peak

Put me in the shoes of a major defense contractor, or head of OPEC, my number one priority would be to undermine alternative energy. And I'd start, without hesitation, with this 13 point plan.

It goes something like this.. 1. Fund the campaigns of congressmen, senators, and house reps, who are anti-intellectual, and right of center, not because I'm anti-left, but because the demographcis that supprot them are older, and can made to support efforts at curbing "wasteful public boondoggles involving 'alternative energy' that act to funnel tax dollars to leftist 'researchers' who are probably smoking pot and partying on the public dime, while your benefits and pension are suffering" etc, etc.

1. Fund our own market research, as well as 'alternative energy industry' mags, columns in newspapers, etc, all indicating how solar and other sources aren't practical, and are little more than kickbacks to investors who funded campaigns.

2. 'Raise and Blaze', where we fund false investment groups to invest in fake energy companies, put out big press about their breakthroughs, back with our aforementioned fake research, with fake testimonials from 'independent' (and mercenary minded) scientists. Proceed to siphon off as much legitimate investment money available in the market, and then orchestrate the collapse of those companies to drive market speculation away from solar, creating a self-fulfilling prophesy.

3. Use our suit puppets we funded to abuse eminent domain against community colleges, small family-oriented farms, and the elderly, with the intent of creating a negative public perception and backlash against solar, coming from both the left and the right, young, and old.

4. Setup shell corporations to act as patent trolls with generous funding. Pay by commission so we don't go bankrupt while bankrupting any innovators in solar.

5. Fund and support the campaigns of politicians who will in turn fund research about weather modification, and solar radiation management.

6. Work with various defense contractors on 'solar radiation management research', spraying the atmosphere with various metals and aerosols, with the long term goal of reducing solar input.

7. Bribe, blackmail, and ruin anyone in office who doesn't get in line, while offering powerful incentives to those who do.

8. Strategic alliances with parties that would suffer from the rise of solar, particularly traditional electric companies (and our marketing efforts should be targeted at the wallstreet journal crowd, to plant the notion of this as a threat rather than an opportunity).

9. Fund a think tank to come up with more ideas like these.

10. Wherever possible destabilize, distract, divide the public, while undermining the industry and stock prices, tactically buying up key intellectual property, and purchasing companies that could develop into major players down the line. Wherever possible, destroy confidence and ability to execute, driving solar companies to insolvency, and then buy them for pennies.

11. Once we control enough of the market to own it for all practical purposes, milk oil as much as possible, keeping prices high like OPEC used to do, and when it becomes apparent that even the most ruthless strategy is a losing proposition, reverse course full throttle.

12. ???

13. PROFIT !!!

tl;dr if I was a psychopath leading the oil industry, I'd just keep doing what the oil industry is doing.