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Is a "buy local" economy really sustainable?

Janne K. Flisrand's take:

There's no silver bullet to sustainable living, but rather a toolbox to pick and choose from. Sustainable consumerism is intentional consumerism. Buying local is one of those tools, one with many benefits, but it will never be the whole solution. Organic, fair trade, and manufacturing practices (like avoiding discharge of hazardous waste) are also key. None of those is inherent in buying local. A complete sustainability consumer solution might be a Life Cycle Damage score printed on the packaging of every product and service purchased, with scores that could go infinitely high, and a perfect score being 10.

Given that, buying local creates jobs and recycles money through local economies, and there are buy-local options everywhere. Some places have local, Community Supported Agriculture (like the CSAs within 100 miles of Minneapolis) and in others it might limited to locally-owned vintage stores.

No place in the United States today has a self-sufficient local economy. The community-based economy our parents and grandparents knew has been systematically destroyed. Cheap manufacturing in places with a low cost of living and lacking strong environmental regulations produce cheaper goods than local manufacturers who meet their employees on the street or see them walking into a food shop. Cheap big box store prices — thanks to very large suppliers — have forced many local shops out of business.

Plus, some products simply cannot be produced locally. Compact fluorescent light bulbs will never be manufactured in every community.

If we are serious about buying locally, we will have to change how we live. Consumers will have homework: What is produced locally? Where do I get it? Is it worth paying a little more? But it goes further, to changing habits. In Minneapolis, I have the Twin Cities Green Guide and Green Routes to find local products. But if I want to eat local in the winter, I'll have to begin canning and preserving.

While some places could become locally sustainable over time, that's not true everywhere. Some of the fastest growing communities in the country are in the desert southwest where the ecosystem cannot support many people — too little water means too little food. They aren't out of the game — guides like Local First Arizona list local businesses and services, and Craigslist, the parent of all ìreuse sites, is active practically everywhere. But they'll never be self-sufficient with their current populations.

When enough consumers make a push, the system builds on itself and it gets easier. In Minneapolis, I shop at a food cooperative that labels local food. In addition to Craigslist, we have a local (free) on-line product exchange. The Reuse Center deconstructs old buildings and sells materials in their stores, and provides a metro outlet for locally harvested FSC wood from Aitkin County — where they are building a network of local producers of value-added goods like flooring and paper. We have stores selling clothing by local designers. And, local bike shops sell products made within 25 miles.

In the Twin Cities, it's working.

Heidi Siegelbaum responds:

Buying local is a powerful consumer choice. Here in Seattle there's a growing fabric of FSC certified wood products sold by Ecohaus, some of which are sourced from local sustainably managed forests. We purchase regularly from farmers markets, several of which are open all year, their tables redolent with local earthy fecundity and I make a point of buying wild Alaska, Oregon and Washington seafood from the fabulous Fresh Fish Company in Norwegian Ballard.

It's unlikely any community could survive exclusively on local products but consumers can begin a small revolution by asking businesses to carry more local products and asking ìwhere was this product made? We must be willing to pay a small price premium for the overwhelming benefit of keeping money circulating in the local community rather than shunting most of it off to a corporate office out of state. There is also an interesting dovetailing of buy local campaigns with community sustainability groups. This is a great way of creating a blueprint for healthy communities that build civic pride, keep neighbors interacting on a more intimate basis and reduce our carbon footprint — imagine walking to the store!

Dennis Markatos-Soriano responds:

As Janne says, buying local is only part of the path to sustainability, with benefits such as reducing oil consumption to transport the products I buy. But the green score also depends on practices of the local producer (whether they utilize energy efficient equipment, minimize their pollution, have solar panels on their roof, etc.).

As we promote local economies, it would be useful for us to define local. Does that mean within 25 miles or does it mean that the product was made in the USA? I tend to get excited about opportunities for marginal improvement every year, even if it doesn't mean we reached utopia. For instance, if we in New Jersey used to import 50% of our apples from New Zealand, and we lower that share by buying more delicious North Carolina apples (disclaimer: as a Tarheel, I have a serious bias toward Carolina anything), then we are making great progress toward a local economy. My main concern is to lower the carbon score, so even a product made 12,000 miles away can beat out the local good if they run their machines on wind power and deliver the good via cellulosic ethanol.

I don't see economies as being either local or global, but as fostering the right balance for each community. Further increases in the price of oil would drive greater opportunities for entrepreneurs that can provide quality goods in a sustainable way to local markets.

Jim Nicolow responds:

Bill McKibbin's comments in Sam Eaton's story were dead on. The idea of making an altruistic sacrifice to buy local will soon be irrelevant. Throughout most of human history, economies were primarily local. And not because people were attending standing-room-only buy local conferences; they were local out of necessity. It was too expensive to rely heavily upon remote goods.

A temporary abundance of cheap energy changed that dynamic. I can buy a Clementine in Michigan that was grown in Morocco and imported through Canada at a price comparable to a Michigan-grown peach.

As energy prices continue to climb, due both to scarcity and more accurately reflecting the environmental toll of fossil fuel energy use (such as through carbon taxes), non-local goods will simply begin to cost more than local goods due to higher transportation costs.

People will begin to once again buy local because it's cheaper. That doesn't translate to exclusively local economies. Most never were. The spice trade is a great example of a non-local economy that predated cheap energy. Archaeologists can cite numerous examples of pre-historic cultures trading goods and materials over great distances. However, these were luxury items and did not represent the majority of economic activity.

• November 15, 2007 by Janne K. Flisrand
• 2 comments

Is there room for Wal-Mart on the green bandwagon?

Heidi Siegelbaum's take:

It's a wonderful, yet tragic story. Wal-Mart, the world's largest and most profitable company is going green and bringing its supply chain along for the ride. The benefits will be impressive, particularly if Wal-Mart retrofits all of its stores to make them energy efficient and their packaging reduction strategiesbear fruit. Goals include 100% renewable energy supply and cutting their carbon footprint by 20%. This is coupled with a targeted 30% increase in existing store efficiency and 25% reduction in solid waste.

Because Wal-Mart accounts for 10% of all retail sales, the positive multiplier effects from their environmental programs could be staggering. The sale of compact fluorescent bulbs will make a huge difference in energy use (who whudda thunk?) although it's residential home design and heating/cooling retrofits that pack the biggest energy saving punch. Promoting employee adoption of environmental practices at home is also a very promising sustainability diffusion strategy, employing the notable "behavioral change commitment" approach.

However, there is also a niggling lipstick-on-a-pig story here. Wal-Mart footprints are Eee-normous 224,000 sq. ft. (at their non-Supercenter largest) for the retail space plus another 16 to 20 acres of pure, unadulterated asphalt parking lot per store. Compare this to the local Main Street retailer of 2,000 sq. ft. Parking lots and other hard surfaces are super energetic highways of pollution: Phosphorous, hydrocarbons, and heavy metals rush into nearby rivers, streams and bays, not to mention that they interrupt and reduce the supply of drinking water (can anyone say Atlanta?). Using a generous estimate of 413,000 gallons of polluted runoff for half the Wal-Mart parking lots from a single one-inch rain storm, times existing stores, times the anticipated increase in new store development, worst case scenario we could be looking at more than 7 million gallons of polluted runoff every time it rains an inch.

We are losing forests, prairies, wetlands and other valuable forms of landscape to a sea of impervious surface that affects everything from water quality, water supply and carbon sinks to visual aesthetics and our mental health. Carbon tax? We should think about adopting an impervious surface tax because the cost of every square foot of asphalt or concrete always outweighs its benefits.

This is not an unimportant story. Water pollution and water supply will be THE driving issue in this century because without it, there will be no Dow Jones, no deeply discounted consumer products. Consequently, we may find ourselves one day importing not only oil but drinking water, from other places around the globe, notably the very places where 80% of Wal-Mart products are manufactured.

Wal-Mart's environmental strategies, as promising and positive as they are, are unlikely to counteract their underlying business strategy, which calls for linear expansion and diversification into markets such as banking and cars, is inherently unsustainable. As we are inexorably driven into manufacturing inexpensive goods in overseas markets, we increase our carbon footprint considerably through shipping (which uses filthy bunker fuel), air freight and driving the unsustainable consumption of billions of plastic products manufactured using petroleum byproducts (not to mention lead). Perhaps Wal-Mart will remake itself one day in the style of the newly minted Corporation 2020 which completely shifts our thinking about businesses as serving the public rather than the obverse.

Janne K. Flisrand responds:

Heidi's focus on asphalt parking lots leads right to one of my favorite topics — community design, and why it matters.

The way America plans our towns has left us with a world in which nearly everyone is mandated to own a car. We separate uses — housing, civic spaces, businesses, retail — all get their own place.

Try going somewhere without driving. Even if you are 1/4 mile from your destination, without direct connections between locations every trip has to go out of the way onto a big, fast street to get there. That makes reducing the 1/3 of American green house gas emissions from transportation tough — in new communities public transportation, walking and cycling aren't broadly viable.

Until Wal-Mart (and other big box retailers) figure out other ways to build stores that fit a more walkable context (or until we stop shopping at them), we're trapped behind the wheel. We may find ways to get cars moving without fossil fuels, but that won't solve other problems:

• the water problems Heidi described
• use of energy and materials embedded in producing cars
• obesity and inactivity
• a transportation system that doesn't work for people who don't drive: children, people with health problems, and soon aging Baby Boomers
• a loss of community (Do you stop to greet your neighbor as you drive down the street? When you walk down the street?)

Dennis Markatos-Soriano responds:

After celebrating the virtues of developing local economies yesterday, it's funny to then applaud the efforts of the epitome of globalization, Wal-Mart. But it's undeniable that this leading retailer can help transform the business world toward sustainability.

Though as Heidi said, Wal-Mart has a long way to go. From parking lots that threaten our water quality to pollution from the energy production for its stores and its goods manufacture, Lee Scott and others who promote sustainability and energy efficiency have a lot to make up for. Over the next several years, if Wal-Mart wants to maintain/win the respect of the majority of the public who cares about the environment, they will have to push the envelope beyond CFL lighting to promote other Energy Star appliances that can stabilize our energy consumption.

One idea that they could initiate is to put a carbon label on all of their products (like nutrition facts on foods). Such a label would give consumers the opportunity to reward producers that lower their greenhouse gas emissions whether through efficiency, renewables, or more local production. If consumers respond, as they have with organics of late, such an initiative could mark a movement to more conscious consumerism. It could help low- carbon technologies grow in market share by lowering their costs — unleashing climate progress by utilizing Wal-Mart's signature, economics of scale.

Jim Nicolow responds:

Sustainability is a three-legged stool: social, environmental, and economic. Wal-Mart is a company that seems to have focused exclusively on economic performance. When I first heard murmurs of Wal-Mart embracing environmental performance I was highly skeptical, assuming they had made some token green gesture to offset the groundswell of negative press they were receiving at the time for poor social performance.

But their case is more complex. Wal-Mart is making legitimate improvements that will have significant positive environmental impacts (if you can call ëless bad' positive). And what they do has a huge influence across the economy.

I doubt Wal-Mart is doing any of this to be nice. Waste is bad for profits as well as the environment. Maybe they recognize that sustainability is not a zero sum game. You can do the right thing for the environment AND improve the bottom line. If they focus on the social side before driving the last family store out of business, we could be in for some exciting times!

Heidi's comments regarding water and water quality are important. Wal-Mart and other big box retailers could be doing far more to address this critical aspect of sustainability, such as including pervious paving and natural stormwater management at all new sites. But that's a subject for a future blog....

• November 16, 2007 by Heidi Siegelbaum
• 6 comments

Las Vegas' new City Center: greenwashed or not?

Jim Nicolow's take

Holy crap! We're holding up Las Vegas as a model of sustainability? A city that would dry up overnight without imported drinking water to flush its toilets, imported food to stock its casino buffets, imported energy to run its air conditioned sleek glass towers, and imported gasoline to ferry its citizens across the growing expanse of exurban sprawl? This story made my soul ache.They rejoice at the creation of a new 76-acre collection of "sleek glass towers" in the desert, suggesting this is a model of sustainability? Excuse me, I misspoke. They're not just "sleek glass towers" in the desert. They're sleek glass towers in the desert with added shading devices...and some sustainably harvested wood from China!

Hogwash. No, greenwash.

This is like celebrating a school bully who pledges to cut back on beating up his classmates to every other day rather than every day as a model of nonviolence.

The definition of desert is, "a barren or desolate area; especially, a dry, often sandy region of little rainfall, extreme temperatures, and sparse vegetation." "Desert" comes from the Latin desertum meaning "an unpopulated place." Talk about an inconvenient truth. Las Vegas is the ìlargest city in the world founded after 1900" because the area simply does not have the ecological resources to sustainably support a large population.

We need to drop this flawed notion that any number of people can live in any region "sustainably" if they simply begin to deplete their resources (or those imported from another region) at a slightly slower rate. That's not sustainability. Sustainability is living in a way that can continue in perpetuity. It's balance. A city of half-a-million people living in the middle of a desert is not a model of sustainability. This new infusion of 7.5 billion dollars will further increase the region's drain on imported resources, not reduce it.

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I'm all for recognizing the efforts of individuals and organizations who are doing the right thing, and I do recognize that the designers probably incorporated more green strategies than the shading, cogeneration, and use of 'sustainably' harvested Chinese lumber referenced in the story.

However, I question the premise that a 7.5 billion dollar investment in Las Vegas provides an instructive example of sustainability. Green buildings coupled with brown urban planning won't lead to true sustainability.

This reminds me of the 70's passive solar Earthship houses that used very little energy but were 30 miles from the nearest store, requiring a 60 mile round trip to buy a loaf of bread. After factoring in transportation energy use, they would have a larger carbon footprint than an inefficient urban apartment.

Surely there are cities that could provide a more instructive, holistic model of sustainability than Las Vegas? What about Portland, Oregon's urban growth boundary; or Kalundborg, Denmark's example of industrial ecology?

Janne K. Flisrand responds:

"A project this size can move markets."

Cindy Ortega says, "Then what happens is it goes into Home Depot, and all of a sudden when you put your addition on your home, you have the availability of those materials and so that's the whole purpose of large projects moving the needle on sustainability."

Nope. City Center probably isn't sourcing materials through Home Depot & a denizen of architects is researching every tube of glue, every piece of wood, every ounce of paint used, and most are purchased wholesale. Home Depot employees who tell us Christmas tree lights are in aisle four aren't verifying that materials meet LEED standards.

I do want to give Home Depot credit. They are working hard to get environmentallyfriendly products on their shelves. But - they've got work to do in the staff training department.

The last time I was in Home Depot, I asked someone in an orange apron whether the pressed board contained urea formaldehyde glues. They looked at me like I was from Mars. Well... "We're getting more green products all the time." Maybe the architects should train Home Depot employees?

So, yeah. Huge projects create demand for certain products. But, commercial building materials are pretty different from what's in Home Depot aisles. Where they do overlap, I look forward to the day someone in an orange apron can teach me which washer has more recycled content, as well as which one will work.

Heidi Siegelbaum responds:

Holy crap is right. Las Vegas could only be a sustainable city in a parallel universe. Its location, rapacious growth, delusional water policies and the City's vigorous sell of excess as an enviable social value is anything but sustainable. City Center's green building is a trumpeted red herring. Sustainable Las Vegas??

• 70% of Las Vegas' water is used for outdoor lawn watering and golf courses, not the famed Las Vegas strip. We'll see if the $2/square foot incentive offered by the Southern Nevada Water Quality Authority pays off in its "pretty please with a maraschino cherry on top" approach to voluntary conservation
• The city is sucking groundwater in a politically charged fight with the Great Basin's ranchers and farmers. Lake Mead, from which Las Vegas draws most of its water, is at half its normal capacity
• Las Vegas has among the highest per capita water consumption in the world
• 336 acres is developed each week in Las Vegas

Sustainable Cities respect their realistic carrying capacity, build local assets, are self reliant and ensure future generations have adequate resources. Maybe Las Vegas will find an innovative way to turn the Great Mojave's sand into drinking water?

On October 24th of this year, a summit was held on Environmental Sustainability and Las Vegas (opens PDF) where the conversation seemed to focus on "managing" natural resources but alas, a viable-- much less sustainable-- Las Vegas will require a radically different approach.

Dennis Markatos-Soriano responds:

Y'all make some great points. Las Vegas has a long way to reach sustainability, and it feels silly to connect the desert city to environmental responsibility. However, while I am not inclined to praise Las Vegas's initiatives over those of Portland or New York, I do appreciate the steps that they take to mitigate their environmental footprint. And given the fact that some people do live excessive lifestyles, it is important for all of us to foster policy that will at least make them pay the social costs of their private actions (and hopefully help moderate their most damaging habits). Such policy includes a carbon tax or a cap-and-trade system allocating greenhouse gas emission permits. Specifically for Las Vegas, I have an idea to help change its unsustainable image:

Rizhao is a coastal city in eastern China (its name means "city of sunshine") that has built its identity as a solar model for the world. Almost every household in the central city has a solar water heating system on their roof, cumulatively producing energy equivalent to thousands of tons of coal. Las Vegas could make a similar commitment to becoming a solar capital, putting their perpetual sun to great use.

Every decision moves the market, so I encourage Las Vegas and other communities to improve their footprint. In that vein, I celebrate its new City Center, and hope that the building is only the beginning of an overwhelming nationwide shift that positions the U.S. as a leader rather than laggard in achieving a sustainable future.

• November 27, 2007 by Jim Nicolow
• 1 comments