Overview

Overview

Now that you are familiar with market interactions along with the arguments for renewable energy and its relationship to sustainability, we will begin to investigate a variety of renewable energy options and needs for bridging energy strategies (from fossil to renewable). Here, we will look at various renewable energy options from a political and environmental drivers perspective as well as from a markets perspective. Further, you will become familiar with various projections about renewable energy demands forecast by global organizations and will develop tools to help you keep track of and analyze the varieties of materials you will collect over the rest of the course.

Looking forward, the development of a renewable energy nonmarket strategy requires an understanding of the context in which these technologies will be applied, including social, environmental, and political conditions – something we will cover in the coming lessons on nonmarket strategies. But first, we need to get more familiar with our renewable energy options and how their markets operate accordingly.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this lesson, you should be able to:

• detail the different techno-social aspects of each of the main forms of renewable energy;
• make the connections between climate change and renewable energy;
• describe why climate change will become a significant driver/determinant of renewable energy markets; and
• categorize the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT) of each of the major forms of renewables, i.e., conduct a basic SWOT analysis of RE techs.
• Advanced Option - Level 1: Give arguments for why an emissions reduction strategy will depend on RE.
• Advanced Option - Level 2: Present an argument for why a renewable energy portfolio needs to be diverse.

What is due for Lesson 4?

This lesson will take us one week to complete. Please refer to the Course Syllabus for specific time frames and due dates. Specific directions for the assignment below can be found within this lesson.

Questions?

If you have any questions, please post them to our Questions? discussion forum (not e-mail), located under the Discussions tab in Canvas. I will check that discussion forum daily to respond. While you are there, feel free to post your own responses if you, too, are able to help out a classmate.