It's okay, except for the last image of a field full of solar panels. If there is one electricity generating technology that does NOT require carving up a landscape it is solar. Put 'em on all them buildings in the big citay.

why did this have to be so violent?. I would not want my 7 year old to see this commercial. I think it would have been way more effective to tone down the violent imagery.

I think they went too far with the exploding bus, but the rest was probably a good way to make it catch the attention of the average TV viewer and to show in a memorable way just how much solar energy hits the Earth. Won't be to everybody's tastes, obviously.

Violent? Carving up land? Oh come on!

It's an ad! For maximum effect, you know: viceral, compelling, memorable.

I thought it was excellent.

Very Hollywood! It should get peoples attention...however I have been more captivated by this commercial:

Sweatband & Solar Powered Blender
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLF_LJnp-sY

:)

I agree with the bus commment. I was good up until that point. It seemed a little too...innappropriate as far as what the world is dealing with in regards to terrorism. Other than that I found it to be an effective and visually stimulating ad.

Well communicated ad., I agree to the fact that the whole experience was more hollywood style but as long as the content is well differentiated and executed I think it deserves a pat. well done guys

Wow, what a STUPID commercial... probably the worst I have ever seen. No element of cleverness, irony, comedy - just the tiring and typical American fascination with violence in television. Groan...

You guys are missing the point completely. The violence (if you can really call it that) is to illustrate how much energy is available from the sun. I thought that was pretty darn obvious...

I thought the violence was a bit overkill. It really detracted from the message.

Also, I have to agree with Chris Shaw. This idea that we have to have these fields of solar panels is kind of silly. Every home, business or sky scraper has large amounts of space for solar panelling.

I'd love to see it, so I have to say its a great message, if a little bit sensationalist.

it makes no sence, too much violence....

At about halfway you can easily hear sounds directly stolen from Star Wars...

"why did this have to be so violent?"

The answer is at the end of the ad:

"-970 trillion kWh of energy fall from the skies every day
- GOOD WE CAN'T SEE IT
- Bad we don't use it"

The bus is for increasing the spectacularity. You know... it's an ad, must be shocking.

By the way, the original link is: http://pioneers-of-power.de/

Joel, if the bus explosion is innapropriate because of terrorism, 90% U.S. films coming to my country (Spain) would be innapropriate... Almost everything in TV would be innapropriate. But that is another question to be discussed in another place, I suppose. Maybe we should have another films and TV...

Sorrry for the probable languaje mistakes... English isn't my native tongue.

what's wrong with the bus ? i don't get it. from the beginning to the end bigger and bigger batteries (power sources) fell down from the sky. the bus was at the climax point. let's imagine a nuclear reactor fell on it. ;-))
batteries tend to explode (catch fire at least) too.
the bus is fine. nice ad.

That absolutely sucked. The last thing solar energy needs to be associated with is batteries falling from the sky killing people. And the exploding bus? are these guys out of their minds? Incredibly bad marketing fellas, I really hope that doesn't air in the US.

Cool commercial, we could always do more to promote sustainable anything.

Wow, that ad sure is polarizing.

Personally, I think people are smart enough not to take it literally, and I think it gets the point across that there's a LOT of energy coming form the sun (people in the mainstream always talk like solar can only be a small player and can only provide little power), and it's memorable (proof: everybody's talking about it here).

The amount of power coming from the sun and the amount we can use are totally different numbers.

Absolutely, and both amounts are vaslty more than what we need (especially since we currently waste so much in production, transport and use, and we can improve significantly on all those with current technology).

We waste on production, transport and use of what? Energy? Ya, but solar would not really alleviate much of that. Currently the cost premium of solar does not make it a good idea in all places. Especially cities where the sun may be blocked by tall building. Now if/when the windows that generate electricity become available then that will make a difference. I don't think power generation will ever be truly distributed. There will always be shortages and surplus's in different places at different times. That mean energy will be transferred. I'd love to see solar and wind become so cheap that anyone could put it up and not have to worry about how long it would take to pay it off.

Solar saves a lot on losses in production and transport because it is produced close to where it is used. You don't need expensive lines, inefficient transformers, etc. I don't have the exact numbers here, but in many cases over 50% of the energy produced is wasted just in production and transport (that's not counting inefficient end use).

As for cost, one of the benefits of solar is that it doesn't really have to compete with the cost of other technologies at the production level, it can compete with the cost that the consumer pays (higher) because it is usually produced there.

Of course, solar won't work everywhere - nobody said that - but a smart use of it in combination with other things (efficiency, wind, hydro, wave, tidal, geothermal, smart design (ie. passive solar)) would certainly help us quite a bit. Even if it doesn't work at night, demand is lower at that time and hydro/wind/etc could take most, if not all of it, and we could have backup combined-cycle NG plants to be fired up when necessary (a few days each year).

It would take decades to get there, but it's not impossible and it certainly would be a better future than some of the alternative paths (except maybe for fusion).

"It's okay, except for the last image of a field full of solar panels. If there is one electricity generating technology that does NOT require carving up a landscape it is solar. Put 'em on all them buildings in the big citay."

I agree, but I think they probably used that image just to contrast the nice image of a clean green field with the gritty pics of the city before.

Wow I think this is excellent.
Definetly Grabbed my Attention.
This is what the Solar Power market needs, a Bit of Shock Therapy.
The exploding bus was hilarious!

I'll probably save it on disc and give it to my Marketing Teacher. lol

Solar power is definetly a power source that is too expensive to be implemented the correct way, that is unless Nasa shoots up some solar power stations into Mercurys orbit instead of trying to fly random people to the moon.

Interesting - nobody complained about the Igloo getting blown up! The point there was that even in extreme northerly climates - there is large amounts of solar radiation - whitness the melting ice caps.

Also - the large field of solar panels all 'arrayed' in green - the 'wasted space' spoken of - is kinda like all those wonderful growing areas being turned into 'urban development' like in the 'burbs around Toronto Ontario & elsewhere! (And - what about all the nice green - GOLF COURSES!)

Must be over 3,000 acres of farming and treed land north of Toronto has gone under 'development' in the last two years to add more power sucking homes to the grid! Even if each one of them covered 100% of their energy needs - the grid would still have the load of all the rest! Reality Sucks!

But - Some Good News - A Car Dealership just up from Toronto put up a nice sized Wind Turbine - was on local news - TV!

I thought that advert was real good! Yeah, I know it's unrealistic and stuff, but that's the point. At least it got the message across, but in a very dramatic way.

what a strange notion to be so obsessed with labeling things violent... catatonic PC peeps. :)

very good conveyance of a simple but powerful concept...the nice green field with panels at the end was a great touch!

Why all the violently stupid responses?
Oh my god,the children's EYES!
Will be damaged images of batteries falling from the sky.
And i bet you dont even have solar panels,now THAT is what i find disturbing and sickening.That is what will really harm your kids,not using renewable technology....

It is an excellent impressive advertisment that make people talk about it while remembering the message. Since I'm pro renewable energy, it is hard for me to state clear but I even think it makes you want to take part of the solution by using solar panels.