20 April 2009

taking green job claims to task

I just read a blog article by Fortune magazine contributor Marc Gunther on Greenbiz.com about green jobs. But it's not what you'd think.

Instead of supporting the full expectations of the green job claims, which have been a major support point of renewable energy development and by extension global climate change action, he calls out inflated claims and makes a point to cite other projections from conservative and, as far as he can tell, middle of the road studies and articles. In fact, the article is called The Phony Green Jobs Debate.

In the article, he hits on two pet peeve points of my own--one, that simple slogans to define complex issues are a great way to lose the real focus and possibly lose the whole issue to prevailing opinion; and two, using over-inflated statistics to advance a cause even though the statistics were sufficient to prove the point to begin with, so even if the cause and predicted outcomes were right it didn't measure up and is still viewed as a failure.

To the first point, Marc calls out the Environmental Defense Fund's recent campaign claim of "Carbon Caps = Hard Hats." The most clear marketing message, however, is of course "Green Jobs." It's become what the renewable energy movement is about. As Gunther notes, it only took one soundbite from Harry and Louise in 1994, "If we let the government choose, we lose," to help kill the Clinton health plan. If people perceive that more green jobs is not what will happen, the entire movement towards renewable energy and global climate change solution is sunk.

To the second point, the projected future green job statistics used by the current administration are very optimistic, and studies from conservative think tanks are--gasp!--very pessimistic. Obviously. The problem, as Marc notes, is this:

"Let's get real: We can't predict oil prices 12 months out. Last spring, virtually no one anticipated the global financial crisis of last fall. And we are projecting the number of green jobs that will be created or lost on a state-by-state basis by a law that won’t take effect until 2012? Who are we kidding?"

In other words, they don't know--no one knows! Both and all sides are using business-as-usual justifications to make green job claims! Another Rube Goldberg machine at work. And yet action needs to be taken so we must act on what we can best back with knowledge.

Folks, let's not fight. There is no black and white here, just like there isn't anywhere else. We really need to focus on the true aim here, which is to create long term stability--energy, economic, military, social, all of the above, not political motives. Global climate change is a lot to digest, but just because we have to take one ton of medication to cure our consumptive disease doesn't mean that we can't take it on a regimented schedule. In fact, we probably can't take it all right now. But the sooner we do, the sooner we will feel better and we can forget about the nasty taste in our mouths.

I leave you with this quote from Marc about recent green jobs ads, which I completely agree with:

"They're like political campaign ads. They promise something for nothing. They treat the voters like children. They're emotional and not educational. And they're not helping to build a movement around climate change."

These ads, like political ads, are created by marketing firms marketing to real people. They think this is what you will respond to and they go out of their way to make them this way. Marketing is one machine I would love to see redesigned.

16 April 2009

get together

I have an occasional blog that would have belonged here, so I'll be reposting some old ones. This was posted on August 25, 2005 as is. Well, except for fixing the hyphens.

The people who understand the concept of sustainability--that buying local is smart in the long run, that cars don't have to be mandatory pollution machines that kill tens of thousands of people each year, that it should cost more to ship fish across an ocean twice to have it de-boned in China and brought back, not less--need to get together. We need to get together to talk to each other, to help each other understand broader and broader models of sustainability. We need to inspire each other. We need to keep each other up when things look bleak and move in the wrong direction (plenty to be bleak about nowadays). But more than that, we need to make sustainability a movement in this country. We need to make sustainability the new normal. And we have to hurry.

If we count on economic forces to drive the actions that government and businesses make, the quantity and price of the resource in question is what will be the only justification for change - though more and more the voice of customer and the marketing implications of innovation are weighing in. But every time another regulation is passed, or not, in this country the justification is to save jobs and to grow the economy. Not a word about the eminent demise of EVERY RESOURCE that is not sustainably managed. Every one. Just preserving jobs and growing the economy.

And how, exactly, would the acceleration of a new generation of innovation and services designed around long-term sustainability principles cripple our economy? By taking jobs that already exist. By forcing people who have had the same job for decades to be laid off. By disrupting the system already in place. Systems hate that, and are programmed to avoid it.

Can everyone who is not planning on having at least 10 jobs over the course of their lives please raise their hands? Unfortunately for the time being, the era of the lifetime job has come to an end. We as a generation have learned how to play the game of occupational Frogger. When something starts to sink, jump! When something comes along that will move you closer to your life goals presents itself, jump! No guarantees, but a couple free guys if you're lucky. That is the world we live in. I truly pity those further along who have to transition out of their occupational norm and into this strange, Atari-tinged world. But it's here and it's life.

However, nothing quite says long-term stability than sustainable business. That's what it means, after all.

So then it seems that the key to move things along is to ensure that the jobs are transferred out of the old, archaic as I believe we can now call it, product-oriented model into a new, innovative, service-oriented model that doesn't produce products so much as the services that people gain from using them. Say renting or leasing things until you're done with it instead of selling them. A Rent-A-Center economy, except that the renter is responsible for what happens to the product at the end of its life. Every product should be able to be recycled, or used to make a new version at the end of its life. This is the essence of sustainability.

Throwing something away at the end of its useful life is normal, but it's pretty stupid. If the companies that made these products had to pay to do it, they would innovate to save money instead of passing the costs of disposal on to you, the customer. Right now you are paying for that final wasteful end of their resources and energy.

So join up, sign up, make yourself known, and let's get to talkin'.

the first step is realizing it's there

Rube Goldberg

n. a comically involved, complicated invention, laboriously contrived to perform a simple operation. - Webster's New World Dictionary

Hello.

My name is Daniel Henderson. I think a lot, probably too much. But I try to be entertaining.

Upon thinking of what to call my professional blog, which will be about sustainability, pointing out what isn't, and hopefully helping folks figure out solutions, I thought about what I might use as an analogy for the current state of developed civilization. Simply put, developed civilization uses extremely resource intensive (energy, water, materials, labor, transportation, etc.) procedures to arrive at an end product or service that is often not even really that necessary. A Rube Goldberg machine seemed like a good fit.

There are millions of Rube Goldberg machines running out there, each set up by clever human beings. Unfortunately most of them aren't trying to be a joke, and they are taken much more seriously. They each have their own support structures, legal frameworks, proven precedents, and resistance to change. But from a systems perspective, which I consider sustainability to largely be about, there is ultimately one large machine that is the sum (or perhaps less) of its parts. It is the one in which we all live.

The first step is realizing it's there. The second is realizing what could be.

Welcome aboard...