The Distributed Revolution

The war for energy democracy

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One of my favorite quotes is Wimpy’s: “I’ll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.”

It’s an insightful commentary by the writers of the Popeye cartoon that reminds me of today’s rampant energy consumption. That hot greasy crude burger, sweet Saudi fixins, a side of bite-sized anthracite...

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A group of business leaders, confused over the mismatch between what its members read and what they see on the street, is trying to set the record straight through a series of newsletters. “All across America, we’re witnessing clean energy jobs being created almost every day—helping to rebuild...

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The companies that are best weathering the recession are in the IT industry. It seems almost like a different world in San Francisco and Silicon Valley, in Seattle and tech hubs in Denver, Portland and New York and all across the country. What recession they say? These companies flush with cash and giant consumers of energy for servers are going green in a big way. 

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If the U.S. Marine Corp understands the power of clean energy. Why isn’t its use more widespread?  

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The most dangerous jobs in Iraq and Afghanistan are protecting fuel supplies. Clean energy is also local and distributed energy. Its impossible to bring down with an attack as its everywhere. Makes us more secure and cleaner. 

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Germany has seized upon renewable energy development as a way of retreating from power sources such a nuclear and coal. Their strategy is not only better for the environment, it is good economics as it is making them more energy independent and is creating jobs for German workers.

“With...

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Germany who has a solar radiance on par with Maine, is the leader in solar energy. What is wrong with this picture?!?

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Nearly a decade in the making, Cape Wind - what will be America’s first offshore wind farm - was a done deal after receiving federal approval in April. Or so it seemed. Ever since, anti-wind groups have fought tooth and nail against the project, which would power most of Cape Cod and...

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Its amazing the time and effort spent on massive energy projects, from the crazily dangerous drilling of deep ocean rigs, the polluting fracking technologies, enormous wind farms and solar plants too far from population centers where power is actually needed.

Now this is not to say that wind farms and solar projects have no role, or that natural gas is not a useful bridge to a clean energy future. But the reality is that distributed solar at the local level on the millions of empty roofs, enormous parking lots and other concrete strips and miles and miles of highway are prime for renewable energy without all these giant hurdles. They are safer as well from terrorist threats and natural disasters because they are spread everywhere like the internet which never goes down.

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Financial Innovation that actually helps

How long until we stop ignoring the thousands of empty roofs around each of our neighborhoods and communities that are bathing in sun day after day that is not being harvested?  Financial models and smart implementation are key to taking advantage of these untapped resources and we do not need giant banks and the government to do it. Solar Mosaic is one of the innovators in the "crowd sourced" funding of solar. We all can contribute to the distributed revolution.

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We are moving through a period of global economic transition. The new economy will favor complexity over hierarchy, and work with ecosystems and civil society, to achieve a more harmonious relationship between individuals and their environment. There are certain key points that will define...

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Local energy is democratic energy. When we are all the power producers we are all involved just like the internet enabled us to all be writers, create music, share video, etc... the traditional centralized media broke down and the same will happen to the centralized power generation of today.

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There has been lots of “he said she said” over green jobs, and whether they are truly benefiting the economy. Part of the controversy is related to semantics and differing interpretations of “green,” but there is one segment that appears to be expanding. Sustainability departments. Big...

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Sustainable jobs are going to be the stable good jobs of the future.

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Make no mistake there is a battle brewing and the first shots have been fired by Marin County and now Boulder, CO. Both municipalities separated from their large Investor Owned Utilities (IOUs) in order to get the clean energy that Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) and Xcel Energy refused or were unable to provide. Both IOUs spent millions and millions on votes that both were shot down by the public.  As long as the utilities remain stuck in this old model of centralized technocratic (elite) run power companies that simply dont work in the age of distributed solar, wind, and other renewables and an energy internet.

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The massive amount of information, every watt that is used and produced by millions of homes and businesses present an incredible growth market for cloud computing, IT professionals and big data companies. IBM, GE and Microsoft are already positioning themselves to be big players in this market, but who will be the innovators that challenge the traditional players?

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eye-on-earth:

Betting On Clean Energy by Third Way on Flickr.

Pictures worth a thousand words.