Notes from a work in progress:
The guys at Ford are retooling a mongo-sized factory to produce electric cars rather than trucks. Are they retooling the factory's air conditioning and lighting to waste less energy, too? Ford commissioned the River Rouge factory, a beacon of smart architecture, then went on making brain-in-zipper SUVs. A green building flails if its people and surroundings don't feel inspiration, connection and vigilance. So green thinking, as leaders like architect William McDonough and Big Apple sustainability czar Rohit Aggarwala have pointed out, envelops all thinking about justice and peace. Our greenest strategies involve people living close to each other, close to their food and close to modes of transit that they share. These strategies require good schools, safe streets, fun things to do and places to run around. So "environmentalism" ruts when you think of it as a lifestyle or a posture. It is a concern with all elements around us, most immediately with each other, and a commitment to make those elements as durable and fair as we know how. So:
Every decision of every business must factor in its cost to the health and future security of the people who buy from it. And every open palm from every source- including the guy on the oil rig saving a gimmicky no-carbon yacht crew- deserves respect. The relationship between immediate security and long-term sustainability is a lot more intimate than we reporters sometimes let on, and it's baked somewhere into the prices we pay for cars and oil and yachts. Or it should be.
