Alternative technology is a term used to refer to technologies that are more environmentally friendly than the functionally equivalent technologies dominant in current practice.
The term was coined by Peter Harper, one of the founders of the Centre for Alternative Technology, North Wales (aka The Quarry), in Undercurrents (magazine) in the 1970s.
Some "alternative technologies" have in the past or may in the future become widely adopted, after which they might no longer be considered "alternative." For example the use of wind turbines to produce electricity.
Read more about Alternative Technology: Alternative Technologies
Famous quotes containing the words alternative and/or technology:
“Education must, then, be not only a transmission of culture but also a provider of alternative views of the world and a strengthener of the will to explore them.”
—Jerome S. Bruner (20th century)
“The real accomplishment of modern science and technology consists in taking ordinary men, informing them narrowly and deeply and then, through appropriate organization, arranging to have their knowledge combined with that of other specialized but equally ordinary men. This dispenses with the need for genius. The resulting performance, though less inspiring, is far more predictable.”
—John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908)