On February 9th, 2007, the affable Richard Branson and the former US Vice President Al Gore announced a $25 MM prize for a viable idea that will reduce the growing volume of greenhouse gasses over a ten year period. The buildup of greenhouse gasses is warming the Earth at an alarming rate, which is causing severe floods, droughts, storms, and species extinction. The goal of this “Virgin Earth Challenge†is to focus public attention on solving the root cause of global warming: the continuing and unrelenting growth of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere.
Will the “Virgin Earth Challenge†succeed? Well, to answer this, let’s look at the rules, the pro’s, and the con’s below:
Rules:
- The competition runs for three years until February 8th, 2010, with the ability for extension if there are no viable solutions.
- The $25 MM prize purse is divided into two parts: (1) $5 MM for the best design idea to reduce greenhouse gasses, awarded at the earliest in 2010, and (2) $20 MM after greenhouse gasses have been successfully reduced in the atmosphere for 10 consecutive years, awarded at the earliest in 2020.
- Submitted ideas are judged based on viability, longevity, scalability, and countervailing harmful effects by a panel of experts that includes Gore and Branson.
- The judges have the subjective discretion to award more than one winner and allocate the prize money among the winners as they see fit.
Pro’s:
- One of the largest prizes in history is being offered to focus public and scientific attention on a critical issue facing all life on Earth.
- Anyone can enter with no notable fees or restrictions.
- The first part of the prize can be won by just submitting ideas.
- High profile industry and political leaders are supporting the prize.
Con’s:
- The timetable for winning the prize and addressing the greenhouse gas crisis is optimistically 15 to 25 years out between announcing the initial winner in 2010, developing the winning idea, and then measuring 10 years of improvements. Even the Inconvenient Truth movie states that this may be too late.
- The $25 MM dollar prize is divided into parts with the chance of having multiple winners, so it is possible that a winning idea may receive less than $100,000 in prize money. This makes it difficult for an entrant to invest heavily in a winning solution.
- The awarding of the prize and judging of the winner are both completely subjective, using language in the rules such as “must have long term benefits (measured over say 1,000 years).†It is difficult for any individual and especially for a large organization to propose solutions to a subjective metric.
- An idea may win the first prize, but that idea may prove to fail when implemented or fail to be implemented at all.
Conclusion:
The high profile $25 MM prize is bound to get a lot of media attention for global warming, but the subjective and uncertain nature of the rules will make the competition resemble a high school science fair. The prize will not attract the best and brightest without fixing some of the fundamentals.
Recommendations:
Some minor changes to the rules and the incentives can have a big impact in the outcome. Below are some proposed recommendations. Do you have others?
- In order to reduce the long timetable to a solution, the prize organizers may want to award a significant cash bonus in 2010, such as an extra $5 MM, for the winning idea that has operational components or proven technology.
- If the organizers choose to have multiple winners, there should be a clear hierarchy of winners and tiered prize amounts. For example, in the first $5 MM award, the organizers may choose to have one primary winner at $3 MM and two secondary winners at $1 MM each. This allows entrants to make intelligent decisions about investing time and materials to win.
- In order to remove some of the subjectivity from the prize judging and awarding, there should be a series of clear objective “minimum criteria†that any proposal must meet to win, such as a minimum volume of greenhouse gasses reduced per year. Without the objective components, it will be hard to tell if the winning idea or if new advances in clean coal were responsible for improvements in the greenhouse gas crisis.
What are your recommendations to improve the prize offering or thoughts in the Virgin Earth Prize itself?
