energy soapbox

It’s been sometime since I’ve had the opportunity to post here. In my absence, a number of things have happened; the most notable being my move from Clovis, California to Fort Collins, Colorado. Since the move, I’ve continued to support renewable energy and have recently written a letter on the subject to various newspapers across Northern Colorado:

Editor,

Northern Colorado is quickly becoming a hub for the new energy economy. If the recent opening of the new Vestas wind-turbine blade plant, Woodward Governor announcing 100 new jobs for their wind-turbine inverter business, AVA Solar Inc.’s plans to open a new manufacturing facility in Del Camino and the new Colorado State energy research “super cluster” are any indication, the future looks bright.

Just as we did for the oil companies in their heyday, we can help spur additional investment in the region with tax credits and other incentives. Unfortunately, our House representative, Marilyn Musgrave, recently voted against such a renewable energy stimulus package. In fact, over the last few years, she has consistently supported the oil companies and the “old” energy way.

It’s time to ensure that our interests are represented in the U.S. Congress. Unlike Musgrave, Betsy Markey has renewable energy high on her priority list: She wrote: “We have a unique opportunity at this time in our history to change the way we power this country. Colorado is poised to lead this effort. Our state’s wind, solar and agricultural energy supplies offer opportunities to create jobs, protect the environment and decrease our dependence on foreign oil.” I have no doubt that she would have voted to secure the long-term economic and energy security of the region by voting “aye” to the Renewable Energy and Energy Conservation Tax Act of 2008.

Sean Rees,
Fort Collins

So far, this letter has been published in The Coloradoan and The Journal Advocate.

The Seattle Times reports that a number of states are lining up to sue the federal government in order to get them to stop dragging their feet about federal emissions standards for automobiles. It’s interesting that they have finally realized that turning to legal resources is probably one of the only ways to get the federal government to cooperate; it has seemed blindingly obvious for quite some time that the Bush administration has absolutely no interest in improving fuel economy for the United States automobile fleet. This may seem like an incredibly myopic view of things; however, consider this quote from the article:

But these 16 states, representing about half of potential car-buyers, want to do better. That’s a lot of market share to entice car manufacturers to improve emissions-limiting technology.

But the Bush administration, which dragged its feet on acknowledging climate change, inexplicably seems intent on doing whatever it can to thwart states’ efforts to take the lead. The EPA was having none of it, rejecting the only waiver among more than 40 applications in 30 years.

It seems interesting that the government is afraid to allow states authority to enforce their own standards; for instance, the state of California, for a long time now, has had some of the strictest standards nationwide.  This is partly because they realize their responsibility, but also partly because the voters in the state actually support the endeavor.  It is no coincidence that many other states tend to adopt California’s standards after they are made; it is primarily because those states recognize the wisdom of these standards.  Let us hope that the federal government can do the same.

Someone once told me — perhaps in a far more eloquent way — that we should pursue that which makes us happy; that if something fails to make us happy, and should be abandoned.  As I think about this statement, I wonder whether or not this idea is directly applicable to the idea of sustainability.  For instance, we have people who greatly enjoy buying vehicles such as the Hummer, which is one of the lowest rated vehicles for fuel economy on the market — in fact, it is exempt from the EPA fuel economy scale due to its weight.  If sustainability does not make us happy — indeed, if its exact opposite makes us happy — should we pursue sustainability?

The problem is, sustainability is really something focused towards the greater good.  While some people are certainly happy implementing sustainable ideals, this is not globally true.  Nor is it really our responsibility to make it so, since we value the idea of personal freedom.  So what happens when the necessity of preserving a way of life overrides our need for individual freedoms?  We can certainly promote sustainability as a cultural movement, which is entirely appropriate, since there are a large number of people who believe in it.  But to force sustainability upon people who don’t want it is to alienate them from the idea.  This would almost suggest that we should focus on the young, that we have to focus our efforts on people who are growing up around the idea of sustainability, encouraging them to make sustainable decisions.  But then we have the same problem that we had before — we are forcing sustainability on a population that has no choice in the matter.  Yes, we can educate the young to make sustainable decisions, but is that really allowing them their own freedom?

One of the ideas that we must struggle with, then, is that sustainability, while necessary, cannot simply be foisted upon others.  Much the same thing can be said about our energy independence, where alternative energy supporters practically presume that everybody else is wrong and we are right — that we must force upon people the ideas of solar power, wind power, and other alternative energy sources.  While many people are certainly receptive to this idea, one could argue it is a violation of freedom.  So where do we start?  How do we make this an effort that makes everybody happy?  Is this even possible?  Sustainability is yet another field where we deal with this contradiction.  The answer to all of these questions is both yes and no — it simply depends on our approach.

The New York Times wrote recently on conflict between the Fish and Wildlife Service and the Minerals Management Service.  In brief, these two agencies plan to implement two different policies that will impact the polar bear population.  The Fish and Wildlife service intends to list the polar bear population as endangered, while the Minerals Management Service intends to open up potentially vital habitat for the polar bear to oil companies.  The energy problems surrounding this notwithstanding, this is a beautiful example of how two kinds of sustainability come into direct conflict with one another.  Which is more important - energy or saving world species?

This is where value judgements enter quite strongly into play, and, much as we might like to ignore the fact, sustainability is in fact a value - more specifically, it’s a personal value rather than a cultural value, since the culture of the United States as a whole has yet to embrace the idea.  Economists would say that sustainability is also a part of a person’s utility, since doing things to assure sustainability increases a person’s well-being.  When that’s the case and sustainability is not prevalent enough on a cultural level, which way do you swing the pendulum?  Do you declare the species endangered to protect their habitat, or do you attempt to increase our energy independence by allowing drilling operations?  Doing both is certainly entirely possible, but one act makes the other inherently more complicated.

I’m not sure there is a right answer here, but there is certainly a more correct answer given the direction of the economy and the overall political environment: declare polar bears endangered and protect their habitat, but allow for drilling elsewhere if it is feasible and can be done in a reasonably low-impact manner.  I acknowledge the relative absurdity of the previous statement, since by definition, no drilling is low-impact, ever, and the likelihood of such drilling occurring anywhere within the lower 48 states is likely to be met with extreme resistance by concerned citizens.  The debate over the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and drilling rights there notwithstanding, Alaska is, plain and simple, an easier state to drill in, since much of its population is concentrated.

One hopes that we can arrive at a sustainable solution for both the problem of habitat and energy independence; indeed, it’s the only thing we can reasonably attempt as a nation.

As of late, I’ve had a job search agent working for me on careerbuilder.com, sending me all jobs that match the phrase "sustainability".  I originally intended it to try to isolate jobs that involve environmentally sustainable planning, advocacy, management, and thinking, but that’s not quite what’s turned up.  Here’s a sample of job titles from the most recent alert on January 2nd:

• Geologist
• Civil and Structural CAD Technicians
• Civil Engineers
• Architects/Architectural Designer
• Electrical Engineer
• Mechanical Engineer
• Regional Sales Manager - Retail

It’s fairly clear that at least some of these have some sort of ties to the environment - architecture and geology have clear ties (and to a lesser extent, so do the engineers).  But why the regional sales management position?

Keep in mind: this is a keyword search.  Thus, it simply matches the word "sustainability" in anything, and will match:

Supports marketing initiatives and ensures successful implementation and sustainability within the Region.

This is an indicator of two things, at least from my perspective as both an information management graduate student and as someone highly interested in sustainability:

1. It’s all about context. "Well, duh," I can hear you say, but it’s amazing how many people forget this.  Search engines are only as good as the amount of context it has about what you’re searching for.  What does this have to do with environmental sustainability?  Pretty much nothing, until you consider:
2. While "sustainability" may be synonymous with "environmental sustainability", the reality of the job market would seem to dictate otherwise.  Tying back to my previous post, this synonymy is not universal, though it would seem to be by glancing at the political atmosphere of  a good chunk of first world countries.  My job search might pull up a job that directly has to do with sustainability - my alma mater, The Evergreen State College, recently posted a job ad for a Director of Sustainability, for instance.  But it’s equally as likely to suggest regional sales positions precisely because the meaning of "sustainability" depends upon its context!