Amory and Hunter Lovins: Spokespersons for a Sustainable-energy Future
(Page 10 of 15)
July/August 1984
By the Mother Earth News editors
Second, look at your own resources and try to find what you already have that you can market to the outside. Velarde, New Mexico, had a lot of seemingly useless aspen trees until it realized that they're superb for making Japanese chopsticks, which that town now exports abroad. Glenwood Springs, Colorado, is building a thriving commodity brokerage trade, because it has remarkably clean airwaves for satellite transmission. There are enormous opportunities everywhere, but you have to be creative, clever, and self-confident.
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The third principle is to carefully scrutinize new economic activity. Will the new enterprise bring a net economic benefit or only the illusion of it? Will the new employer bring its employees with it? Cities used to engage in smokestack chasing; now it's chip chasing. But in either case the chances are that such a "rescuer" is a myth . . . that it won't come and it may not rescue you if it does. So instead, take all the money and advantages you were willing to offer "Zorch Chemical'.' to lure it to come, and spread them around the existing viable or nearviable parts of your current base. That is where you can really look for exciting opportunities.
At Rocky Mountain Institute, our goal is to develop a modular, standalone manual that we can ship out across the country to help communities with self-renewal. We'll just provide the model ... the actual working out of that process will change from community to community. But we are committed to involving local people from the beginning — rather than doing a top-down government study — so that you get the wisdom of all the different segments of society. Although it is a messy, thrashing, struggling process to work through, when all is said and done the groups that have put such a plan together own it. It's their plan; it's what makes sense for their community.
We'll be testing these ideas this year in the town of Carbondale, Colorado. So we should know better in a year or so what works, what fails, and what needs to be restructured. If the process works, the program will then be available for whoever wants to use it.
AND A SHORT DISCUSSION
PLOWBOY: Amory and Hunter, I've noticed these last few days that you most often stress economic rather than environmental or social benefits for moving toward a soft energy path. Why is that?
AMORY: You've got to talk to people in their language — and about their concerns — or they won't hear you. So when we try to convince a banker to install energy-efficient lighting in the office, we'll say, "Hey, you're passing up a loan with an 80-point spread!"
HUNTER: Or when we talk to utility people who are stuck with a costly and controversial nuclear plant project, we'll say, "Look, as far as we're concerned, it's fueled with Kitty Litter. Let's just look at your cash flow and work together to help you get out of this mess." That way we're much more likely to set up a working relationship that will actually change the utility's behavior.
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