What kinds
of people do we imagine inhabit the world?
This
question came to mind as I was reading the Executive Summary of America’s
Energy Future, a forthcoming report from the National Academy of
Engineering (its pre-publication draft is posted on the National Academy of
Sciences website). America’s Energy Future was written to help
policymakers sort through the technological choices facing society’s efforts to
establish a more climate-friendly energy system. What struck me most
immediately, however, were the kinds of people who lived in America’s Energy
Future.
·
First,
and most prominently, the report’s Executive Summary imagines significant roles
for scientists and engineers involved in long-term efforts to develop,
demonstrate, and deploy new energy technologies. These are the heroes of the
story.
·
Second,
in one location, the report’s Executive Summary imagines that people might be
consumers of electricity whose costs are likely to go up. These folks are the
innocent bystanders.
·
And,
third, in its final key finding, the report’s Executive Summary imagines that
people are barriers to energy system change who will need financial incentives
if they are to accept new energy technologies and change their behavioral
patterns. These folks are the villians.
That’s it.
Now, don’t
get me wrong. People will play these roles in America’s Energy Future.
But that they are the only roles imagined is a bit disheartening. Where are all
the other kinds of people who live in this country? And where are future kinds
of people who will either come into existence as a result of our energy choices
or who might appear if only we can figure out how to call them into being?
·
Where
are the millions of Americans who already factor energy use into their
consumption patterns?
·
Where
are the social and business entrepreneurs pursuing innovative ways to create
sustainable energy or enhance energy efficiency?
·
Where
are the activists who’ve agitated for renewable energy and strong climate
policy and those who’ve agitated against plans to construct concentrated solar
power facilities or wind turbines in places where they might not ought to be?
·
Where
are the individuals and families, each living their own lives, struggling to
make ends meet, facing complex trade-offs and poor sets of options regarding
where to live, how to live, and what kind of work to do – and all of the energy
consumption dimensions that go along with those choices?
·
Where
are those who don’t currently have access to affordable energy?
·
Where
are the folks who just work a little bit harder to help other people make sound
energy choices (I’m not referring to the otherwise helpful Home Depot guy the
other day who tried to convince me not to buy compact fluorescents for my flood
lighting because they wouldn’t put out enough light)?
·
Where
are the billions of US and global stakeholders in energy system change whose
lives and livelihoods are caught up in the shape of current and future energy
systems, who will live next to them, work in them, see them on their daily
commute, buy stock in them, depend on them for energy, or are otherwise
impacted by them?
·
Where
are the well-informed energy consumers who have access to good information
about all of the energy consumption consequences of the choices that they make
and a good set of options to choose from?
·
Where
are the communities and citizens with adequate capacity to engage as full and
informed partners in choosing energy futures and future energy systems? And
where are the businesses, utilities, and government agencies willing to have
them on as full partners in this exercise?
·
Where
are all the people who will have to adapt to new ways of living, new kinds of
work, new daily practices because of decisions by people halfway around the
world who’ve they’ve never met?
All of these
people have a place and a stake in America’s energy future. They’ll certainly
have to live in and with that future. Indeed, if climate scientists are right, all
of humanity has a stake in America’s choices about its energy future. And we
are all complex, dynamic people, with hopes, dreams, fears, aspirations,
values, know-how, rights, responsibilities, and commitments to diverse views of
the kind of future we’d like to live in. We are not economic or behavioral
models. It would be nice if the leaders of efforts to create America’s
Energy Future would imagine us as we really are, in the full glory of our
humanity.
Choices
about the design of energy systems for the future are ultimately choices about
human identity and community – about what kinds of communities we live in and
how the risks and benefits of modern societies are distributed. What is needed
is a new approach to making these kinds decisions that recognizes the depth of
everyone’s stakes in the energy future we choose to build. Democracy demands
it. Energy planners are remaking one of the core foundations of modern society,
and we should subject their efforts to all manner of democratic deliberation
and accountability.
About
the Author:
Clark Miller is associate director of CSPO and
associate professor of science policy and political science.
