Corporate Power

by Matt DeNoto

According to economists, one ingredient crucial to a stable, capitalistic society is a strong set of property laws.  If consumers don’t feel confident that they own what they buy, they won’t bother buying at all.

This was somewhat interestingly demonstrated recently when Amazon started messing with its customers’ Kindle e-book readers without their knowledge or permission.  When a publisher decided to pull a couple of books off the virtual shelves (George Orwell’s Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, appropriately enough), Amazon deleted the books even from customers who had already bought them, refundin g the money that had been paid.

While this is clearly an example of a corporation overstepping its bounds, it does provide a somewhat stumbling segue into how the Green Revolution must make us re-evaluate the concept of what we ‘own.’  Just because we’re paying for the water that comes out of our kitchen faucet, that doesn’t make it okay to leave the faucet on all night, regardless of whether or not we can afford it.  We are, at best, renting or borrowing much from the Earth, and we will have to reorient our thinking to reflect that.

This goes double for large corporations, who seem to be in the habit of assuming they own pretty much everything except the waste that they dump into your backyard.  That’s your problem.

But even that may be changing.  Wal-Mart, that paragon of consumerism, has been making small but significant strides towards becoming a more responsible company, at least insofar as its carbon footprint is concerned.  It looks like it is getting ready to take a much bigger stride.  Starting soon, products on Wal-Mart’s shelves will begin appearing with ‘sustainability scores,’ which will take into account all parts of a product’s manufacturing, transportation, etc.  This will give customers more information on which to base their shopping decisions.  It’s a great, bold move, and we can only hope other retailers follow Wal-Mart’s lead.

See?  Corporate power can be used for good.

Evolution of the Revolution

by Matt DeNoto

Before the Industrial Revolution, travel was slow and dangerous. Goods were made by hand. Everything took much, much longer.

And that’s because there was a limiting factor to all human endeavors. Back then the limiting factor was power. The only means we had to affect change were our own hands or the animals we domesticated.

So we did the smart thing. We found a better source of power. At first it was steam. Over time we discovered oil. Suddenly power was, for the most part, no longer part of the equation. Human productivity flourished. We were able to make more food, stronger shelters, and faster modes of transportation and communication.

Today there are new limiting factors to our endeavors. These new limiting factors include the dwindling supply of natural materials, the buildup of waste, and the strains of urban populations.

Now we must do the smart thing again. We must find better ways of using what we have. That’s what the Green Revolution really is. A smart reaction to our problems.

I imagine that one of the reasons the Green Revolution is so polarizing is because it is a response to problems that we ourselves caused. We chose to use a limited resource that causes pollution when we burn it for power. We chose to bury our trash in the ground, rather than find ways of re-incorporating it into the flow of goods. We chose to allow cities to become clogged beyond their reasonable capacities.

Why didn’t we see it earlier? Why have we not been self-correcting all along?

For one thing, we didn’t have the information. Sure, burning oil churns out nasty-smelling fumes, but the fumes dissipate and then they’re gone. As far as we knew, trash buried was gone for good and would never bother anyone again.

It’s only over the past couple of decades that our collective consciousness has really started putting the pieces together. And a lot of that has to do with a technology that simply didn’t exist previously. Computers.

The ability to store and manipulate huge amounts of data has finally shown us the consequences of our choices. Computer models are what tell us that the climate changes we’re seeing now do not line up with nature. They tell us when we can expect every oil well to run dry.

And just as computers were able to show us the problem, they are now being utilized to formulate the solutions. They are modeling more efficient batteries and cities. They are finding the ideal placement for solar arrays and wind turbines. Perhaps even more significantly, the internet has allowed like-minded individuals to come together and form plans of action.

Just as railroads and the telegraph helped speed up the Industrial Revolution, so our modern means of communication are building the momentum of the Green Revolution.

I guess the point I’m getting at is that the Green Revolution is not terribly revolutionary. And that’s a good thing. We’ve been through this before. It should be a comforting thought to those who believe we as a people don’t have a capacity for change, and it should be a wake-up call for those who don’t want to.

At the same time, there are those who feel we are not moving fast enough. It can be hard to look at the huge problems facing humanity in the future and not feel frustrated with it for the slow pace of change. To those people, I hope this little meditation has a calming effect. It’s only been a relatively small amount of time that we’ve known enough to see the problems we’re causing.

It will take time, but we’re now doing the smart thing.