Eco-Not Very Friendly
How sustainability can become inaccessible and not so sustainable.
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So, what even is "sustainability?"
Sustainability is "the practice of using natural resources responsibly today, so they are available for future generations tomorrow." (NatGeo) Basically, living in such a way that the Earth can support. The word "sustainability" often goes hand in hand with things like electric cars, solar panels, and reusable organic cotton grocery bags. You can practice sustainable living by turning off the lights when they're not necessary, buying less fast fashion, using less paper, or choosing xeriscaping instead of grass- and generally trying to reduce your footprint.
As climate conditions become more dire, the push for sustainability has increased.
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Courtesy of BLM and Flickr
The emergent properties of being eco-friendly:
Emergence is the concept that unexpected behaviors and complexities occur when a system becomes assembled. At its very core, sustainability is simple- think about the impact you have on the world. But as sustainability and climate awareness has become more widespread, there have been some unforeseen consequences.
Greenwashing, a slang term for when corporations will falsify claims that their product and practices are environmentally benign, has resulted in increased prices for cheap materials that will pollute regardless of the "biodegradable" packaging and the recycling stamp.
This idea that being eco-friendly costs more, is a common trend. Regular toothpaste in a plastic tube costs about $1. The green, zero-emissions, sustainable toothpaste tablets peddled by "EcoFam" cost $14. For a lot of people, "going green" and being Earth friendly just isn't economically feasible. It's obviously important to make sustainable choices whenever possible, but businesses capitalizing off of supposed environmentally conscious products only serve to widen the economic gap between lower and upper-class people, dividing them into those who are good and can afford to live sustainable, villainizing those who simply can't manage the hefty price tags that come with a smaller carbon footprint.
How does this connect to climate justice?
The correlation between two maps; one of renewable energy plants and the other of average income by county. Green represents wealthier areas; purple represents poorer areas. Present in both maps are the green dots which represent homeless population- the size of the circle corresponding to the amount of homelessness.
As you slide between the two maps, you might notice a few things. The majority of homelessness is in large cities like LA, San Diego, and San Francisco. Obviously, more populous cities are going to have higher homelessness rates. These areas also have more concentrated amounts of renewable energy plants. While there's undoubtedly countless factors that contribute to rates of homelessness, particularly things like the justice and mental health system, it's interesting to see that the wealthiest areas in California with the most renewable energy also have the largest amounts of people on the streets.
Let's zoom in on Los Angeles. It's got, by far, the biggest homeless population, but with a population of 3.9 million people, that's somewhat expected. It's also surrounded by solar plants, hydroelectric power, and some biomass. Solar power plants are notorious for their upfront costs, and for one of the many plants you see around LA, it cost roughly 1.3 million dollars. A hydroelectric power plant can cost anywhere from 2.3-3.3 million dollars.
No doubt that hydropower is a great investment, and one that can provide clean energy, but it is incredibly expensive to start out.
Once again, I do not deny that it is imperative to increase the production and use of renewable energy. That is a vital area of focus, particularly as the climate situation worsens. But the juxtaposition between so much financing towards solar and hydro power in LA county and the large homeless population is interesting.
Additionally, power plants require a sizable amount of land- (see below right image) and as the push for renewable energy has increased, so has the demand for land. This creates competition for flat, usable land, pushing up prices for both the development of power plants and housing.
Graph from Business Insider, image courtesy of BLM and Flickr.
The graph on the left shows that the actual cost for solar energy has become cheaper than that of natural gas. However, this doesn't take into account the cost of installing solar panels, repairing them, and replacing them. It also doesn't account for the fact that some homes simply aren't equipped to access solar energy.
Renewable energy is having a positive impact on our energy crisis. But it's also important to think about the trade-off between using money to create a more sustainable future in 50 years or giving someone a future tomorrow. The incredible financing that goes into bankrolling clean energy could 100% change the lives of a lot of people living on the streets. Once again, I'm all for clean energy and environmental consciousness, but I think that we should work on the distribution of wealth between energy and people in need, particularly in LA County.
Courtesy of Pixabay