic — quite independently of whether he or I want it to be.  As I’m fond of saying, the moment you take away the subsidies and force everyone to pay the true cost of the energy they’re producing and consuming, you’ll have ubiquitous clean energy in about 10 minutes.

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