Plastic might not be my nemesis

Bashing plastics has been one of my more common themes here. I've gone on at length about how they're not truly recyclable and thus create waste management, industrial and public health issues.

At the same time, switching to nontoxic biodegradable substitutes for all current plastic products - packaging, durable goods, medical supplies - would trigger its own set of problems. The additional methane produced from the decay of that much material could feasibly exacerbate climate change, as research from North Caroline State University suggests.

Clearly the solution to waste management issues is not to replace one type of waste with another, but to reduce how much we waste. And within that amount, to have a hybrid solution.

I'm not waiting around for microbes to take care of plastic for me (although bacteria have apparently already adapted to take care of nylon for us), but if we can manage it in a more viable way and avoid the hazards of getting it into our food system, then plastics won't be the enemy. That's precisely what Mike Biddle's succeeding in doing.

He's overcome the challenge of sorting plastics into their respective types for maintaining their integrity and as a result, has turned a nonrenewable petroleum-based resource into a renewable one. His method is cheaper both financially and from a social cost perspective. For that reason it stands to redress a fundamental wildcard that has been distorting our economy.

Occupy Boston Profiles: Eliana

The Occupy movements have got me fascinated. That's led me a little off-track in terms of what I usually write about, but regardless of their agenda - if you can even say they have an agenda - a movement of this magnitude would intrigue me and compel me to consider what it's implications might be for sustainability. (I wasn't around for the Tea Party.)

I decided to check out Occupy Boston myself to understand better what's brewing there. I've had my expectations violated on an occasion or two before - which is something I think everyone can use a healthy dose of - so I knew I wouldn't be able to trust any interpretation of the people there and their activities until I'd seen a fair bit of it for myself. The only way to build up an accurate sense of any collection of people or ideas is to start from the bottom - with individuals. So that's what I did.

Eliana

It proved more difficult to approach people and get their backstories than I thought it would. Even at a protest, people seemed a little shy about being scrutinized by a nameless stranger. I suspect part of that stems from a reluctance to be perceived as speaking for a movement that's still very much in a formative phase. Another reason is probably that, as Eliana articulated, there are different views represented there and you can't be sure how yours will be received.

Especially if I had just come as an agitator.

But luckily, after possibly scaring off some other people, we were able to talk a bit.

What brought her out here

Eliana works in the biomedical research industry. One of the first things she shared with me was that the environment was her top concern. She saw the economic downturn as an opportunity for a government jobs program to bolster our infrastructure and make society more sustainable, such as by expanding renewable energy.

As far as government debt, she didn't see it as a concern. It had not been one under the previous administration. It was only when Obama came into office that it was raised as a major issue, one manufactured by the Tea Party, when in reality the US would retain its solvency.

It was also important that the Tea Party not be the only group of people assembling and expressing themselves in such a visible way. What's interesting is that, as I would later find out, the two groups weren't mutually exclusive either. Tea Party members have been in attendance at the Occupy movements as supporters, as well as Ron Paul supporters. I suspect they have in common a desire for greater accountability in business and government, whatever size they consider ideal for it.

Government measures

That Eliana repudiated criticism of the deficits under Obama isn't to say she's in full support of him. In his attempt to compromise she's witnessed him preemptively make concessions and give up the opportunities he's had to make substantial progress. In recent times it's seemed to me that Obama might be making an about-face and start putting his foot down, but it may be too late to garner the support of the likes of Eliana.

In terms of policy changes, the conversation turned toward Paul Krugman's suggestions; a return to the Glass-Steagall Act, which had separated commercial and investment banking from the Great Depression until 1999, thus keeping banks from trying to profit off risky investments funded by deposits; and the Buffet rule, which would levy higher taxes on the mega-rich - at least high enough that they'd be paying the same rate as lower brackets. As of today they pay a lower rate than the middle class on average, since their incomes typically come from capital gains, which are taxed less than wages.

Pulling it all together

The Occupy movements are clearly unified by their frustration (who isn't?) and, as I see it, a longing for a more egalitarian distribution of the political power that determines economic fates. Naturally, people will differ in their thoughts on how that can be attained, in addition to tagging their pet issues onto the momentum that's built up. For instance, I witnessed one general assembly where Occupy Boston was compelled to adopt a position on the wars.

It makes me wonder whether this will solidify into more specific, but broad-based policy initiatives. If it doesn't, it's still getting many of us to pause and reflect on the state of the union, the system that's determined it, and the roles played within it. At the very least, I've gotten a few interesting conversations out of it.

Occupy Wall Street

Like many movements, Occupy Wall Street inspires me with its level of civil engagement but leaves much to be desired. I won't be the first to point out that it could benefit from narrowing its scope to a concrete, productive goal. Indeed, if it doesn't its sole legacy may be disillusionment. My main goal here though is to address a couple aspects of the discourse unraveling around it.

I got around to checking out OWS's declaration and what really drew my attention were the characterizations, both from the side of the protesters as well as their critics.

Who are the corporations?

Corporations are made up of individuals. Just like any organization, they're heterogeneous, consisting of people whose views vary widely. Just as there are individuals who don't have the interests of society at heart in these settings, there are also individuals who share the values embodied by this protest in certain respects. I am one of them.

Any view can dominate at a given level in an organization and thus inform the direction corporations take. Even in their capacity as legal entities corporations differ. I'll give just a couple examples of how corporations don't hold to how they're being portrayed here.

The first is Calvert Investments, which specializes in socially responsible investments and thus helps businesses that don't place profit over people get ahead in the market. The second is Whole Foods, which helps to promote more sustainable lifestyles. Though there's arguably some greenwashing involved in their operations, they're renowned for the treatment of their workers and are certainly an improvement upon the preexisting status quo. Like churches, nations and book clubs, you'll find both good and bad corporations and you should always be wary of letting the whole come to represent its constituent parts and vice versa.

Who are the activists?

There's a tendency in American society to identify a movement with one political extreme or another the moment it strikes the slightest semblance and to caricature its participants accordingly. Critics of Occupy Wall Street and related movements have described their participants as lazy, uneducated, voluntarily unemployed, irresponsible, spoiled and financially supported by their parents. Hippies and hipsters.

There are some to be found who satisfy those definitions, of course. What concerns me though is an incapacity I frequently observe for anything but gross generalizations. I doubt anybody's saying all the participants fall into these categories, but I'm skeptical that even the majority does, in the same way that I'm skeptical that the Tea Party consists mostly of selfish, racist, gun-wielding evangelicals.

To be sure, there are people at the Occupy movements who drive me up the wall, but there's a whole world out there and you can find anything you're looking for. As a case in point, I take myself. I'm interested enough in Occupy Wall Street to at least attend, but I'm educated (I received no funding from my family) and hold a professional job at a corporate entity that I happen to find morally irreproachable.

The Targets

Targeting groups of people whose morals can't be accurately and consistently characterized is bigotry. As I elaborated above, there are both good and bad corporations. There are also both good and bad rich people, with Warren Buffett and Bill Gates immediately coming to mind as examples of wealthy individuals who render a service to society commensurate with their extraordinary affluence.

Even if we can pinpoint the "bad" corporations or the "bad" people in them, is that the appropriate target? There will be exceptions, but I think the main factor behind the frustrations expressed at OWS is preferential treatment of people and organizations that are already so clearly empowered. The enemy here is not big business or the rich, but the mechanisms in place that allow some of them to live with less accountability than their smaller counterparts. It's the arrangement that allows the largest banks to benefit from bad business decisions and taxes billionaires less than the middle class.

As preferential treatment has its roots in political corruption, if the movement is to adopt policy goals, campaign finance reform should probably be one of them.

The Collusion

This movement couldn't have been precipitated without the financial crisis. And the financial crisis couldn't have been precipitated without three culprits, which Raghuram Rajan outlines so clearly in his book Fault Lines: government, corporations (banks), and the consumer.

Government's to blame for pushing better access to credit through Fannie Mae and other organizations as a fix for growing wealth disparity and thus distorting returns in the securities market; the financial sector for responding to those distortions and pursuing unsustainable business models for a quick buck (then pursuing them further to establish systemic importance and thus ensure their longevity despite their decisions); and those consumers who overborrowed to live a life they couldn't afford.

There are improvements to be had in the private sector, as well as in the private sector's relationship to the government and the public. Nevertheless, there are also issues we need to address outside of it, with our government and with ourselves. To be more concrete, I'll advocate here what I have so often elsewhere: leverage what power you have, however small, as an economic actor.

Companies and people don't grow rich on their own; someone has to give them the money. By refraining, or more effectively, opting for or providing a better alternative, people can shape fates and behavior. Disagree with a bank? Move your account to a more responsible one. Keep your money in a sock. Leverage your power as a friend or family member to increase the likelihood that those you come in direct contact with will do the same. Expose wrongdoings and commend good deeds as you see them in conversation and on the internet.

But don't be an imposing jerk because that never works.

It's through this feedback that we can hope to transform an existing foundation into something better, instead of uprooting the establishment with potentially nothing to fill the vacuum. Take the lessons of failed revolutions and shock therapists to heart: it's easy to destroy something, but it's much more difficult to create something better out of it.

The Greening of Ohio State University

So I was making a student loan payment when I stumbled upon this: my alma mater's football stadium is going "zero waste." Okay, that really means 10% waste or less, but that would be a huge stride in the right direction. They're planning to make this happen through recyclable and biodegradable materials and by making only corresponding bins for their disposal available. No more trashcans.

Zero Waste at Ohio Stadium

I'm wondering how well it'll be received. The reason it would be such an improvement is because games generate so much trash, which also means it'll be a tough habit to curb. What if a person comes into the stadium with a load of stuff that can't be recycled or composted? Likely throw it where they please, which threatens to make this new system in practice not much different from the current one.

The fact that the vast majority of products available for purchase at the stadium will conform to these new guidelines, however, is reassuring. Even with a stray wrapper here or there, it could still work. I just hope people don't get frustrated with it or see it as a damper on their festivities. Because they can get really passionate about them.

It seems like OSU really took up their sustainability bent right after I left there, which is awesome but makes me regret that I wasn't around to take part in or be influenced by it. They've got smarter, sustainable buildings now, were pioneering dandelions as an alternative fuel source last I knew, offer courses in that same vein. It at least gives me a little something to brag about.

Speaking of which, one of my many cynical friends was quick to point out that "they're probably only doing it for the PR." My response to which is, of course they're only doing it for the PR! Virtually no organization wants to take on more responsibility and do the right thing for its own sake.

What interests us is the recognition and reward that comes with that responsibility, rarely the virtue in and of itself. Luckily in a more transparent, interconnected world we start dishing those accolades out. The more we move in that direction the better the feedback will be for those who appear to act beyond their own interests.

I think that this arrangement is probably our best hope for steering ourselves toward a brighter future. Sunlight is the best of all disinfectants.

The Future of Lighting

It's easy to take electric light for granted. It's ubiquitous for all but the most marginalized. It's also relatively cheap. It's only on the rare occasion that you find yourself without power that you are reminded of what a big difference it makes. Indeed, light is a factor of production, important enough to warrant switching clocks twice a year as so many places still do. Electric lighting accelerated industrialization, gets kids through school and even makes neighborhoods safer.

On the horizon for this technology are the same trends that are dominating elsewhere in the push for sustainability: smaller, safer, more efficient, longer-lasting. As that process has progressed we have seen compact fluorescent bulbs make their move from offices to homes, and I predict that we will soon see wider implementation of LED lighting.

LED lights are already commonplace in many household electronics. They're bright, sharp and colorful, look like lasers and thus speak visions of a high-tech future. I personally think it would be pretty cool to reside in an environment cast aglow by these lights' particular spectrum, but there are more material reasons to prefer them, not least because they can approach the same quality of light more conventional alternatives offer.

To start off with they use less energy to produce a given amount of light. For instance, straight from Wikipedia I've learned that a 7 watt LED bulb can produce as much light as a 60 watt incandescent bulb or a 15 watt fluorescent bulb. Beyond that LEDs live longer than incandescents by 30 times or more, with the latest fluorescents capable of shining for a comparable length of time. That's at least 30,000 hours, or 25-30 years.

Something lasting that long demands a comparable investment and for that reason LED bulbs are still pretty pricey. As is the case with all good things, that price is coming down. Whether or not it makes sense for you to put that money into a bulb you might forget or smash when you move depends on how inconvenient it is for you to front those funds and how inconvenient it is for society should you opt for something else - I wonder what the social costs of night vision goggles are. As long as you're not living hand-to-mouth though, the higher price should be more than offset by savings on energy and maintenance.

Speaking of a cool sci-fi future I now come to our second prospect on the horizon of lighting technology: bioluminescence. Bioluminescence, that alluring biochemical reaction that led more kids to aspire to become marine biologists than research funding could support, is not just for jellyfish. Genetic engineering long ago gave us glow-in-the-dark tobacco and monkeys as well. The next step is bioluminescent trees to replace street lights.

This idea has already been pretty well-documented. Here I will make the hardly profound observation that lighting in this form wouldn't require electricity. What interests me more though is the idea that overtaxed avenues of energy transformation can be relieved by redistributing that weight to other paths, and that one of those paths runs through life.

Is biology the answer to an electricity shortage? It seems to make increasing economic sense to produce what we need - light, industrial chemicals - not by the conventional means of combustion, electricity or mechanics, but by the pathways that exist within plants, animals and other organisms. That's an alarming thought when one considers the ways in which we have already exploited life. It could lead to some pretty freaky developments. We could also spare other species and engineer ourselves to see in the dark, which, again, would be pretty cool.

As long as such technology is used for the purposes of making human existence - and thus the planet - more sustainable, I find little cause for concern in engineering trees and other organisms. In the development of alternatives for lighting we have captured a glimpse of the greater integration with biology that will take place in many other areas.

Coke's PlantBottle Hits Home

In an earlier post I mentioned that Coca-Cola has already had its green bottle on the market for a couple years now. What makes the bottle green is that 30% of its content comes from materials that are renewable as they're made from plants. I was excited to see at work today that our latest shipment of Dasani, which is produced by Coke, is also housed in the container. It had previously only been available in the Western United States in this form.

As Coke explains on their site, they've been able to create the bottle by using different ingredients in the synthesis of its plastic, polyethylene terephthalate or PET, which is commonly known as Type 1 and the material most plastic bottles are made from. This involved replacing a petroleum-based ingredient with the same chemical derived from sugarcane-based ethanol. This accounts for the renewable component of the bottle. The remaining 70% consists of terephthalic acid, which Coke has not yet been able to derive from plants. With the release of Pepsi's latest green bottle, however, it now seems that they've been beaten to the punch. As it is Coke's aim to take that step themselves and shift all of its packaging to renewable forms I expect that we will soon see plant-based plastics dominate the marketplace.

As Coke astutely points out "Just because a material is made from plants doesn't mean it's necessarily better for the environment or society." For that reason they've made efforts to remedy the issues their campaign could potentially give rise to. By using sugarcane-based ethanol from Brazil they've better ensured that their latest operations don't actually produce more additional carbon than is saved. This supply choice simultaneously keeps production from crowding out food supplies. That Brazilian ethanol is so conducive to these aims has interesting implications for the agricultural subsidies in America keeping it out of this country.

It's worth noting here that the plant-based components of the PlantBottle are not necessarily biodegradable and that even biodegradation doesn't always eliminate toxic chemicals. In other words, once Coke launches its 100% plant-based bottle, it still won't be as simple as throwing it into a compost bin, which arguably isn't very effective in terms of energy and resource use anyway. Rather, these bottles will have to be channeled into a recycling system that could conceivably go on to have the materials reused indefinitely if well-managed.

This initiative has highlighted for me a couple of best practices in sustainable business that I have in part articulated elsewhere. First, if you're going to create persistent or harmful wastes as a byproduct of production, make sure the channels for indefinitely reusing them are available and utilized. That's the direction Coke is currently moving in. Second, in the event that wastes escape your recycling system, work it out such that they don't come back to bite us, preferably by making them nontoxic, if not both nontoxic and biodegradable.

I say nontoxic and biodegradable because as I alluded to earlier 'biodegradable' is too vague a term to adequately guide sustainability decisions. It's even been used to describe PET and other plastics, since they inevitably break down into smaller pieces. But that's actually a problem, since their fundamental chemistry remains the same and poses threats to biology. What I propose is coining a new term for these purposes - perhaps bioconvertible - to describe materials that we know can be chemically transformed into something useful or at least harmless by natural processes, a class that would largely consist of time-tested, "natural" materials.

PlantBottle leaves us with some of the same issues that the conventional PET bottle does. We wouldn't want it to get into our oceans, for instance, but it's definitely a step in the right direction. The growing niche for recycling Coke and Pepsi's efforts are creating promises to make the collection process more widespread and efficient and thus reduce the risk of persistent litter. Most importantly, plant-based plastics take advantage of an underutilized resource in the form of agricultural byproducts and reduce our dependency on foreign resources and fossil fuels. Let's just hope that the resulting decrease in oil demand won't lead to a commensurate drop in its price that would tempt us to use it even longer.

This move has come about as a result of public pressure exerted by citizens either at the consumer level or as it translates into government policy. Thanks to consciousness of the repercussions of their actions, market actors are improving the efficiency of how the market operates. That process has afforded us healthier alternatives at no greater financial cost while creating business opportunities in the recycling industry and elsewhere. Without that development, business would have gone on as usual and these advances wouldn't have materialized until precipitated by external shocks, such as spikes in oil prices. This dynamic underscores the importance of continuing to build such awareness of the consequences of our decisions and the responsibility that comes with freedom.

Perhaps Coke's experience will one day lead it to push bioplastics more than carbonated beverages. Who am I kidding?

The End of Growth?

I came across this video recently that aptly summarizes the developments that have led to our current predicament. It turns out that it's part of a promotional campaign for The End of Growth, a book which, predictably enough, argues we are entering a permanent era of no growth. The book in turn is sponsored by the Post-Carbon Institute.



It's worth asking whether growth can be sustained and, if not, whether that change is already upon us, as both answers would have profound implications for our way of life. This is not least of all because it would result in a zero-sum game, the subject of another book.

At first I wasn't particularly convinced that growth could already be coming to an end, but feared that that was only because society and my education had trained me to think otherwise. I even questioned the idea that growth can't go on indefinitely. I'm still not a convert to the idea that the economy is stalling, if only because the theory of no growth requires that environments don't change. As long as shocks still rock our system, and they always will, whether in the form of natural disasters or changing demographics, there will always be some lost ground to make up for.

I also wonder whether it wouldn't be possible to continue expanding economically on the basis of abstract goods that require no increase in material inputs. Equipped with our faculties as humans and a fixed level of capital, we could confer something of value, perhaps even something that makes people more productive, in the form of providing advice or inspiring others, to name just a few. It would only require mobilizing existing resources in a different way. Instead of watching videos, for instance, you could spend an evening disseminating best work habits.

Even this area of activity, however, is subject to diminishing returns. As a result, although we might not see an end to growth, we will at minimum witness it taper off. What we understand least is when and how quickly this condition will materialize. The level of uncertainty surrounding its timing might be sufficient to warrant taking the cautious path and preparing for such developments in advance. It makes me wonder whether that's what the Post-Carbon Institute is hoping to precipitate through its work, quite possibly by making premature predictions and consciously so.

There's a lot to explore on this topic and I've only hit upon the tip of the iceberg. Because of the pressing need to adjust to the end of growth, as PCI puts it, they've made excerpts from the book available on their site. I'm already in the process of reading them over and will likely add more thoughts on the issue at a later point.