I am feeling inspired and somewhat elated currently. The stream of positive news in the renewable energy space has been thunderous today. Perhaps because it is Earth Day. Perhaps it is because we are experiencing a shift of such magnitude that the feeble confines of traditional thinking can no longer contain it. Today Tesla released further details on their home battery. Today reports stating that new construction of renewably generated power facilities has overtaken coal, oil, and natural gas combined. Today a solar powered plane commenced its journey across the Pacific Ocean. Today a greater number of us around the world celebrated our march toward energy independence than ever before. How did this all happen? When did it start? How did change come about so quickly…?
Unfortunately, I am not a social or cultural anthropologist, nor a PhD in economics. I am, however, someone who likes to simplify things. I am constantly at odds with my amusement and my frustration with the resistance to change most often observed in the vast majority of humans when that change does come. Which is daily by the way. But if the cause is right enough, or the situation dire enough, then broad, sweeping, gigantic, awesome change comes so swiftly and so completely, that we almost change overnight and instantly forget what it was like before that change occurred. As an example – people like examples – I like examples – as an example, recycling. The mindset and habits of multiple nations, simultaneously, almost instantaneously, changed. Now I was pretty young when the change happened, but it seemed like the entire world went from throwing anything and everything mindlessly into the trash, to sorting, stacking, bundling, tying, and separating overnight. Recycling was not an easy thing to do in the beginning, either. And it was messy. And there was no real personal, immediate, noticeable benefit in the instant gratification kind of way that is usually sought after. But it happened. the world embraced the extra effort, the confusion of what went with what, and what was not actually allowable even though intuitively it seemed like it should be.
I am hyper aware that this not only does not answer the question of how did the giant shift to renewables happen, but it adds another ‘how did it happen’ onto the pile. Again, I believe when the purpose and cause are true enough, when humanity connects deeply enough on an issue of such vital importance, change happens. Change at the deepest level. And here we are again. At Bluewater Energy we salute the rapid onset of renewable energy, the exponentially increasing capacity of solar generated power, the end of fossil fuel as a means of producing heat and electricity, and the birth of a new economy where no one person, corporation, or government holds dominion over it.
So on this Earth Day, celebrate the small victories – the little cottage that went off-grid – and the big wins – that new renewable energy generating capacity is now outpacing that of fossil fuel facilities. Celebrate an unregulated, non-taxable, unowned, royalty free source of power. And celebrate Energy Independence, which is where this all leads to. Energy Independence for individuals, for businesses, and for nations. As a great human in another era of sweeping change once said: “This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” Winston Churchill. Every solar module counts. Every renewably generated electron matters. Every individual who steps forward and embraces this change makes the world better.