Our collective failure to see that the current economic crisis is merely a symptom of a wider ecological crisis, fueled by our short term greed, willingness to mortgage the future and an anthropocentric (human centred) approach to resources, is the politics of the cul-de-sac. It is good that the USA is setting car emission standards and benchmarks for renewable energy supply, but one can't help feeling that this is all too little too late. A spokesman for the Obama administration recognised, on BBC last night, that it isn't enough, but stated that because George Bush refused to take action, they are some way behind and this is just reality. Whilst this may well be the political reality, the ecological reality doesn't care and is unforgiving.
It is not so much that politicians are irrelevant, they are not. Without them we cannot create and legitimise new policy tools and markets, as carbon trading illustrates perfectly. However, if we wait for politicians, we wait for innovation that is simply not forthcoming. Imagine if the world had waited for governments to organise and structure the telecoms markets from the 1980's onward. We would all still be waiting weeks for a fixed line. Only when public interest was aligned with corporate interest (profit potential) did real innovation emerge.
It is refreshing to see how companies are bringing forth new products and business models that harness the need to reduce environmental impact and improve the customer experience. These last weeks have brought us the first production electric motorcycle with credible performance abilities, whose only drawback is limited range. However, this is remarkably similar to the first mobile phones, and one suspects will evolve along a similar trajectory. Interestingly it was not brought to market by a large established manufacturer, but by an entrepreneurial inventor, backed by a Silicon Valley investment fund. Given the collapse of the traditional model of car manufacturing at such hallowed names as GM and Chrysler could a new business model of car ownership be the way forward? This is the idea of Shai Agassi, who believes it is not car technology that is the problem so much as the business model itself. He argues that adopting a model similar to mobile phone ownership, where in exchange for a contract we select a car, whose performance characteristics determine how far and what price we can travel. Such a strategy would enable the construction of re-charging points, reduce consumer capital outlay, push purchasing decisions towards small and beautiful cars and undoubtedly be based upon battery driven vehicles.
Mr. Agassi, a brilliant salesman, may, or may not, be right, but this does illustrate that giving the expression “new green deal” meaning is as much about thinking outside of the box as it is about engineering. Of all the research being offered to the car companies and other industrial giants to develop 'greener' products and services, I wonder how much of that money and effort is being allocated to rethinking the way that people work together and develop ideas. One suspects that the future of our economy and thus our ecology is to be found in the garages and notepads of middle managers across the world. Reaching those people and harnessing their talents, maybe inefficient, costly and difficult, but in the past it has brought us HP, Apple and Virgin. This time the stakes are too high not to try.
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
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