Could open source technologies help us solve climate change?
Could open source technologies help us solve climate change?
Jamie Andrews
4th May, 2010
TheEcologist.org
'Open source' is a familiar concept to many web users, providing free, well-supported software across the internet. But could the same principles be used to rapidly disseminate low-carbon technologies around the world?
The growth of the internet, with all the associated changes it has brought to our lives, has been driven in large part by freely available, non-proprietary technology. The ethos of sharing, formalised by carefully worded open source licenses, has allowed inter-connectedness to flourish in ways that we once never dreamed of. Could adopting a similar approach for carbon-mitigating technologies have the same effect in tackling climate change?
One of the main problems that are faced when making this comparison is the ease with which a curious teenager in their bedroom can easily download open source software. In contrast, building an electric car, wind turbine or solar panel, requires significant resources and design expertise specific to the physical characteristics of the location in question.
That said, in recent times there has been a growth in open source hardware projects, beginning with those that straddle the software/hardware divide.
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