<div>Excuse me but this is exactly what I mean by preaching and moral superiority.</div><div><br></div>We don't know if they have morals or not. If we relied purely on the morals of the manufacturers, we're in trouble. We need to create a market and incentives where their morals don't matter.<div>
<br clear="all">---- Steve (KZ6LSD)<br>
<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Tue, Aug 30, 2011 at 12:03 PM, Benjamin Pratt <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:benjamin.g.pratt@gmail.com">benjamin.g.pratt@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;">
Speaking of "letting the market decide" (and this has to do with my<br>
discipline of industrial design):<br>
Manufacturers--99 percent of them anyway--don't care about morals. And<br>
most of them don't care about real profits. What they care about is<br>
what their stock is doing. Basically, a bunch of over-caffinated,<br>
reactionary loud mouths on the trading floor have a lot more influence<br>
over what is made then do the consumers, or even the designers, in my<br>
opinion.<br>
Ben<br>
<div><div></div><div class="h5"><br>
On Tue, Aug 30, 2011 at 10:24 AM, Steven Tjiang <<a href="mailto:steve@tjiang.org">steve@tjiang.org</a>> wrote:<br>
> More or less agree with you. There is only one thing that really works:<br>
> increase energy price and scarcity. We can set good examples of what is<br>
> possible but to expect the rest of the north america to see the examples for<br>
> they are we need energy prices to go up.<br>
> ---- Steve (KZ6LSD)<br>
><br>
><br>
> On Tue, Aug 30, 2011 at 8:17 AM, Reuben Deumling <<a href="mailto:9watts@gmail.com">9watts@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>
>><br>
>><br>
>> On Tue, Aug 30, 2011 at 7:51 AM, Steven Tjiang <<a href="mailto:steve@tjiang.org">steve@tjiang.org</a>> wrote:<br>
>>><br>
>>> It is all true that "dryers" are not essential but claiming moral<br>
>>> superiority or nonessentialness may work in this forum but it isn't going to<br>
>>> work for the general public.<br>
>><br>
>> I'm glad you brought this up, Steven. This is a common enough theme in the<br>
>> work that I do. Once upon a time principled advice was dispensed by the<br>
>> likes of Consumer Reports, energy authorities, even our government. That has<br>
>> gone out of fashion. Now we instead say things like 'let the market decide,'<br>
>> or we (gov't, industry, consumer advocacy groups) go to great lengths to<br>
>> align 'what folks desire' with 'what is good for the environment'--which<br>
>> tends to mean 'what is energy efficient.' The problem in my view with<br>
>> substituting this kind of a framework for one based on principled advice,<br>
>> e.g., 'the world is full/the climate can't take any more fossil fuel<br>
>> combustion/let's figure out how to wean ourselves off all this stuff,' is<br>
>> that energy efficiency as a model for policy has no place for enough, no<br>
>> external reference by which to judge the rightness or prudence of an action.<br>
>> Energy efficiency as a framework has us marching like the proverbial<br>
>> lemmings toward the cliff. Energy efficiency makes no difference to our<br>
>> absolute energy consumption. It is oft argued that it slows the growth rate<br>
>> of energy consumption but what the hell good does that do when (a) we know<br>
>> we need to reduce by 80% relative to 1990/drop back to 350ppm and (b) we<br>
>> don't have a long list of other strategies in our tool bag to achieve this<br>
>> because we've so embraced energy efficiency as THE strategy by which to<br>
>> 'solve' this problem? Yes, I know, renewables are another key strategy, and<br>
>> I'm glad we have it on the list, but I contend that both energy efficiency<br>
>> and renewables are supply strategies, and that we've allowed them to<br>
>> displace the myriad demand strategies we once relied on and knew intuitively<br>
>> would work.<br>
>> One of the key tenets of energy-efficiency-as-policy-framework is that we<br>
>> are done with tradeoffs, done with Jimmy Carter's moral framework, done with<br>
>> doing without: 'You can have your energy efficient ice-maker and drink the<br>
>> chilled water too.' I don't think that is a good fit for the present<br>
>> circumstances. I don't think it provides the tools, insights, political<br>
>> space to effect the kind of change we desperately need. In my view we'd do<br>
>> much better to explore (gently or not) the language of enough, of<br>
>> sufficiency. Saying that 'Americans won't go for this' isn't in my view<br>
>> adequate anymore, because sooner or later even Americans are going to have<br>
>> to go for this, not because I want them to be miserable, or Bill McKibben<br>
>> wants them to do without, but because we live on the same planet that<br>
>> Germans and Italians and South Africans and the Chinese live on, many of<br>
>> whom (and many of whose governments) have recpgnized that the 20th Century<br>
>> Fossil Fuel Binge is over; and that we need to figure out how to do all of<br>
>> this (clothes drying and such) in a way that doesn't require fossil fuels.<br>
>><br>
>>><br>
>>> For that reason we do need more energy efficient dryers like the<br>
>>> European heat-pump dryers. But I don't see how that is going to happen<br>
>>> until energy prices goes up.<br>
>><br>
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<br>
</div></div>--<br>
<div class="im"><br>
<br>
b e n j a m i n p r a t t<br>
<br>
professor art+design<br>
the university of wisconsin stout<br>
<br>
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