What is one reason people might not use alternative sources of energy?
The barriers to alternative energy are quickly eroding. As ‘alternative’ forms of energy become more commonplace, and as each industry becomes more common the main barrier, cost, decreases and becomes less of an issue. One form of alternative energy which is decreasing in cost and becoming more realistic for implementation is solar. Of course, solar is most cost effective in areas with more sunny days per year, on average. But with solar becoming less expensive and with incentives and programs such as solar leasing, implementation is easier than ever. Beyond implementation of alternative energy, the quickest way to minimize energy use is with a home energy audit. There reports can specifically define areas where action is most beneficial. With the aid of technology such as thermal imaging, today’s energy audits are completely non-invasive and reasonably priced.
I am glad you are interested in alternative energy and why it is not more popular. The answer is price. When you think about it coal, oil and gas are like air and water – part of the world and no-body’s property (or every-body’s property including future generations). But we have allowed businesses to extract those resources for nothing and sell them to us cheaply (cost of extraction plus profit). This is like a business that has a stock of raw materials converting those materials into products and selling them to us at a price that does not include the cost of replacing the raw materials. Any such business is clearly unsustainable and the same goes for the way in which we have been using fossil fuels. The price of fossil fuels needs to take account of the cost of replacing them. We need to pay extra so that the money can be used to develop sustainable energy. Instead we are heading in the direction of depleting the fossil fuel resources so that the switch to sustainable resources beco
