Climate change. Over-fished oceans. Killer hurricanes. Species extinction. Polluted air and water. Not a pretty list, is it? And a hell of a legacy we’re leaving behind for the kids. But these are the harsh realities we’re facing now as the consequences of our decades of planetary abuse finally come a-callin’. So what, if anything, can we do to fix this fine mess we’ve gotten ourselves into?
Humanity has always treated nature as a thing to be conquered and controlled, harnessed and harvested. We like being the masters of our domain. But last century, let’s face it, things got completely out of hand, leading to near system failure on a global scale and contributing to the depletion of our natural resources faster than they can be replenished. So is it any wonder that the last few years have seen a real push towards finding more sustainable ways of living?
From car companies to television networks to cleaning products, who isn’t talking “green” these days? But talk is cheap (and talk from corporations a whole lot cheaper) and real progress has to be promoted, and made, on a grassroots level. But what does all this green talk really add up to? What should we be doing to make a difference? What, exactly, does sustainable mean?
Well, just for fun, let’s look at the situation through the lens of the Aesop fable “The Ant and the Grasshopper.” Remember this one? The ant works laboriously throughout the whole year to put away enough food to live comfortably in winter. The grasshopper, meanwhile, spends all summer singing and dancing without a thought to saving for the future. One guess as to who makes it through December. Moral of the story: prepare today for the needs of tomorrow.
But sustainability isn’t just about saving for the future, and it’s not about sacrificing, either. It’s about living responsibly within our means and meeting our present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs.
The challenge of sustainable living is to preserve one’s quality of life without deprivation or lowering one’s lifestyle. It’s about consuming only the resources we need, leading to improved living conditions via ecological, economical and aesthetic preservation. Living like the Ant ensures progress and survival. Living like the Grasshopper…well, that leads to the problems we’re dealing with now.
The best measure of sustainable achievement is our Ecological Footprint, an estimation of how each of us is personally responsible for energy efficiency in our pursuit of four basic human needs: food, energy, materials and water. Our footprint’s size indicates the impact that our activities and lifestyle choices have on the Earth. In this case, smaller is better.
Footprint increases with the amount of non-renewable energy resources we consume: coal, petroleum, natural gas. It’s the harnessing and combustion of these fossil fuels that releases CO2, amplifying the atmosphere’s natural greenhouse effect, leading to climate change, which can manifest itself as anything from flooding and increasingly destructive storms (Katrina, anyone?) to permanent habitat change.
So, in light of all this cheery information, what are some simple ways we can each achieve a smaller footprint?
One of the biggest and most obvious ways is to switch to renewable energy sources: wind, solar, geothermal, or biomass power. Call your local utility company and find out what Green Energy sources are available to you. More demand means lower costs, which, in turn, leads to even greater demand. Everybody wins.
But if that sort of wholesale change isn’t an option, how about something small like turning down the thermostat? Buy some extra blankets, cuddle more—nobody said energy conservation had to be boring. For your commute, choose public transportation or a bicycle, or how about some old-fashioned walking? (Lord knows we could all use the exercise!)
One of the biggest impacts we can have? Cutting our consumption of fossil fuels in the production and distribution of goods and services. In other words: eat locally.
What’s that about, you say?
Many of us have only a black box understanding of how food gets from farm to fork. There’s the cow…and then there’s the T-bone wrapped in cellophane at the local grocery store. The in-between? We’re all a little fuzzy on that part.
What most people don’t realize is that each step in the manufacture of industrial foods, from processing to packaging to transportation to market makes a considerable ecological impact. Think about it: the water and energy to grow, process and package the food, the burning of fossil fuels to transport it from one end of the country to the other or from one country to another. That’s a lot of energy expended. So one good way to decrease your amount of greenhouse gas emissions (not to mention improve your health) is by eating locally grown, organic produce from farm stands instead of the packaged and processed stuff. Local, organic produce tastes better, and haven’t you heard? Farmer’s markets are the hippest thing since sliced bread—not to mention the hippest place to buy sliced bread.
Growing food in a way that provides human subsistence and safeguards a healthy ecosystem is the heart of sustainable agriculture. Plus, using alternatives to pesticides, eliminating sources of excess nutrients from animal wastes and fertilizers and preserving biodiversity by using seeds that haven’t been genetically modified all lead to healthier living.
There’s been a lot of talk about water being the next lynchpin commodity, a’ la oil. Well, here are some interesting water facts: nearly all the water we use is for agriculture and industrial production of goods and services. The remaining portion is for domestic use and only a small percentage is available for drinking. So to conserve this precious resource, try taking shorter showers, or shower with a friend (there’s that cuddling again!) Fix your leaky plumbing and drink from refillable bottles of tap water instead of buying bottled water. We use an estimated seventeen million barrels of oil per year to make plastic bottles. And did you know it takes three liters of water to produce one one-liter water bottle? Seems a bit ridiculous, doesn’t it?
Then there’s everything we flush down the drain. Chemicals and toxins are affecting not only our tap water, but our beaches and our fish as well. So next time you’re purchasing personal care products or something to beat the grease in your kitchen, think about where all that stuff is going after it exits your home. Think about the rivers and the oceans you’re having a direct impact on. Think about the fish that live in them. Think about them and act. From household cleaners to shampoo to laundry detergent, tons of environmentally gentle products are easily available now. There’s no excuse. And Nemo will thank you.
As individuals and as communities, we all have the capacity to change the nature of our interaction with the Earth. Sustainability isn’t a hippie fad, nor some political buzzword. It’s about preserving our resources as well as our way of life. Just by making small changes to our living habits, we can be the prudent Ant and the partying Grasshopper. And with each step we take, we’ll come closer to achieving sustainable, environmentally friendly lifestyles and leaving behind us a legacy that will benefit future generations for centuries to come.
To find out your ecological footprint, try one of these online calculators:
http://www.footprintnetwork.org
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Oh wow. This is about the dullest thing I’ve ever read in a SciFi magazine, and I’ve read some winners. This was like a regurgitated High School enviro-porn documentary.
Someone who cares very deeply about the planet could probably infuse a bit more passion into the topic rather than regurgitating the catechism of reduce/reuse/recycle.
Secondly, this little blurb is so filled with fallacy and presumption that it borders on hilarious. The earnestness with which the author can blame Arnold’s Hummer for Katrina is pure farce.
I hope Lightspeed can refrain from future Captain Planet episodes and provide us with some articles of actual interest. Suggestions: cutting-edge technology breakthroughs that can provide limitless energy; creating a bridge from our oil infrastructure to a permanent and realistic future technology; anything more SciFi than preachy to-do lists; environmental advice from someone who doesn’t live in New York, LA, San Francisco, Seattle, Boston, or some other urban scab (Jackson and Tahoe don’t count either – maybe ask someone from Ulaanbaatar or Kisangani).
This is El Zarcho’s blatant attempt at garnishing himself some attention. He not only points out that he has nothing better to do with his life than read something he considers dull, but the truth of this article must have touched a sore spot with him. If it was so dull why would you continue reading?
He is exactly the reason our planet is in the condition it is in now. People like El Zarcho….and that constant need for immediate gratification. He comes to this website wanting SciFi not caring what he could currently do right now to assist in making the world a better place. I have a suggestion for you El Zarcho… jump in a bucket of AIDS. It will be your contribution to humanity if you don’t get a chance to procreate.
I thought the article was clever and informative and made me think of things I had not thought of before EX: farmers markets and how important they actually are. I appreciated learning that it takes three liters of water to produce one one-liter water bottle… I enjoyed the Ant and the Grasshopper comparison.
Please continue posting one piece of nonfiction.
Dude, you’re an asshole – and you’re not entertaining anyone.
Ps – “Dude” = “El Zilcho.” Article was good.
I loved it & I love you..thankful to Mike gor having shared it
Terrific work – enjoyed it
El Zarcho,
Thanks for commenting. Sorry you found the article boring. I thought it was fun and engaging, myself, but then, I’m rather fond of porn, enviro or otherwise.
And thank you, as well, for your suggestions. Those are topics that would certainly work for Lightspeed and would be something I’d be interesting in reading about. But as you may or may not know, we pair the nonfiction here with the fiction. This article was written to accompany Carrie Vaughn’s “Amaryllis” which, if you haven’t read it, is about a low-technology, sustainable community in a future where we obviously haven’t heeded the reduce/reuse/recycle “catechism.” If we run a piece of fiction in which the central theme is limitless energy sources or bridging the divide between our petroleum infrastructure and some other future technology, I’ll be sure to keep your advice in mind.
Alas, til then you’re stuck with the enviro porn. But hey, that gives me an idea: maybe we can interest pay cable in a high school produced, sustainable living, enviro porn documentary special. Cause, really, nothing says green living like Cinemax After Dark!
Anyway, thanks for reading Lightspeed and keep posting!
El Zarcho – I don’t think you got the who idea of the article. Re-read this paragraph: “But sustainability isn’t just about saving for the future, and it’s not about sacrificing, either. It’s about living responsibly within our means and meeting our present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs.”
I think you made the assumption of what the article was about. As someone who believes they are a true environmentalist (meaning me), but doesn’t buy into any of the garbage that is typically thrown at us on a day-to-day basis (you know, by those who are making millions off of green technology, and try to ‘force’, not suggest how we should live our lives). While nobody should tell me I can’t have an SUV, or should pay more in taxes so they can have mansions and pollute like crazy flying across the country at will on our dime), a real environmentalist helps locally (I support Tampa Bay Watch yearly), does his/her part to do what’s right (recycling, sorting trash, driving my 2001 Sentra into the ground) and supporting local businesses). To me, this article is saying just that. A message of “be reasonable”, and “small changes can amount to big results”, and “you might be surprised at what you don’t know”…. I’m all for those messages! Because they are reasonable, and nobody is trying to make millions off of these suggestions – which are really just common sense. It’s environmentalism meets reality. So I say Kudo’s to Miss Levy for a very well-written article!
I agree with a part of El Zarcho’s overall message (if I’ve gathered it correctly), if not his method of delivering it. (I did actually find his comments entertaining, though they seem a bit self-serving — in the sense that s/he is trying to entertain him/herself — and they’re probably more suitable for another readership.) The article on sustainability seemed a bit preachy, and though interesting for some of the facts it presented (such as the aforementioned three liters-to-produce-one) it seemed out of place for a magazine such as this. El Zarcho (and many others reading science fiction magazines, including myself) have certain expectations about what a science fiction magazine should include, and it seems this article — though written well enough — did not meet those expectations.
Again, that is not to say that the article isn’t a well-constructed article on the values of sustainability. I applaud the author’s efforts at alerting readers to the values of well-managed efforts at living more sustainably. Yet somehow the article seemed out of place within the context of this magazine. I understand the article is intended to be paired with a fiction piece written by another author, but perhaps this strategy of pairing fiction with non-fiction might be a bit forced. I love reading a good work of science fiction-related nonfiction (such as those typically discovered in Analog magazine), and I think the idea of pairing related stories is a good one. But unless the story offers something different from the usual fair — that is, the articles found in just about every magazine out there, from Cosmo to Esquire — then perhaps the article should not be included in the magazine.
Welcome for Portland Oregon the Home of so-called smart growth, community uber alles all and sustainability. I seen the future what you are proposing and it look like a soviet gulag with a Starbucks.
The doom and gloom has been recycling for some 35 years or so, just like the environmentalist trash. In the in 1968, the likes of Paul R. Ehrlich warning us about mass starvation of humans in 1970s and 1980s due to overpopulation and advocated immediate action to limit population growth. Yet here in 2010 it din not came to pass. In the 1970’s So called scientist warned of dire threat to humanity due to global cooling unless humanity change society; yet in 2010 in has not came to pass. In 1980 so called scientist warn us the dire threat of global warming including mass starvation, terrible weather, and disappearing coastlines by mid 2000’s. It has been thirty yeas should we see some of the predictions? Not in 2010. If there is a common thread of throughout the decades, the same false prophets of doom who are obsessed by totalitarianism, collectivism, and a distain for humanity made the predictions; The planet is doing ok it is Human freedom and liberty is threaten
Creating a sustainable lifestyle while still enjoying the comforts of a modern, high-tech society and at the same time maintaining economic growth is going to take a lot more than “taking shorter showers” or “eating local food”, i’m afraid.
The very computers and laptops with which we are reading and typing those messages, for example, are made of components that create more “footprints” in their manufacture than can be offset by just using energy saving lightbubs. Are we going to give up on them? Of course not.
Stop taking the car and walking to work instead ? Might work in a small village, however people usually live miles away from their workplace. Yes, everybody could use the exercise, but the proposition strikes me as unrealistic. The author also doesn’t say what would become of the millions of people working in or in relation to the car industry that would have to be laid off if we all stopped using cars. El Zarcho’s suggestion to “create a bridge from our oil infrastructure to a permanent and realistic future technology” is a lot more sensible than patronizing recommendations to “take the bus” instead.
The solution lies in finding and developing other sources of materials and energies that do not involve as much fossil fuels, as well as creating an alternative to the current economic model of exploitation-consumption that prevails today while still being able to raise the living standards of the 2 or 3 billions of people living in poverty on the planet. A challenge, i think, that will require more imagination and scientific developments than just starting an organic garden in your backyard.
I found the author’s heroization of the Ant laughable. If it wasn’t for our antlike industriousness, we never would have constructed the industries and used the vast amunts of resources that we have in destroying the world. Step on the ants.