What will drive tomorrow's economy?

Here is my dilemma:

Today's economic engine is fired by stuff. It is the production, manufacturing, and distribution of stuff that keeps our marketplace humming. That is what this economic downturn is reminding us. When we stop buying, the economy starts tanking. But to buy more stuff degrades the environment. More stuff equals more mining, more manufacturing, more housing, more land development, more stores, more driving, more shopping, more throwing away, more waste.

To save the economy, then, we have to buy more stuff. To buy more stuff, though, is to harm our world.

Which forces the question: How do we break this cycle? If we wish to save the environment, ourselves, and our finances, what will drive tomorrow's economy?

There seem to be two possible solutions: (1) either we should make stuff more-efficiently, ie, more sustainably; or (2) we should build an economy not based on stuff. Or both.

Few of us want to envision a future built on "less." We live in a world that imagines that more is more, more is better. Almost everyone, from the most developed lands to the least 'emerging markets,' want more. And how can we say no to that? It would be both mean-spirited and fruitless for us Americans, who are but 5% of the world's population and yet consume 25% of the world's resources, to tell others they cannot aspire to the quality of life that we live here.

In this vision, then, if world consumption grew to match US consumption, we would need multiple earths to meet that demand. Since we don't carry around extra earths in our pockets, we will have to think of something else.

One suggestion is to make more stuff than we do now in better ways. Efficiency and recycling, cradle-to-cradle manufacturing, is one suggested solution. In this view, we dare to imagine that no matter how many of us there are, and no matter how big our appetites, if we can devise cyclical, sustainable, waste-free ways of manufacturing and consuming, all will be well. Done right, there will be enough money and resources for all.

I do not doubt that efficiency is a critical and necessary piece of the puzzle. Doing more with less is almost always advisable. And we know it is achievable to some extent. Years ago, California instituted energy efficiency procedures. In response, over the past 30 years, its energy consumption per capita has plateaued, remaining flat at just under 8,000 kwh per person, while the US average per capita usage has soared to 12,000 kwh. At the same time, California's average per capita GDP has surpassed the US average. (source: California Energy Commission; via Congressman Bartlett's power point).

And yet the question remains: is this sufficient?

First, there is the challenge by some that GDP is not an appropriate measure of a country's health, indeed that a country's quality of life can be sinking even as the economic indicators are rising . (For more information on this, and the alternative measure of GPI, check out Redefining Progress at www.rprogress.org. I will write more on this in another entry.) To be fair, the cradle-to-cradle view leans more to GPI than GDP. Still, is that enough?

Second, no matter how efficiently we live, no matter how creatively we stretch the natural laws of the earth's carrying capacity, we will eventually bump up against its limits, and be constrained by them.

And third, even if there were no natural limits to expansion and growth, are there not spiritual limits? Don't we need to ask at some point: Are we there yet? Isn't this enough? One quick example: over the last 30 years, America's average house doubled in size. Doubled. What was acceptable and sufficient, and perhaps even comfortable thirty years ago, is small and tight and unacceptable today. Yet today's households - the number of people living in these houses - are smaller. One report says: "As household size has decreased, the floor area per capita has increased by more than a factor of 3, from 286 square feet per capita in 1950 to 847 square feet per capita in 2000."

Of course, this trend may be temporarily reversing itself during this recession, as family and friends move in with family and friends. But that may be just the point: larger houses, representing our overall bloated consumer habits, didn't make us happier. In fact, one could argue that because we pursued more than we needed, we ended up with less than we had. And as the AIG bonus fiasco has shown us, those at the very top of the mess have developed a tin ear to the ethics of money. Do we really want people running our economy who only or mostly think of money and short-term profit, regardless of risk, rectitude, righteousness or social justice?

According to some happiness or satisfaction surveys, even before this recent economic downturn, Americans were no happier than we were decades ago (and perhaps a little less so). Nor are we the most satisfied nation on the planet.

Spiritually, then, even if we could have ever more, without cease, is that what we would want? Is that what would make us happy? Is that what our purpose in life is?

Once we pass a threshold of comfort, health and viability, how much do we need? At what point do we say, enough?

Which takes us back to our question: what will fire the enginen of our economy if not stuff?
Can we build another model?

Can it be driven by the services we provide one another: teaching, nursing, protecting, research, companionship, repairing, fixing, developing, curing, entertaining, transporting, etc. instead of making unnecessary stuff?

It is reported that Americans spend $2.6 billion on wrapping paper a year. What if we put our gifts in reusable bags (saving both the earth and our money) and instead, took the savings and with it, renovated our schools, and created community gardens, retrofitted old factories into green manufacturers, and increased and improved our social work, police and home aide work force?

Stuff will continue to be made to the extent that all these services, and our needs, require it. But wouldn't it be better if we didn't make stuff just so we can make a living but rather made a living with a minimum of unnecessary stuff. A quote in the Baltimore Sun business section on Tuesday, March 17, page 10, talking about the hard times an up-scale clothing store is going through, reads: "You have to try and encourage a 'wants'-based shopper in America and give people a reason to go out and make that purchase."

Is that really what we want to do? Waste our money on things we don't need so it can go to who-knows-where, instead of using that same money to do all the things we as a society say we need to do but can't afford? At what price is such a "want-based" society? What does it cost us in children who go to bed hungry, families without support systems and an environment that continues to degrade?

What would a healthy society, and a healthy economy, not based on wants and stuff really look like? I would love to know the answer.

We need to see this recession as a game-changer. It is not just something we need to get through so we can return to the good old days. We need to use this crisis to see the underlying ills that brought it on and build a new, renewable, economic model, to heal the earth, protect our bodies and enrich our souls.

Then, all the pain we are all going through will have been worth it.

the light side of global warming

Listen to this, from Dr. Steven Chu, Nobel Laureate in physics and President-Elect Obama's Energy Secretary:

"There’s a recently published paper from people in our laboratory (Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) that says, if you take only the city buildings that have flat-topped roofs and make them light-colored, and make the roads light-colored by using cement, the amount of carbon dioxide decreased is equivalent to taking all the cars in the world [carbon emission] and turning them off for 10 years." (Steven Chu, quoted in Taipei Times 15 December 2008 - from off-grid.net website)

This is certainly one of the most creative and inexpensive contributions to stemming global warming. Maybe all car roofs and truck roofs could be made white as well. We created this problem through the millions of little things we do everyday and we can help fix it the same way.

Let's just hope that Dr Chu does not lose his scientific edge when he enters the world of politics. It seems, though, that he already got a strong dose of real politik before his hearing today. His scientific stand against coal was softened in the face of coal-state senators who vote on his confirmation. Let's hope he and the administration guiding him won't retreat too much.

of moons and cat litter

While people of good will, and rivaling romantic inclinations, may forever disagree about the size of the moon at moonrise (is it larger on the horizon than straight overhead?), there was no disagreement about the size of the moon these past two nights. The moon is at its perigee, the closest spot on its elliptical orbit around the earth. Which means that it is very close to us indeed, and therefore bigger and brighter than any other time of the year. (14% wider and 30% brighter than lesser Moons to be precise) Indeed, the skylights in my house did seem to pour in more light to navigate by, filling the halls with comforting, almost angelic, guidance. This neighborliness will not happen again until next year, January 30, 2010 - when the moon's appearance will be a two-fer: a blue moon (the second full moon in one secular month) and a perigee moon.

As for the cat litter: I have always wondered about the best way to dispose of the standard clay cat litter I have been using all these years (tending to my son's cat). The answer seems to be, there is no good way to dispose of cat litter. It is not compostible, can't flush it away, so one has to landfill it. Not the solution I was seeking. And then I found what many of you may have already discovered: Swheat Scoop. Now, I am not endorsing this particular product. I imagine there are others on the market like it. But, as its name declares, it is made from wheat and therefore fully compostible or flushable. It does not kick up the dust cloud clay litters do; it absorbs all that litter is made to absorb; clumps adequately - although not as well as some clay litters, but that is a small price to pay - and doesn't get stuck on little cat feet, and therefore doesn't get tramped around the house, the way clay litter does.

The one thing I don't know, in this world of growing food insecurity, is what part of the wheat this is made of and how it impacts the wheat crop. My hope - and expectation - is that this is the chafe, at least that is what it looks like - and so this is doubly good, using what is waste anyway. I will try to find out and get back to you on that.

But at least for now there is one less waste item I need to worry about.

lessons learned from wood burning stoves

I know there are many of you who are way ahead of me on this one. I must confess that not only am I a late-comer to the joys and environmental value of wood burning stoves, but I actually bought a house with one and removed it in the renovations!

Now, I see the light. First of all, it calms you better than an aquarium. The hearthiness, the earthiness, the physical engagement (you have to manage the wood flow, the air flow, the cleanliness, the timing), the visual comfort of the flames, the colors and the show, especially if the window is spacious. (The heat of the fire cleans the window constantly so it is always clear.)

I have a backyard filled with wood, and with the cost of oil these days (yup, my electricity is all wind powered but my heat is oil), this stove will pay for itself in 2-3 years.

Here are things I am learning about the benefits of a wood-burning stove:

-- the newest stoves have a burn cycle that consumes most of the smoke's particulate matter and is said to burn so efficiently that it leaves less of a residue (including less CO2 - though I welcome an explanation of how this works) than naturally decomposing wood.

-- CO2 put into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels is CO2 that what would have been safely sequestered deep underground, save for the fact that we dug it out of the ground, and are now releasing it. Burning fossil fuel changes the CO2 equation, for the worse.

-- CO2 put into the atmosphere by burning wood would have been released into the atmosphere through decomposition anyway. So by burning wood, we are not adding to the cycle of existing above-ground, loose, CO2. That is, burning wood is CO2 neutral - and sustainable, as long as additional trees grow in their stead. (The source of the wood for these stoves could become an issue if we begin to destroy more trees than are replanted. A net-loss of tree cover is bad - no matter what the reason for cutting down the trees.)

-- Most interesting to me, however, is what I learned about radiant stoves and how that is being emulated in the broader construction and building maintenance business.

Wood stoves largely come in two varieties: circulating air and radiant. They both burn wood efficiently. They both heat the house. But one (circulating air) heats the air directly, and the other (radiant) heats a material (cast iron or soapstone) that absorbs and stores the heat and releases it evenly over an extended period of time. To heat air directly is to allow the heat to dissipate quickly. When the fire is gone, so is the heat. But when the fire's heat is absorbed by these efficient heat-storing materials, and released slowly over time, the fire keeps heating even after it is out.

The lessons learned here go beyond wood burning stoves. We build power plants to meet the maximum peak energy demand of a region. That is, we have to build new power plants mostly because most of us wake up between 6 am and 9 am and use hot water, lights, shavers, hair dryers, toasters, microwaves, coffee machines all at the same time. However, at 3:00 am, almost all of us are asleep, and the energy demand is minimal. If we could somehow shift our energy use schedule, and spread it out more evenly over the course of the day, we would not have to continue building new power plants at the same rate as is demanded today.

However, few of us are going to get up at 3:00 am or stumble around in the dark or otherwise make the significant shifts we have to (moving up to 50% of our daily energy use to off-peak hours). However, if the burden were placed not on the consumer to shift their use, but placed on the industry to create ways to store its energy, that might be a most useful tactic.

That is, what if the power companies generated a steady rate of energy 24 hours a day - and stored it in big batteries (or whatever creative technology they can devise - and I believe they can with the proper incentives and investments). The public, you and me, would draw on the energy as we needed it - and could even be enticed to shift some of our energy use, say, dishwashing, oven cleaning and clothes washing to off-peak hours, especially since many of these appliances are coming with built-in timers to help us do that.

But mostly, with efficient storage systems, the generation of energy could be constant even while the consumption of energy would still follow the circadian flow of human activity. Would this reduce our energy use or our CO2 emissions? Maybe. I need to learn more about that. But it would reduce the cost and waste associated with building and operating additional, unnecessary, facilities.

Heat storage and delayed release is what my stove is teaching me. That is what some construction companies and businesses are doing. They are using materials that can store and time-release the heat and cool that they have stored to ease peak-time energy crunches.

Solutions are at hand. There is no one single magic bullet - but with thousands of little innovations, we can conserve, shift and redirect our energy so that we can run a more efficient, and ultimately healthier society, both for the economy and the environment.

LEDs

While exploring the Terrapass carbon offset site, I discovered that they had LEDs to sell. Not inexpensive: $30 for a light with the equivalent of a 40 watt bulb. But it is supposed to use about 1000th of the energy of incandescents and will most likely outlast me.

Curious, I bought two - one to put over my kitchen sink, which is our most-used indoor light. I figured I would feel less unhappy if that light that stayed on every night til the wee hours of the morning due to some late-owl meanderings if it was energy efficient. The second one is still in its box. Not sure where to put it.

One thing I noticed right away when I screwed in the LED - it does not play nicely with the incandescents in the other kitchen fixtures. (we are a hybrid house - the kitchen now has an LED, 9 CFLS, and three incandescents. don't ask.) It goes better with the CFLs, but it is a different breed of light.

It is strong, but not diffuse. It is white but not harsh. Soft - like a shower of bright fullmoon light. To stand in its orb is to feel oneself outdoors, mid-month, on a cloudless night - and to wash dishes in its light is to imagine that the water is a tangible rush of its light cool on your skin.

Still and all, not all members of my family like it. And it does not give off enough light for aging eyes to feel sated in brightness. There are times I would like to slide up the dimmer switch - but there is none to be had. The bulb is as high as it can go. It was the highest strength I could find.

So the industry must continue to work both on the quality and power of the light, and on the price.

But to know that not only is my house powered by 100% wind energy; but that our consumption of even that energy is low (the lower our per household consumption, the further wind energy will go and the more quickly we can be weaned from fossil fuels) feels good.

And to glance into the kitchen with all the other lights off and see this glow of cool, calming moonlight transforms the space into the place of fairytales.

change of heart and bamboo dishes

Inexplicably, but happily, the US withdrew its obstinacy at the 11th hour of the Bali conference, so now there is an agreement. While the reports are still coming in, and details are few, here is one report of America's change of heart:


"The United States initially did not agree to proposals to strongly require that rich nations help poorer nations access green technology to limit their emissions.

The U.S. stance caused delegates to boo the American delegation at the conference, and at one point a tired-looking Yvo de Boer, the UN's climate chief who hadn't slept in two days, broke down in tears over the deadlock.

Finally, U.S. negotiator Paula Dobriansky capitulated and declared she would accept the deal.

"We've listened very closely to many of our colleagues. We will go forward and join consensus," she said, as the room erupted in cheers."

How refreshing - a team player emanating from the Bush camp. Thank goodness this gathering was in Bali and not Washington.

now, the trick is not just to create solid benchmarks but assure that we meet them. That is where we, the people, come in.

On a different matter, for synagogues and homes who don't want to use disposables and can't afford to use fancy dishes, bamboo plates and utensils come to the rescue. They are lightweight, easy to clean and stack, won't break, and affordable, especially now.

Crate and Barrel is having a hefty sale - buy them for your synagogue's shabbat kiddush and your informal family gatherings.

The gift to give the person who has everything. And a way for your shul or institution to be green. And they don't weaken or leak!