Despite the alarmist scenarios regarding energy prices meant to raise our awareness concerning what could become the case, ie. price-wage spirals that launch us into a depressed state, the fact of the matter stands that there is still time to respond to the sound of the alarm.  Of course, one thinks of "REACT" and jump forward in time in extrapolation to examine the tempting feelings of loss and sadness, but in actuality, we must be mindful of what may be possible in spite of the rather exaggerated state of markets and their interdependence.

Interdependence is not merely a rigid set of relations of things where if one moves another also moves.  It is a principle or a lens with which we can evaluate how different conditions and circumstances may stand to influence one another.  There are many methods with which one can "adjust" the market, many ways in which indicators can be moved by certain information or certain popular views.  Thus, we must be reserved in how we come to a judgment of the state of affairs.  A certain reservation and distance will allow us to examine the domain of possibilities that can be open with the right enquiry.  We cannot merely rely on formalized abstractions of the financial market, instrument or indicator, to prescribe what a response to rising energy prices could consist of.

Perhaps an initial question to raise would be why.  What is causing the energy costs to go up so drastically in recent years?  The reasons consist of a spectrum of factors that loosely, to say through many plausible connections, tie together in some coherence.  Such of course is not the exact constitution of the real market, but is a facsimile of the larger picture, one of lesser complexities.  This is to be addressed because oftentimes we rely on such facsimiles as a fundamental diagram but its truth value must be questioned if we are to find certain degrees of freedom through which to examine additional possible solutions, ie. we must think outside the box.  The problem of the truth value to the facsimiles composed of a network of indicators drawn from the real market is to do with that they were originally representational and thus through representation certain facts are ascribed but also that information loss is inevitable.

The point of referring back to the real market and indeed the real society in which a small fact of the dollar value to energy is found is to question the basic premises or phenomena in which the change in dollar value to energy is realized.  What is the first proposition by those who propound that rise in energy costs is irreversible and necessary?  In one case, it is referral to the maxim of supply and demand.  If demand continues to rise and supply remains limited then it stands to reason that the cost of the commodity should go up.  Whether this is the case remains an open topic to investigate in the specifics of supplies being shorted somehow, perhaps in response to rising demand across the world.

This is a point not to brush aside because we must question how the demand has risen.  The simple answer is that there are more factories and cars that require the use of fossil fuels.  Yet this answer had not addressed the matter of the how of usage and its implications referring back to the manner with which energy is used and whether the energy used produces excesses in society that turns to waste or if it produces a consumption that is productive in the end, ie. realizing some good evaluated to be worthwhile and is more than the indulgence of consumption.  It must be noted that how we consume energy and to what ends energy consumed is directed is a question to be addressed at different levels from the individual to the larger in-organizing.  For instance, at the level of the individual, it does not make sense to visit the supermarket ten times a month when once would suffice; or at the level of a import-export company, it does not make sense to import large shipments of oranges from a foreign country when the oranges two states over are cheaper and require less fuel to transport.

But why are such examples relevant in any way?  It is because the demand and supply and costs was never a simple equation as is popularly and mythically believed.  The simple equation negates the fact that a society was never a rigid organization with definite protocols whose people have no ability to change and adapt.  One way to see a counter to rising energy price, as due to proportionally decreasing supply, would obviously be decreasing the total sum of energy being consumed.  While this may seem like a rather obvious proposition and thus is weak in propositional value, in reality, to decrease the total sum of energy consumed is no simple task.  It is worthwhile because where domestically, the total sum of money squandered onto energy that for instance produces only excesses to be turned into waste is managed, the price of energy that maintains the market as a price point can have limited effects onto the rest of the markets.  Intuition guides that delimiting the effect of changing energy price points would delimit the perpetuation of effects into other industries, thus the rest of the market.  To be more concise, the threat of inflation broadening out due to increasing energy price could in this way be managed.

The notion of managing usage has the most important consequence of separating the volatile energy market from the rest of the market.  The term "economy" actually denotes more than the market, and implicates the social behavior that in totality inclusive of the various market mechanisms and financial indicators as well as common prices and buying behaviors.   Conservatism is a notion we must broadcast across the domestic landscapes.  While pointing fingers to developing nations is fine and good and provide certain checks on behaviors by the international community by moderating views and perspectives, it is only one avenue, and it is one that excludes our own people from examining the basis of the problem domestically.  It is a fact that in America our consumption overall is less than some other countries, but the fact of the matter stands that even so, the consumption is excessive as is normally acceptable to use energy as can be afforded.  Thus, conservatism is a notion that requires expanding and elaborating, so that the finer details can be observed by actors at different levels.  It is a notion powerful enough to hold together the different levels of actors in society, such that adoption could express the will of the nation.  It is one idea that should not be brushed aside for our behaviors are exemplary for the rest of the world.

The separation of the fossil fuel market through the moderation and even decrease in energy usage domestically should probably be led to the effect that energy prices can no longer be so immediately driven up by increasing demand here despite rising costs.  The rationale is that where demand decreases it becomes possible that the price point of fossil fuel could be managed within the borders.  As behavior towards energy change domestically, to say less energy is usurped here so that demand is stable and non-increasing, or even, decreasing. than it becomes possible for those in the market to evaluate the possibilities in interventions and mechanisms that work out the balance affecting the price point domestically based on domestic behavior.  We always talk of stronger borders but a border is not a physical wall necessarily, but consist of definitions that guide behavior and determinations for those geopolitical locales interior to the boundary.

But of course the utility of energy is often associated with innovative growth.  Management consists not only of adjusting the increase or decrease of usage and price points, but in investing wisely.  Energy of course is a kind of capital.  There is a finite supply of it at any given moment.  To invest wisely this capital of energy is something which can be taken to task at many different levels.  It is by this rationale that the notion of conservatism has not just to do with delimiting or ceasing usage, but rather to do with being reserved in judging how best to utilize it.  On the way, smart investment of energy will lead to more positive and productive outcomes, as well, it is likely that a decrease of consumption could be had.  To say that energy consumption is correlated with productive activity is to note that we shall not move towards ceasing its usage.  Nevertheless, it is a fact that if we can moderate and delimit the proliferation of effects due to increasing prices in particularly to the rest of the market, we will bide our time.  

Time for what?  Of course, it is to move the inertia of research and development of alternatives to fossil fuels.  As nothing happens in a day, to shift investments into alternatives to this form of energy requires time and effort.  Such research not only opens up alternative vistas in energy harvesting and use, such research will encompass many factors that must be taken into the balance of the bigger picture consisting of efforts from many industries and fields of discipline and of concerns in regards the environment of planet Earth.