Coming soon is another free report from 2GreenEnergy, tentatively called 25 Tips for Renewable Energy Businesses. As I began to respond to readers who had called or written in to ask my perspective on business ideas, I realized I was drawing on my experiences as a business consultant – 800+ projects over 25+ years. Trust me, that’s a lot of PowerPoint, crowded conference rooms, trying to remember which suit you wore last time you met with client x, and consolidating air travel to ensure upgrades on the way there and back.
As readers may be aware, I spent the bulk of my career working to increase sales revenues in companies with business-to-business products and services. Most of my work was for the Fortune 100: the IBMs, AT&Ts, and Hewlett-Packards of the world – yet a great deal of it was for smaller companies – even a few dozen venture-capitalized start-ups.
In any case, all this gave me the opportunity to observe real-world business processes, and to gain an understanding of what works – and what doesn’t – in business. I believe, looking back on those days, that some of my experiences will be valuable to those wishing to expand businesses in the renewables sector, and so I offer these as “tips.” Coming soon.
Robin Murphy, Vice President for External Relations at the World Resources Institute (WRI) was kind enough to spend a few minutes with me yesterday. He explained one of the key missions of this 27 year-old organization: to provide policy-makers and business leaders with objective, high-quality research and advice on environmental issues. What I found most interesting in our talk was his belief that the world – at the top levels of both the public and private sectors – is awakening to a new day of environmental stewardship. As readers know, I waver on this issue, and I may have shocked my guest with my initial skepticism.
Yet, as we talked, I began to see this from his perspective; I was able to gain a position of appreciation for the work that is being done, and develop a reasonable hope that we are, in fact, on the right track. Robin brought me through WRI’s approach over the last decade, which, in a sentence or two, goes like this: After a variety of projects in the 80s and 90s, the organization spent the years of the Bush Administration patiently waiting, not wasting its manpower, focusing mainly on the state governments and business communities during this dormant period at the federal level. Robin told me, “We let good ideas incubate,” while developing a sense for how the world of energy might go forward under more progressive national leadership.
And now the time has come. “I see a new awakening,” says Murphy. “The USCAP (Climate Action Partnership) is a great example of this. Here you have huge, diverse corporations working hard and with total sincerity. This isn’t easy, but they’re doing it. There are tough decisions that have to be made, and there is an abiding sense that the environment is an issue that is here to stay.”
I asked Robin for signs by which we can differentiate between real change from lip service.
“Oh, I’ve seen a great deal of candor – for instance, Duke Energy and Alstom both quit the American Coalition for Clean Coal because they didn’t see this as legitimate. There is huge, tangible change,” he explained. “Business decisions are being delayed and rerouted, as CEOs see legislation and regulation affecting the way they do business.”
“But what do you see driving this?” I asked.
“Is the change altruistic, you mean? Not now; it’s capitalistic. But I also see the worlds of sustainability and commerce converging, as companies find cost-effective ways to change their business practices in the direction of sustainability.”
I told Robin that I’d love to believe this, though I am challenged to take it at face value.
“All I can tell you is that it’s very gratifying to see CAP holding together,” he explained. “It gives me a very good feeling.”
You can ask me what I think on this tomorrow, and I may give you a different answer. But today, I believe that, regardless of the motive, we are all on a rocket-ride toward environmental sensitivity. There are too many people paying attention now for this to go in the wrong direction. And, as Robin pointed out, the costs of renewables are coming down, and the enormous costs of not shifting are becoming more clear. Soon, even those who see this purely as a business issue will be on board.
As I continue to learn and write about the energy industry I feel a growing need for fairness. Anyone can sit on the sidelines and throw stones. And Lord knows, there are plenty of great targets for stones when you look at where the oil and coal companies have taken us over the last century. But here, I provide a brief examination of the need for fairness in reporting on the subject.
In a story that one of my people is preparing on British Petroleum, I see that it’s clear that the company’s ostensible interest in renewables is quickly being displaced by executives’ and shareholders’ demand for profits. Apparently, it has discarded its previous vision of moving toward renewables as suggested by its slogan “Beyond Petroleum” which has been articulated as the organization’s rallying cry since 2000.
BP made profits of $25.6 billion in 2008, up 27% from 2007, but has engaged in vigorous job-cutting and other cost reduction, and, in the process has downgraded renewables to the pint of insignificance. Last April, it closed its solar manufacturing plants in Spain and the U.S. Finally last June, the axe fell on the Alternative Energy unit BPs CEO dismantled its London headquarters.
My researcher wrote that BP is keeping its focus on biofuels, but notes that this is only because that “is in the best interest of BP.” Here, I wonder if this isn’t a little unfair. Can we really expect BP to do things that aren’t in its interests? Yes, we can expect them to keep their promises, and not deliberately mislead us about their motives and actions. But here I think we’ve touched the very essence of the problem. As I noted in my post called Bill Moyers and Renewable Energy, the profit motive is the sole reason for the existence of the corporation.
The problem that renewable energy faces is very clear: Insofar as it’s not as profitable as fossil fuels, Big Energy can be counted on to fight it all the way. As a reporter, this is what I expect to find, and I am no more angry when I do find it than I am angry with a compass needle when I find it pointing north – that’s simply what it does. But again, in exchange for this dispassionate approach, I’d like to see some honesty in return. I’d advise the energy industry: don’t spend 75% of your advertising and PR budget convincing us of the philanthropy of your token efforts in renewables. In the end, you’ll come off looking better by telling us the truth.
I just got off the phone with Suzanne Shaw, the Director of Communications at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a 40 year-old non-profit organization headquartered in Boston. I made the call because I wanted an independent read on what I see as a change in public perception about global warming. To me, it seems that for the first time in years, a significant number of people are questioning the theory – and some actually perceive the whole idea is a hoax. Has there truly been some movement here, and if so, how did it happen?
Suzanne denies that there has been a change. “The people who attend to science believe that global climate change is underway, and that it’s largely due to human activity — mainly burning the forests and consuming fossil fuels,” she told me.
“So what I thought I was seeing doesn’t exist?” I asked.
“It is true that the companies in the fossil fuel industries have a vested interest in our continuing to consume these forms of energy; they have mounted powerful political campaigns to convince the public that global warming is not an issue, and to persuade Congress not to act. These campaigns take various forms, for example, the industry has formed allegiances with groups like the US Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers to tackle the issue from the economic perspective, convincing people that there will be dire consequences of taking action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”
“But don’t you find that unconscionable?” I asked.
I could hear a slight, uncomfortable chuckle on the other end of the phone. After a slight pause, she spoke: “Craig, I don’t pretend to see into the hearts and minds of other people. I can speak only for my organization and myself. Let’s just say that all of us here feel an obligation to future generations, to ensure that our children and our children’s children can enjoy a reasonable quality of life.”
“But let me ask you about the economic issue you raised. Don’t they have a point, given the financial pressure people find themselves under?” I asked.
“Ironically, the exact opposite is true.” Suzanne pointed out an article in today’s Wall Street Journalthat attempted to quantify the costs of various directions that could be taken regarding environmental protection. The article quoted a study by The NYU School of Law’s Institute for Policy Integrity, which asserted that there is a total of $2.27 directly saved from every dollar spent to reduce the activities that contribute to global warming.
There is climate legislation currently in the House. I guess we’ll find out soon how powerful these two positions are.
Here’s a quick video on the energy industry vs. renewables. I used Windows Movie Maker; I really like this platform; it’s certainly easier than shooting a video — for me at least. Hope you enjoy.
A number of readers have written in, noticing, with general approval, the developments in the 2GreenEnergy site itself. My partner, George Alger is hard at work making all this happen behind the scenes. He does great work, and I’m very appreciative.
In addition, there is something happening here that may be less obvious: people are writing in requesting that certain of us at 2GreenEnergy do work for them on a consulting or contractual basis. I’m already elbow-deep in writing business plans for clients, conducting market research projects, and providing certain other advice in the sales and marketing arena, which was my area of expertise for 25+ years.
But many of these business questions I’m receiving pertain to subjects in which I’m far from expert: legal, financial, organizational, engineering, etc. So, over the coming weeks, you will notice that we’ll be populating various 2GreenEnergy pages with reference to a set of “associates” who can assist renewable energy businesses in a full range of business disciplines.
Please feel free to write in and pose any business-related questions you may have on your mind, and we’ll try to get right back to you.
I happened to run into one of the most interesting people I could have hoped to meet at a chili cook-off I attended over the weekend: a university professor whose focus is hosting seminars on terrorism for graduate students. I spoke with him for over 30 minutes, hanging on every word. Here I bring you the basic ideas he communicated:
Terrorism, of course, is a tactic. It makes no sense to say you’re waging a “war on terrorism” any more that one would say you’re waging a “war on hand-grenades.” This use of language to pander to the masses represents the depths to which the US has fallen in the integrity with which it thinks and communicates.
One can’t fully address the terrorism that we see from Muslim Fundamentalists with a war of ideas. Yes, we can make the situation worse with the missteps of the warmongerish Bush Administration that has fostered Al Qaeda recruitment by creating intense hatred for the West. The Muslim world itself must iron out its own differences, and history has shown that this is a monumentally difficult thing to do. In any case, the challenge is not amenable to something like an advertising campaign from the West.
The real issue is the fanaticism of certain people who have risen to lofty places, having become highly respected by certain groups of disenfranchised Muslims. Extremist movements that have any chance of success almost always are derived from alienated people from privileged backgrounds. Peasant movements are normally squashed immediately, because they are the product of poor, uneducated people rising up in spontaneous anger with no real planning and foresight, and thus are usually crushed immediately by those in power. The privileged few, by contrast, have the education, as well as the time on their hands, to think through exactly what they are doing, what they feel their ideals ought to be, how they should recruit, raise funds, promote, operate, etc. This is the case with Al Qaeda.
I asked why this extremism isn’t attached to all monotheistic religions – why it doesn’t arise anyplace in which one group of people has the belief that “their God is better than someone else’s God.” He told me that indeed there are extremist Christians, trying to establish a theocratic United States, for example, but they’re generally regarded as the lunatic fringe, and they gain no traction.
When I asked why theocratic Christians fail, where Muslims succeed, he offered two explanations that I found fascinating:
a) Like the Old Testament and the New Testament in the Bible, the Koran has a new and an old part. However, unlike the Bible, where the angry, vengeful God of the Old Testament is replaced by the loving God of the New Testament, the case with the Koran is the reverse. During Mohammed’s life, his early followers were first at Mecca, and, though they were oppressed, things were generally hopeful, and thus the tenor of the religious scripture was one of peace and tolerance. Ten years later, they were forced to fight, and wound up at Medina. They survived the fight, and thus took away a kind of “bring it on” mentality. As a consequence, the writings that found their way into the Koran were generally bellicose and intolerant of “infidels.” And today, the interpretation of the Koran includes this idea: where there appears to be a contradiction between the old and the new, the new is to take precedence.
b) The Western world had its Age of Enlightenment, its French Revolution, and its US Constitution, all serving to divide church and state. And even our Bible contains passages that serve to tell us to separate religious from public matters, e.g., Matthew 22:21 in which Jesus said, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s.” There are no analogies in the Muslim world. The idea of a theocracy is an intrinsic part of the way Muslims think. While it’s true that certain Muslim nations tend to be stricter about the way Islam is imposed on all aspect of its citizens’ lives, the idea of a secular government really has no legs on which to stand.
You may be wondering why all this history has made it into a blog on renewable energy. Here’s your answer:
I asked, “Well let me ask you about the money that forms the power to make this all happen in the first place. I suppose this is really about oil. It would seem to me that, if it weren’t for the unfortunate geologic accident that these countries happen to be sitting on a large portion of the world’s oil reserves, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. They would be even more completely marginalized, and no one would care.” He believes that this is precisely correct. The only force making any of this relevant in today’s world is oil.
He wonders why a US government that is concerned about its own security is not doing everything it can to move away from oil. To him, it’s a complete mystery. I’m out of answers there too.
I don’t want to appear as if I don’t have a life outside of 2GreenEnergy, but each Friday night, I try to watch Bill Moyers’ Journal on PBS. Occasionally the content directly or indirectly affects the renewable energy debate, and last night was a good example. Two extremely senior constitutional attorneys took on a question that one of the two will be arguing in front of the US Supreme Court this week: does the right to free speech guaranteed under the First Amendment (including the right to exert pressure over the electoral process) extend to corporations?
Of course, this issue is central to the growing debate over where our democracy is headed and whether, as some say, it’s been abrogated so many times and so thoroughly that we no longer have a democracy in any meaningful sense of the word. As a citizen concerned that ordinary people are losing too much power to corporate giants, my immediate reaction was to favor restricting the rights of corporations to influence the political process in their own favor. Yes, there are campaign contribution limits, but the corporations, with their extensive legal support, exploit the many loopholes in the form of political action committees, etc. And, as someone pointed out on tonight’s show, the ultimate work-around is for the corporation simply to run a political campaign at its own expense, to elect representatives known to favor its positions. At first glance, this seemed to work against the ideals of our society — if only the idea of one person, one vote.
Yet I must say that I was swayed by the first speaker, whose claim was that the First Amendment does not identify who does and who does not have the right to free speech. He freely acknowledged that free speech isn’t free at all, that wealthy people can own television networks and newspaper chains, and thus enjoy hundreds – or probably millions — of times more “free speech” than you or I could possibly dream of affording. But we don’t restrict rich people’s freedom; and by extension, the fact that a corporation is big or wealthy does not mean that it must not communicate.
I must say that I was flummoxed on this issue and, as a fair-minded guy, I was about to give up hope and turn on Jeopardy! when the second speaker came on. But I’m happy to report that at the end, I think he won the day. He pointed out that corporations, defined under law as “fictitious persons” are given enormous power to achieve their one and only goal: to make a profit. Human beings, i.e., voters, are not fictitious, but real people. Unlike these fictitious persons, we get sick, we die, we are given no special powers outside of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and we have a multitude of interests: familial, religious, social, etc. If we now grant corporations, who have by force of law unnatural profit-making powers the right to communicate without restriction about matters of their one concern (profit), they will use that profit to exert extreme pressure on the political process — potentially at the expense of human voters.
He went on to point out that ExxonMobil made $85 billion last year, and, if left unrestricted, could ensure the election of only those who would work against global warming mitigation. He also mentioned that the coal and nuclear lobbies, funded similarly, could make it impossible for these industries ever to be brought down — even by fair competition from renewables. This, for what it’s worth, is *exactly* what is happening now as I see it.
It will certainly be interesting to see on what side the Supreme Court comes down.
In any case, for those readers who may be new, this blog follows three different courses within the issues that surround renewable energy: the scientific, business, and political/philosophical issues. I argue that anyone serious about pursuing a clean energy business needs to have a solid understanding of all three “legs of the stool,” so to speak. And to that end, I’ve recently begun working on bringing on contributing authors to augment each of these three discussion threads. If any of you wish to make such contributions, please contact me.
Over the next few days, I’ll be posting a few articles on my company’s work with the island nation of Bermuda. From the standpoint of the raw facts, Bermuda is probably the best candidate on the planet to “go green” in a big way. As a people, they’re wealthy and enlightened. As a tourist destination, they’re anxious to make a statement. As a physical locale, they suffer from the pollution of their power plant’s historic reliance upon diesel. And as a candidate for electric transportation, can anything be more auspicious than expensive gas, high tariffs on internal combustion engine cars, short driving distances and low speed limits?
At this point, I would like to introduce you to the Bermuda Electric Light, Power & Traction Company or BELCO – the power utility that is wrestling with a great number of alternatives to fossil fuels: solar, wind, tidal, etc. I invite you to read the reports of the vendors that have been asked to create proposals for five different green technologies. As you read these documents, perhaps you’ll be thinking along the same lines that I am: How many do they really need? Isn’t one better (probably FAR better) than the other four?
I’m always amused by the pundits who say that we in the US need to blend many different alternative fuels. Outside of politics, exactly why? Given the configuration of our land mass vis-à-vis the sun’s path, our predominant wind patterns, the location and depth of our subterranean pockets of heat, the flow of our rivers, and the nature of our ocean currents, isn’t there one best solution? I think so.
One hears a great deal about the cyclical rebound in many of the phenomena we come across in our lives – especially political and financial. I’m always amused by the consultants who urge us to invest in blue chip stocks like General Electric and so forth, on the basis that they’ve taken a momentary downturn, but they always come back. Hey, don’t panic, kid — it’s business as usual — it’s feast and famine. But stop and think. Do you know the normal consequence of famine in nature? It’s Death. It’s Extinction.
My point is not to depress you. I don’t think of myself as a cynic; I think of myself as a pragmatist. I’m here to point to what’s real. And that reality is that we are all directly and systematically oppressed. We are all being deliberately lied to and confused by the energy industry.
OK, but what’s new here? Hasn’t the common man been on the receiving end of the deceit of the super-rich pretty much throughout recorded history? As far as I can tell, the answer is yes. But a hundred years ago when we suffered under the exploitation of the great robber barons, the consequences of those lies by the powerful and ruthless people of the day were monopolies and economic depressions. But now, the consequences are the ruination of our oceans, our atmosphere, and the generally hospitable climate on the only planet we have.
So here’s my point. Don’t expect a miracle. In fact, I have a prediction: There will be no miracle. If there is a chance for us, it will come from you and me with our sleeves rolled up, working hard to expose the facts, and make big changes — fast. We live under tyranny – a tyranny of corporatocracy and corruption, where the huge interests of the energy industry are determined to do everything they can to defeat renewables. Why? Why are money and power so alluring to some people who live on the same dying planet with you and me? I don’t know. That’s beyond me. Ask them if you get a chance and let me know. All I’m trying to say that this: if you and I don’t create a huge impact on our way of life right now, we will not get another chance.
Henry Kissinger said not too long ago that if it weren’t for the opposition of the common American to the war in Vietnam, we’d still be there. That’s amazing, isn’t it? An admission of the truth: By the early 1970s, the war had become so unpopular that our leaders in Washington were forced to take a different course.
The situation now is the same. The great oil, coal, and nuclear energy companies and the lobbies that own the congressmen who create the policy at their behest will turn this planet into a wasteland in which only the super rich will have any real quality of life – unless we do something.
Over the coming weeks, you’ll see more functionality here on 2GreenEnergy that will enable us all to become more vocal and more active in making a real change in world energy policy. Let’s hope there’s still time.
Robin Murphy, Vice President for External Relations at the 
As I continue to learn and write about the energy industry I feel a growing need for fairness. Anyone can sit on the sidelines and throw stones. And Lord knows, there are plenty of great targets for stones when you look at where the oil and coal companies have taken us over the last century. But here, I provide a brief examination of the need for fairness in reporting on the subject.
Over the next few days, I’ll be posting a few articles on my company’s work with the island nation of Bermuda. From the standpoint of the raw facts, Bermuda is probably the best candidate on the planet to “go green” in a big way. As a people, they’re wealthy and enlightened. As a tourist destination, they’re anxious to make a statement. As a physical locale, they suffer from the pollution of their power plant’s historic reliance upon diesel. And as a candidate for electric transportation, can anything be more auspicious than expensive gas, high tariffs on internal combustion engine cars, short driving distances and low speed limits?
