PrintGlobal Perspective
Global perspective, another core competency of the ESP program, prompts us to think about the context and scope of our energy planning decisions. It is often easy to find common ground with those who share our language, cultural norms, locale, and economic standing. In this program, you are challenged to step out of your comfort zone and walk in someone else's shoes, so to speak.
It is important to be aware of our own bias and cultural perspective with respect to the rest of the world. In ESP, we try to cultivate our awareness of biases and perspectives of "the other."
Why is it important to understand people, cultures, and practices that are different from us and our experiences? Because we know that energy-related issues (e.g., resource conversion, demand, exchange, and unwanted emissions) typically extend beyond political boundaries and insulated societies. Energy projects can exceed the scope of the immediate community of interested clients and often have regional or global impacts.
Energy, 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? Context and scope are everything in unfamiliar scenarios.
Consider this…
Two different wind farm projects were proposed in a rural area. Both were on the same mountain range, had similar wind prospects, and the locals both had very similar rural cultural backgrounds. And yet, one was successfully developed into an energy production plant while the other was not.
One was spearheaded by a group which engaged and involved the surrounding community in the project planning and promised to continue community involvement through project implementation. The other was a proposed from a company that never reached out to the community until required to by law and made no effort to understand the community's concerns. Can you guess which effort was successful?
The project that involved the local population was infinitely more successful. The first group's efforts to treat the local community as stakeholders and understand their perspective allowed the project team to better connect with the community and implement a win/win project scenario for most involved. It also allowed the project team to tailor 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 - especially when encountering an unfamiliar context. It is a best practice to not ever assume that you fully know a community, the stakeholders, or their concerns!
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.