Winning the Sustainability Game

The latest from Sustainability Illustrated --- running through the 4 sustainability principles, or 'system conditions' for success in terms of sustainability.

You can't take a strategic approach to sustainability without knowing where you're going.  These principles provide that ultimate goal -- not in detail, because the world is too complex to predetermine exactly what sustainability will look like -- but in principle.  We know the basic mechanisms by which we are undermining the social and ecological systems upon which we depend, so by eliminating those, we can move strategically toward sustainability:



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Power + Love

A couple of weeks ago we went to see Adam Kahane talk about his new book – Power and Love.  The talk and the book both helped shed light on aspects of leadership and social change that to some extent have not been explicit in our work.  I wouldn’t say we weren’t conscious of them already, but his depth of research and experience helped solidify our understanding and articulate the important interplay between power and love.

Kahane uses definitions of power and love from theologian and philosopher Paul Tillich:

Tillich defines power as “the drive of everything living to realize itself, with increasing intensity and extensity.”  So power in this sense is the drive to achieve one’s purpose, to get one’s job done, to grow.  He defines love as “the drive towards the unity of the separated.”  So love in this sense is the drive to reconnect and make whole that which has become or appears fragmented. (Power and Love, p. 2)

Central to the book is the idea that these conceptualizations of power and love both have two sides – a generative side and a degenerative side.  He looks to Martin Luther King, Jr. (whose doctoral studies focused on Tillich’s work): “Power without love is reckless and abusive,” King said, “and love without power is sentimental and anemic.” (Power and Love, p. 8). 

The point is we cannot choose power or love, we must choose both – generative love must come with power and generative power must come with love. 

The implications for sustainability work - for creating positive social change - are many and far-reaching.  Too often elements of the movement are dominated by degenerative power (e.g. obstructive regulation or heavy-handed guilt tactics), and probably more often, by degenerative love (e.g. “save the whales,” “think of the children,” “why can’t we all just get along?!?”).

We’ve always tried to avoid both in our work, and for me, that is at the heart of why Strategic Sustainable Development (SSD) is such a compelling approach.  It recognizes the complex current reality - with entrenched power structures led by dominate corporations and rich nations - and works to evolve it in ways that create a sustainable future as smoothly as possible.  It recognizes the power of our institutions, as well as the love necessary to foster cooperation, alignment and movement towards a sustainable future.  It employs a rigorous, scientific framework for what sustainability means, in conjunction with the tenants of organizational learning necessary to engage the leadership of all types of people needed to create a sustainable society.

The suite of examples from Kahane’s work with Shell, Generon, Reos, and SoL on projects all over the world - Peace and Reconciliation in South Africa, climate change in Canada, political stability in the Philippines, child nutrition in India, national visioning in Israel, and the Sustainable Food Lab across many countries - illustrate how complex challenges cannot be “solved” with any sort of prescription.  The ultimate of these challenges - the sustainability challenge - which embodies each of these and many more, is of course no exception. 

That is why SSD uses a principle-based definition of sustainability.  There is no roadmap or path to sustainability - the system is too complex with too many variables for us to know exactly what a sustainable future will look like. But we do understand enough about our system - humanity living the biosphere - to know what a sustainability society must be in principle; sort of a “true north” towards which we know we need to head before it is too late to avoid wholesale collapse of ecosystems and social systems.  In this sense, we don’t have a map, but we have a compass that can and must guide us in all of our personal and professional decisions.  In doing so, we create a sustainable future step by step.

Kahane credits fellow Reos Partner Jeff Barnum in pointing out that “creating something new in the world… requires us, not to plan it all out from the beginning, but rather to step forward, to act, to reflect on the results of our action, and then to take our next step”  (Power and Love, p. 136).  He also quotes peace activist Ana Teresa Bernal, with whom he worked in Columbia, and who said: “It’s like that poem of Antonio Machado: ‘Walker, there is no path.  The path is made by walking’” (Power and Love, p. 140).

I agree this is the only way to effectively lead in complex systems, and would add that having a compass for the “true north” of sustainability - not prescriptive specifics, but generic principles - is necessary for providing sufficient context and orientation for walking that path in as strategic and effective a way as possible. 

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Life After Growth

How do we get smarter, not bigger?  How do we promote the growth of value, not the growth of stuff?  How do we increase well-being without increasing consumption?

This 20 minute video gives a good run through some of the attempts going on out there - degrowth, happiness indices, GDP alternatives, transition towns, post-carbon lifestyles, local production, etc.

Life After Growth - Economics for Everyone from enmedia productions on Vimeo.

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Two-minute Video Explaining Sustainability

A concise explanation of what sustainability is and why it matters is always tough - here's a pretty good explanation from Real Eyes Sustainability out of Ireland.



It doesn't get into the whole concept of Strategic Sustainable Development - the 5-level framework for planning, the process of backcasting from the 4 sustainability principles, etc. - but it's a great intro, certainly the kind of thing we need more of.

(thanks to Gil Friend and The Natural Step for bringing it to our attention, and to Igloo Animations for creating it!)

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Leveling Appalachia: The Legacy of Mountaintop Removal Mining

The negative impacts of coal are so numerous it can be difficult to hold them all in your head at once - CO2 emissions driving climate change (SP1), toxic coal ash spills (SP2); strip mining & mountain top removal (SP3); the devastating social and economic impacts on miners and local communities (to say nothing of the indirect impacts from climate change, etc.) (SP4) - the list goes on...

For a good, 20-minute look at the story on the ground, check out this video from Yale Environment 360 in collaboration with MediaStorm:

Leveling Appalachia: The Legacy of Mountaintop Removal Mining

Our best solutions are to dramatically reduce our demand for energy through smart design (of buildings, cities, transportation systems, vehicles, appliances, etc.) to a point where the available alternatives (solar, wind, geothermal, etc.) can meet our needs.

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Sustainable and Desirable

It may seem kind of obvious, and I'm certainly not the first to express the sentiment, but needs to be said:

a sustainable future is not necessarily desirable, a desirable future is necessarily sustainable.

As interest in 'sustainability' continues to grow exponentially, so inevitably does confusion and misunderstandings of terminology. Sustainability is the bare-minimum we're shooting for, it's not the end-all, be-all by any means. It's the eye of the needle where we stop contributing to unsustainability, get restorative, and start opening up the "funnel walls".

"Sustainable development" is the process of moving towards sustainability, and 'beyond' (and "development" shouldn't be confused with "growth", the former is the growth of value, the latter is just the growth of stuff). Of course, none of this will be a smooth, linear process. We'll move step by step, more and more people and organizations will continually increase their awareness and create more and more solutions, and new, fresh ways of being that don't systematically undermine the social and ecological systems upon which we depend.

In order to do this of course, we need to break away from some deeply engrained habits of thought and action, and backcasting from a compelling vision is really necessary to do that - to move from incremental steps of 'less bad' to transformative, exciting steps of 'creating a sustainable and desirable society'. And that vision needs to be more compelling than just "sustainable," no one is really looking for a "sustainable life" or a "sustainable community" - we are looking for meaningful, interesting, exciting, fulfilling lives, communities, relationships, careers, etc.

The Sustainability Principles are just the basic constraints, derived from basic laws of thermodynamics and social systems... they set a frame for "free creativity within constraints," empowering the creative process of sustainable development, or 'creating sustainability' - they are not prescriptive in terms of how we get there or what it will look like.

So yes, it's sustainable and desirable, and also just, healthy, fecund, and caring ... sometimes I'll just say "sustainable" to catch all that.

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Happy Earth Overshoot Day!

Yep, it's Earth Overshoot Day again. Ok, not that happy an occasion, but an important one to help us step back and really let it sink it... just what we are doing here. Just what "unsustainability" means.

Here's the basics from the Global Footprint Network that tracks this stuff:

Unlike governments, nature doesn’t do bailouts. Yet as of today, humanity will have placed more demand on ecological services – from filtering CO2 to producing food, fiber and timber– than nature can provide in this year, according to Global Footprint Network calculations. From now until the end of the year, we will meet our demand for ecological services by depleting resource stocks and accumulating carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

...Because of the global economic slowdown, we will reach Earth Overshoot Day one day later than last year, according to Global Footprint Network projections. By comparison, in the past, Earth Overshoot Day has steadily moved four to six days closer to January 1st each year.

See yesterday's post about the Planetary Boundaries for a little more explanation on what it means to cross these thresholds, the implications of irreversibility, etc.

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Implications of the Anthropocene

We've been slamming the table on this key point for some time in speeches, conversations, etc. - which is that as the magnitude, scope, and scale of human activity are now so large that we are a driving force in earth systems.

A group of 30 scientists just published a new article in Nature that digs into the planetary boundaries that our activities have crossed or threaten to cross... climate change is just one of 9 identified boundaries (they put the threshold for that one at 350 ppm).

Take 10 minutes to listen to the explanation:



The whole concept is a great step for mainstream science in that it begins to address inter-connectivity at the global scale and define clear boundaries and thresholds that we cannot cross. These kinds of constraints can be effective drivers for creativity and innovation (and not simply limits that imply sacrifice or lower life-quality). It essence it the same concept as sustainability principles, just taken a step further towards details and hard numbers in some of the major groups of material and energy flows. This is similar to the process any organization moving towards sustainability using the framework for SSD would do in terms of grouping activities under each principle and then measuring impacts and implementing solutions to eventually eliminate those impacts (which is in my view the only way to really ensure that we stay below thresholds and within "safe" limits).

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Karl-Henrik Robert - from cancer research to strategic sustainable development

A quick clip from Karl-Henrik, going through his story of moving from cancer research upstream into strategic sustainable development leadership... about how and why people work together and help each other when they know life is on the line:



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Food, Inc

Get ready for what looks like a great movie on the food industry - hopefully it will help bring home why it's so important to buy local and organic, and support the development of a safe, resilient food system - so often these reasons are invisible to us, so a movie like this should be a big help and great reminder:



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Biochar & Synergistic Solutions

When dealing in complex systems, and working to create solutions to tough problems, it’s rarely useful to look for a “silver bullet” – one single answer that can solve all the problems. We hear this with regard to the climate crisis quite a bit – we can’t eliminate our net emissions with just one activity or technology. It’s not just efficiency, or better design, or biofuels, or solar, or wind, or geothermal, or changing lifestyles, or new laws that will do it – it’s some combination of all them, plus many more exciting solutions we will create.

However, in complex systems we can (and should) look for synergistic solutions – positive activities that also generate more positive side-effects. We’ve been talking about this with regard to Village Corps, and the possibility of helping to generate some economic activity through animal husbandry, which could provide food and income, and could help the chances of reopening a processing plant which would create jobs, and the animal waste could be used in an anaerobic digester to generate methane for cooking fuel, which is cleaner burning and more healthy than wood fires, and would help stem deforestation in the area, which would help stop erosion and improve agriculture, which would provide more food and jobs, etc. etc.

Well, a similar kind of synergistic solution with tremendously exciting global potential is biochar – essentially charcoal derived from any kind of biomass that acts as a carbon sink for thousands of years. It is essentially a way to lower the atmospheric concentrations of CO2 (currently at 387 parts per million) back down to what more and more scientists are sighting as a safe level – 350 ppm. The process of creating it generates carbon neutral electricity (displacing the current common sources like coal, that has a whole host of other negative side effects) and the char itself provides a powerful organic soil amendment (displacing the current common sources of chemical based options that deplete soils over time and pollute oceans and water tables). While the reasons are fully understood (because the complex world of soil science isn’t fully understood), the biochar provides a great habitat, essentially, for the diverse array of soil microorganisms that create healthy, fertile soils.

This article from the Financial Times last month provides a great overview on how this technique was “rediscovered” by studying patches of fertile soil left by ancient peoples of the Amazon: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/67843ec0-020b-11de-8199-000077b07658.html.

There is lots of exciting research and development going on around the world. Our colleague Scott Grierson in Australia has been doing research on the potential of algae feedstocks for biochar. Universities in the US are looking into as well, including Cornell, UGA, and Iowa State.

And there are some young companies looking to commercialize this process and bring it to scale, including Best Energies and Eprida (who we had a chance to see present at Bioneers last year – very exciting results). The International Biochar Initiative is keeping track of the developments in this rapidly growing area and has a lot of great information.

It’s no silver bullet, but estimates for how much CO2 this process could remove from the atmosphere each year range from 2-4 Gigatonnes –that’s a billion tonnes – and a significant percentage of the approximately 8.8 GTs humans emit annually. And with all of the positive ‘side effects’ – like clean renewable energy, and healthy, productive soil gives biochar great potential as a synergistic solution on the path to sustainability.

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Free, online "Intro to Sustainable Engineering" course from BTH

Gotta love those Swedes, offering more awesome education for free -- see below for an announcement of a new distance learning course from BTH, sans tuition. Also lacking of course the other benefits of actually studying in Sweden, but could be a great fit for any engineers out there:

We are excited to announce the limited opening of a Bachelor-level distance course called Introduction to Sustainable Engineering. This free online course will run from April 17th - June 25th, 2009.

Applications open soon (March 6th), for only two weeks. They tend to fill up extremely quickly, so please let them know asap.

The course explores these key aspects:

Module 1: Core Concepts of Strategic Sustainable Development (SSD)

• Today’s environmental problems from a systems perspective

• The cyclical processes in nature vs. the linear use of materials in today’s society

• How to use a systems view and strategic planning for sustainable development

• Principles of sustainability stemming from basic science: thermodynamics, energy, biological systems and social systems

Module 2: Examination of Engineering Applications for Sustainability

• Application of SSD framework to:

> Energy Systems & Transport

> Sustainable Product Development

> Environmental Management Systems & Regulatory Frameworks

> Life Cycle Analysis

Please visit the following website for more information ):

http://www.bth.se/site/sustainability.nsf/pages/sustainability-distance-learning

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i.heart will.i.am

Seems like I can't turn around without posting another awesome video from will.i.am - this one taking Gore's speech and challenge about creating 100% clean renewable energy within 10 years (9.5 now...I'm sure you all saw the news yesterday that Obama's going to stop the federal gov't from impeding states on setting their own higher auto-standards - a great early move).

This is a big step to see a major music star take up the call to create a sustainable society - doing a pretty damn good job of putting a lot of the pieces together (from climate and energy, to plastics and textiles, to water, to sustainable product design, etc.) and tying each back to his own daily routine - showing at the same time how (a) we're all complicit in this unsustainable reality, and how we can change our behaviors personally, demand better politically, and create better professionally, and (b) we're all getting played by corporations with goals and parameters that are in many ways misaligned with maximizing well-being for as many people as possible.

It also highlights the importance of the arts in this process of co-creating a sustainable society. For communicating in compelling ways, for inspiring, for reshaping our collective values, for connecting with our authentic selves and what's really important. Sustainable development is truly a transdisciplinary endeavor, and can't be relegated only to the scientists, engineers, designers, politicians, or economists.



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The Birthday Barrel

So, it's my birthday, and I just had to brag on my present right away - a rain barrel! As you can see, it's pretty much just a big plastic barrel (of which the dog is very skeptical), but it's got a top that serves as a big filter so you can simply place it under the downspout of a gutter and fill 'er up. Looks like that filter-top comes off pretty easily too, which should be good for clearing it out, and cleaning the inside of the bucket now and then, if needed.

It'll stay in the basement for a couple more months, as we're still snowed in here, with more icy rain expected today, but come spring we'll be collecting our roof water for irrigating the back yard permaculture "farm".

Anyone guess which sustainability principle this helps out with? ...primarily SP3, as we use too much water we're essentially degrading the natural system of the water cycle by physical means. Also, as we put stuff (like our waste and chemicals to treat it) in the water and contaminate it we're getting into SP2 territory, and of course, in many areas and instances irresponsible water use can have serious SP4 consequences.

Anyway, anyone with a house or suitable apartment should get one of these and rig it up - helps cut down on run off saves water, pretty cheap and easy to set up. Happy birthday to me! Stay going...

Education for a Green Economy

Here's an exciting piece co-authored by many of our colleagues working in the education for sustainability movement. The shift in language is I think a good one, "green economy" probably makes a lot more intuitive sense to a lot of people than does "sustainability" ... a green economy of course is not just about the environment - the trees and owls - but about people meeting their needs. Some might say "green/blue" to make that more explicit - but the social and environmental aspects of all of this are so interrelated that they are indeed one in the same.

Education is too often overlooked in these matters, yet it is vitally important - it shapes our thought and patterns of thought that create our unsustainable systems (and then say "we didn't do it, there's nothing we can do about it"). This is key both for the immediate-term green jobs training, particularly in our community colleges, but also in all disciplines and throughout our education systems to breakout of these thought-traps and create sustainable systems - economic, infrastructure, social, energy, engineering, building, health, transportation, monetary - all kinds of systems.

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OPINION: Letter to the New Education Secretary

by Worldwatch Institute on December 19, 2008

Worldwatch is pleased to publish this open letter from prominent education and environment leaders urging the newly nominated U.S. education secretary, Arne Duncan, to consider the importance of education in carrying out President-elect Barack Obama's environmental agenda.

Dear Mr. Duncan:

Congratulations on your nomination. As you jump into the daunting challenge of bolstering our sagging education system, you have a powerful opportunity presented by the need to create a carbon-free economy.

President-elect Obama has astutely perceived the linkages between climate change, economic stimulus, energy security, and job training by declaring that the transition to a green economy is his "top priority." The missing link in this system is the critical role that education can play in quickly making the green economy a reality. By working with him to include a major role for education in his green economy plans, you'll help advance his agenda - and yours.

Transforming our nation's economic, energy, and environmental systems to move toward a green economy will require a level of expertise, innovation, and cooperative effort unseen since the 1940s to meet the challenges involved... Read the rest at the Worldwatch site.

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New MSLS Brochure

Check out the new MSLS brochure - some great updated info about the program in a snazzy technical online book-thing. Also, if you go to the program you learn how to jump super-high in a business suit, as evidenced on the cover shot.

Check out the new Brochure from the MSLS Programme at BTH!

Earth Overshoot Day

Sadly, today is Earth Overshoot Day. This is based on the measure of the Global Footprint Network, that today humanity has consumed all of the new resources that nature will produce this year. From here until the end of the year, we'll no longer be "living off the interest" and instead will be "eating into our capital." A basic understanding of finances let's us know that this is not good for us - and especially not good for our children and grandchildren, who will be left with that much less, a world that produces less, and as a result a system that is far less resilient.

Often people make the mistake of thinking that sustainability is all about limits, having less stuff, being restricted in terms of what we can do. In fact, it is the opposite. By recklessly pursuing physical growth in a "take-make-waste" economy - thinking we're getting more - we're actually getting less - now and in the future.

As the Footprint Network points out, the financial collapse happening around us right now is a stark reminder of what can happen when debt and spending are allowed to grow out of control, with no responsibility and no acknowledgment of the natural limits that every system is subject to - whether it's the laws of thermodynamics on the planetary scale, or the rules of accounting for a business. You can only cheat the system for so long, and we've been cheating the system for too long. We continue to see examples of organizations, communities, cities, and now entire economies hitting the funnel walls - Enron, New Orleans, Houston/Galveston, Lehman/Bear/Freddie/Fannie/AIG.

Of course the good news is, that to avoid this collapse, all we need to do is be respectful of those limits. And these limits will not limit us. Constraints breed creativity - the rules of music enable artists to create beautiful songs as opposed to jumbles of noise, the rules of soccer make a fun game as opposed to an aimless group of people chasing a ball, tough engineering challenges with unusual constraints spur innovation, the list goes on. And accepting the challenge of operating all of our institutions, organizations, businesses and within the constraints of the sustainability principles will help us come together and engage in the most gratifying work imaginable - creating better lives for ourselves, our families, our communities, those around the world while contributing to the health and well-being of all other life. So we can move-on from this myth that acknowledging the reality of the limits that the laws of nature represent will cause problems for us - it only opens up opportunities and is our way forward for improving our quality of life.

To learn more about ecological footprinting, the Footprint Network, and Overshoot Day, check out: http://www.footprintnetwork.org/

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SP3 Shark Attack

I just got back from watching Shark Water – an incredible new documentary that has been cleaning up at film festivals for good reason. The website (www.sharkwater.com) has a good trailer that gives you a sense of the destruction going on.

Bottom line: shark populations have declined 90% in the last 50 years in a barbaric attack on this species. Sharks have been around for 450 million years, surviving at least 5 major extinctions, and as top predators in marine ecosystems, they are a vital part of the balance in our global marine system, which is crucial in maintaining the stable climate that makes human civilization possible.

This is a perfect, dramatic example of violating SP 3 – a systematic degradation of natural systems by physical means. A lot of the slaughter is being driven by shark fin trade, which is hugely lucrative and made possible due to the lack of enforcement of international treaties. I doubt many of you eat much shark fin soup, but it is a huge issue and one to be aware of. It also speaks to larger trends and exemplifies the systematic destruction of our life-support systems.

The film also does a very good job at addressing a strong mental model that most of us hold: that sharks are scary and evil. The power of mental models – the unrecognized assumptions and habits of thought that we all have – and their importance (as barriers and/or catalysts) in creating a sustainable society.

Check out the flick, and stay going…

Sustainability Principles

In a sustainable society, nature is not subject to:

1. systematic increases in concentration of substances from the earth's crust (e.g. heavy metals, fossil fuels);

2. systematic increases in concentrations of substances produced by society (i.e. compounds not found in nature, like DDT and CFCs)

3. systematic degradation by physical means (e.g. deforestation, overfishing, draining aquifers);

and in that society:

4. people are not subject to conditions that systematically undermine their capacity to meet their needs.

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