Through the recent decades of environmental history, an extensive and expanding vocabulary has developed with terms such as global cooling, global warming, greenhouse gases, greenwashing, climate deniers, and global climate change - to name but a few.
It should be stated at the outset that this blog is not a climate change discussion but rather how words are used to propel a position. Repeated often enough phrases either become “facts” or accepted as a placeholder for a point-of-view.
With today’s major environmental topic being the transition to renewable energy, the phrase “fossil fuels” is repeatedly used to denote the oil, gas, and coal industries. Those of you who are scientists know that technically these resources are not “fossilized” as that is a different process.
While the term was likely coined in the late 18th century, the incessant use in our current conversation is recent, and directly linked to the rapid thrust for renewables.
What picture does “fossil fuels” present? Something definitely ancient, frozen in time, non-adaptable, out-of-date, and so forth.
What picture does “renewable” present? Although it has come to be associated almost entirely with energy, it also means “bountiful,” “inexhaustible,” and “sustainable.”
And once again, although more subtly, in practicality the word choices are substitutes for “good vs. evil.”
Those of us who work with words understand how terms affect perceptions, and how different word pictures are most effective with specific audiences and desired goals.
It’s worthwhile to link mission to societal benefits, and awareness of how language affects stakeholder perceptions is critical.