How are green energy marketers promoting renewable and sustainable energy sources in today’s marketplace? As the cost of oil increases, it becomes easier for marketers to promote alternative sources of energy as people go through the pain of paying high gas prices at the pump and energy bills for their home or business.

As the cost of traditional sources of energy has fluctuated from all time highs to again 5 year affordable lows, it’s been hard for marketers to come up with a consistent message to get a good foothold on promoting renewable and sustainable energy sources that drive change in society.

Two things will make messaging become more constant and drive industrial change.

1. The technologies of developing alternative energy sources will decrease

As these technologies come down in price, it will allow for the production of alternative energy to be more comparable with traditional energy sources. Once marketers can move away from the cost savings of alternative energy they’ll be able to focus on the environmental and health issues that using alternative fuel sources will solve.

2. As renewable energy prices drop, the prices will remain more stable than traditional energy sources

Most renewable energy sources have a predictable amount of energy that can be produced over time. This does not mean that the amount of energy produced by a renewable energy source will remain constant, but the prediction of how much it will produce will.

Even with these challenges, green energy marketing will improve as the industry becomes more stable and it starts to consolidate to a unified standard. The renewable and sustainable organizations will start to see a better return on their investment as well.

It will continue to be exciting to see the new technologies and vehicles that will eventually drive us into the future!

On October 19, 2009, the Progressive Insurance Automotive X PRIZE announced that 53 vehicles from 43 teams, from 18 US States and 11 countries had made it through the stringent Design Judging phase. These teams will now be entering the final competition events that will be taking place from May 2010 with the announcement of the winners that Fall. On the same day, Dash+, a high school contest to design the dashboard of the vehicle of the future was launched. Part of the Progressive Automotive X PRIZE Education Program, it is supported by the US Department of Energy and Discovery Education. Find out more at: fuelourfuturenow.com/contest or go to: progressiveautoxprize.org

You can see the Design Phase Qualified Teams for Progressive Insurance Automotive X PRIZE here:

You’ve been greening your house by installing solar panels on your roof, you’ve been greening your workplace by recycling and reusing old paper, you’ve greened your car by buying a Prius, you’ve been greening your entire life, sometimes without knowing why. You have green up to your eyeballs. With all these changes in your life, do you even know if you’ve actually helped the environment?

The products you buy may be considered “green”, but is the manufacturing of those items green? In many cases, no.

Many of the green products you buy actually produce more waste into the environment than the product saves over a period of 1, 5, or even 10 years. So in actuality, you’re not any more green than before, the only thing that has changed is where the pollution comes from.

The cost to produce some of these “green” products are higher than average because the technologies behind them are more complex.

Until these green products are produced using renewable energy, we will not see a decrease in the overall pollution of a product.

We will eventually run out of oil, that is a fact. We don’t know if it will be in the next 20 years, 50 years, or 200 years. We don’t even have to run out of oil to be “out” of oil because once the economics of oil becomes too expensive, oil will no longer be produced or sold.

So eventually we will run out, but who cares, what can you do about it?

All you have to do is be aware that this is going to happen.

Do you what to be part of the problem, or do you what to be part of the solution?

If you thought about it long enough to care, I’m sure you want to be part of the solution.

Do you have to change your lifestyle to help be part of the solution? No.

All you have to do is be aware that the green movement is going to happen, and support where you can.

Does this mean you have to donate money or time to support the cause? No.

All you have to do is nod your head in approvement when you see some of the awesome technologies being developed.

Does this mean that you have to buy an electric car or put solar panels on your roof? No.

All you have to do is say, that’s awesome that those people are working on improving the world through alternative energy.

It seems like each week I read, hear, or see a new method and technology to produce my garbage into a form of biofuel that will generate enough energy to run my truck for 100mpg!

Now, this isn’t a bad thing. I love to see all these technologies being developed as a proof of concept, and then if it has enough legs underneath it, get some seed capital to manufacture and create some prototypes. I have seen literally hundreds of different technologies that produce energy from an alternative source and I am always amazed at the human ingenuity.

We are in an exciting part of history. What’s happening in the alternative energy sector today reminds me of what happened to the personal computer industry in the 80’s. At the beginning of the decade, there were hundreds of different computer manufacture’s as the personal computer began to be manufactured and sold to consumers around the world. The dominate companies were able to standardize their personal computers and it forced the smaller players to get out of the market.

The same thing is happening with alternative energy technologies right now. Over the next 3-5 years we will begin to see more of the technologies that will be considered the “standard” for each alternative energy source. Once that happens, prices will become very competitive and begin to drop, thus becoming more economical for everyone to purchase and use.

The exciting part about all of this is watching it happen in front of our eyes. Which alternative energy sources will become the primary player? What technologies will become part of everyday living? How will our world be different once this is all in place?

I have my thoughts about many of these questions and I’ve written about quite a few of them. Over the next couple of weeks I’m going to cover more of these questions in more detail and I’ll try to paint more of a picture of the future in your mind.

Due to the economy and drop in oil prices it’s just not economical to develop wind farms in the Texas panhandle. The wind energy market has lost a lot of it’s luster considering it can be much more expensive than traditional energy sources such as oil and with the price per barrel of oil dropping below $70 there’s just not as much interest putting together a wind energy project.

The economics of alternative energy will be the driving force of innovation and technology. As long as the prices stay low, there won’t be much advancement in the alternative energy sector, but as oil prices increase, you will see many more technologies and innovation coming from alternative energy sources.

Are there any solutions to our ever growing dependence on foreign oil? Couldn’t we just drill more here? Is alternative energy the only solution?

I just watched a speech by Malcolm Gladwell on spaghetti sauce where he spoke of about the food industry’s pursuit of the perfect spaghetti sauce, that would make everyone satisfied. The basic conclusion that he revealed is that there is no single sauce that would please everyone, but that you must produce a couple different variants of the same sauce (spicy, chunky, original) to satisfy the majority of the people. This was groundbreaking when the research came out because for decades, the food industry had a single solution that they believed would satisfy the most people and since they were content with their sales, they didn’t bother to test new recipes and didn’t innovate.

I’ve been thinking about this same concept in regards to the energy industry and how it can be applied. The basic thinking in energy is that oil is the way to go. It’s what we’ve been doing for the past 100 years and it’s what will keep us going in the future, so don’t waste any time with alternative energy, we just need to find more oil.

On the flip side, the people that are against traditional energy say that alternative energy is the only way to go, it’s what will get us off our addiction of foreign oil.

Both sides of these arguments are narrow minded. Neither of them look for solutions on the other side, or a way to intertwine them both.

So what’s the solution?

I’m going to dig a little deeper into this topic, but for now I just want to leave you with a thought. If technology was developed for automobiles to get 200 miles per gallon, would we want to spend our money and time in research and development of electric cars?

The Pros of Alternative Fuels

Alternative fuels such as bio-diesel, bio-alcohol, fuel cells, hydrogen, non-fossil methane, non-fossil natural gas and vegetable oil are now well known and deemed to be greatly more desirable in the quest to to fuel our vehicles. There are a number of benefits to using alternative fuels. Firstl, alternative fuel-powered vehicles will emit less harmful gasses into the air resulting in less pollution. Biodiesel is also completely renewable as its primary source is vegetable oil. So there is no need to throw out used oil as it can be collected and refined. Secondl, these fuels can also prolong the engine life of your vehicle and are generally cheaper than conventional fuels. Thirdl, they burn more efficiently and will therefore help you save money. In addition to this, using alternative fuels will also help countries to end their dependency on foreign oil.

The Cons of Alternative Fuels

Although alternative fuels are becoming more and more popular, they are not yet perfected. Alternative fuel vehicles are substantially more expensive than conventional fuel vehicles and at the moment it seems that only the more affluent members of our society can afford these ECO friendly cars. Alternative fuels are also not readily available and often finding a gas station to fill your alternative fuel car can be quite a feat. As this technology is new, there are also few places that can service these cars.

Another reason that I don’t like any sort of “biofuels” as an energy source is that it will still adhere to economics supply and demand. If there’s a bad crop, or if there’s any other shortage in a biofuel, prices will rise.

This is a reason why I’m a strong supporter of alternative energy in the solar, geothermal, and wind industries. These types of alternative energy, although the technology is not quite there yet, is more predictable and more stable than any sort of biofuel.

I don’t doubt that we are still in for many years of debate on the benefits and drawbacks of alternative fuels. The most important issue however, has to be conserving the world we live in.

The teams, which collectively represent 136 vehicle entries with 14 different fuel sources, include diverse groups from 25 U.S. states and 11 countries. Established automakers, emerging start-ups, universities and inventors are among those represented. Six of the Registered Teams remain confidential.

The contestants will continue to work on their vehicles through the rest of 2009 and the winner will be announced sometime in 2010. As it gets closer to the announcement date, I will review the top contestants and give their strong points and things that they need to work on to create a vehicle that will be commercially viable.

Good luck to all!

Using smart grid technology, your future home would be as likely to be powered by electricity from a neighbor’s roof-top solar panel, or a biomass generator on the edge of town, as from a traditional power plant 50 or 100 miles away.

This setup would be great, however there’s still too few people who understand how it all works. Even though the “Smart Grid” is gaining momentum, there are some obstacles still in the way.

The technology needed to create such a “Smart Grid” is still years away as our current infrastructure’s technology is outdated. There are companies that are working on the “Smart Grid” to make the necessary changes to the infrastructure. With more companies entering this space, the idea of a “Smart Grid” is becoming more of a reality.