Sustainability: The State of Conversation Today, Part II

by hans peter meyer

A dozen years ago, the sustainability conversation invoked images of the "3-legged stool" of economy, society, and ecology. Now, thanks to folks like Mark Holland, we've got the "8 pillars" of sustainability. In between, the conversation went off the radar in BC as our forest and real estate industries tanked. The ecological leg of the stool wasn't as important as putting bread on the table.

So where are we at today? We've had 2-3 short years of intense discussion about sustainability, thanks in part to Mr. Gore. We are all much more aware of the need to do something about climate change, whether we think it's driven by our carbon lifestyle or just the whimsy of the planet. But our forest industry is in the tank. Again. As is our real estate and development industry. Again. Since October, we're also trying to figure out how to do something about global warming etc in the context of a financial freeze. Do we mimic the late '90s, and casually drop ecological concerns from the conversation about survival, which is what "sustainability" is really about?

I've been talking to people about this, and the consensus is that, Yes, the conversation has changed, but it hasn't gone away.

Peter ter Weeme is a principal with Junxion , a Vancouver-based firm specializing in sustainability consulting. He's seeing a definite change in the conversation. It isn't that people want to walk away from it in the name of cost-cutting, he says, but that "sustainability" is playing a role in how costs are cut. He points to the way that ecological and economic values are sync-ing in the discussion about energy and energy efficiency. For example, BC Hydro's push to meet emerging energy needs through conservation rather than construction. "I'm in Toronto right now," ter Weeme told me, citing another example. "They're talking about powering their public transit with wind power." These are conscious moves towards sustainability. For an examples of how concerns for financial efficiencies can have 'green' side effects, ter Weeme points out that current cuts to business and government travel budgets will help them close the gap on their carbon reduction targets.

For residents of non-metro communities, however, one of the biggest changes ter Weeme sees on the horizon is the deepening of the "buy local" emphasis that has been growing in recent years. "I think we're going to see the end of the big box economics. The costs associated with transportation will start to undermine the advantage of big boxes. People are already being motivated to shop local, to buy local produce."

This is consistent with what Victor Cumming says about carbon-based changes emerging with regard to regional economics. Cumming is a 30 year veteran of regional economic development in Canada and internationally. He sees the market collapse in the fall as signaling the end of the idea that "globalization will save us, that an increased consumption pattern will save us, that we could, in essence, grow into more wealth without any clear understanding that there are some biological limits." For non-metro communities the upside is that some of the economies of scale (and cheap carbon-based transportation, ie. the economics of the big boxes) may be challenged by the economies of locality.

There is a growing realization, says Cumming, "that some of all of this grandiose economic activity needs to be tempered with concepts of long term carbon sustainability. This is going to really change people's thinking about wages, production levels, local economy -- in ways we have never thought about these before. In the Okanagan, for example, it's likely we'll come to the conclusion that shipping all fruit to Vancouver, so that it can be distributed from a single point, back to where it came from, will have to change. Old concepts where you can maximize margins by maximizing the carbon footprint, that kind of thinking has to change. Shipping milk to Calgary to process, so that it can be brought back... Those kinds of things will eventually go away."

Carole Stark is a community planning and sustainability consultant with the Chinook Institute for Community Stewardship. Her home community of Canmore, Alberta shares many qualities with the attractive, high-amenity non-metro communities in southwestern BC and Vancouver Island. Like them, Canmore has been hit hard by the downturn in real estate and construction related activities. But while Stark encounters fear for the future in her community, she says this is tempered by the community's commitment to following through on a recent "sustainability plan." The planning process identified key needs: "diversification of the economy, and social connectedness. We need to remain connected as a community, including residents and weekenders, if the economy is strong. But if the economy slows down, we need to remain connected as well, maybe even more so." With the subsequent downturn, fears have emerged, but the town has a plan, and is not abandoning the sustainability conversation. Stark sees the community resolutely moving "on to the next steps, getting on to working on the priorities that have been identified, and changing the way that they build relationships with residents and other stakeholders."

Stark's research suggests that the current real estate slowdown is temporary for high-amenity communities like Canmore. But beyond the amenity-migration market, there appears to be a bigger shift taking place. "I don't think this is just a momentary blip in how we do things," says ter Weeme, echoing Cumming. "I think we're seeing a real values shift happening. People have been sold a bill of goods - the whole global consumption thing - and they're seeing that it isn't working."

Has the financial situation changed the conversation about sustainability? Yes, says Victor Cumming, "It's changed everything." The focus seems to have shifted to local, to the community. Some communities, like those Carole Stark works with, have the advantage of a "sustainability plan" that looks beyond short term gains. But it takes considerable leadership within a community to hold to medium and long term perspectives when families need jobs and mortgages need paying. Communities in the Comox Valley are in the process of developing a "sustainability plan." While this is critical, especially at a time when significant value shifts may be taking place, a plan is, after all, only as good as the commitment to follow through with it.

Post script:
For Part I of this review of the state of the sustainability conversation, see Tim Pringle's March blog post for the Communities in Transition program. Tim is Director of Special Programs at the Real Estate Foundation of BC and has been participating in the evolution of the sustainability conversation since the early 1990s.







A version of this article appeared in the April 2009 issue of The Island Word.

©Real Estate Foundation of BC / 2009.
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