PrintEnergy, Environment, and Society
What is the role of energy when you think of a specific geographic region as an ecosystem? Do our energy and environmental systems respect state (and national) boundaries?
What is the role of water in energy demand and use in different countries or geographic regions of countries? Is there an environmental implication to our energy planning decisions based on a competition for water as a basic human need (again in what geographical contexts)?
Global perspective prompts us to think about the context and scope of our energy planning decisions.
Context and Scope?
Merriam-Webster defines context as "the situation in which something happens: the group of conditions that exist where and when something happens". So, think cultural scenarios, weather influences, timeframes, etc. (e.g., The native people haven't had potable water access in years as a result of the pipeline project.)
Scope is defined as " the extent of influence or the range of operation". You can remember this by thinking geographically or numerically. (e.g., The pollution plume stretched 1,100 up and down the east coast.)
How do you know how to prepare for a different audience, or an audience that you are unfamiliar with? What strategies could you use to present energy information to audiences with a different view of context and scope than your own?
Envision yourself not in your hometown but instead in Alabama, Nigeria, Canada, or China and trying to introduce the idea of a new wind farm project to the local people. How would you adapt your message to meet the needs of this new audience? In what ways do you need to be adaptive?
Consider this…
Two different wind farm projects were proposed near Altoona, PA. Both were on the same mountain range, had similar wind prospects and very similar rural PA cultural backgrounds. And yet, one was successfully developed into an energy production plant while the other was not.
One was spearheaded by a nearby private college which engaged and involved the surrounding community in the project planning and implementation. The other was a corporate proposal from a company without ties to the area. Can you guess which effort was successful?
The project that involved the local population was infinitely more successful. The college's efforts to treat the local community as stakeholders and understand their perspective allowed the project team to better address the community member's concerns. It also allowed the project team to tailor the information to meet the needs of the stakeholders and therefore communicate with them successfully.
These two scenarios demonstrate a cooperative, inclusive approach vs a top-down, exclusive approach. Cooperative efforts typically take more time and money up front, but the opposite approach can be fatal to a project.
Where do we fit?
As you search the Internet or read the papers, you will find many articles related to energy solutions that come from all around the globe. However, these descriptions often have the reader asking more questions than anything else. This is because readers will naturally ask themselves, "How would this work in my own context?"
You will find yourself coming back to this question repeatedly as a professional in an energy or sustainability policy related field. All across the globe, at every scale of governance, people are implementing innovative and creative solutions to some of our biggest challenges, and there is a lot we can learn from the triumphs and missteps that occur. Putting these ideas into different contexts to account for cultural, environmental, and economic differences is key to understanding what could work for us here at home.