Fear and sustainability

"Dear Sustainability Movement,

Please cease and desist all claims of saving the planet in promotional, educational and propaganda materials. I’ve done a simple calculation that indicates to me that the movement is not sustaining the planet, but is delaying the destruction of the planet. "

This is what Christopher Fugitt, working with LEED, wrote about a year ago. And he was a constructive guy that brought some ideas to the table to really start sustaining the planet.

I sense a lot of fear, and I think working on sustainability should be associated with hope. And most of the time that is not how it starts. I am dreaming up several phases for business in that respect:

1. The "Image"-approach. Sustainability is seen upon as a handy PR-tool. Most of the time anybody working specifically on the topic is reports into the communications department.
2. The "Risk"-approach. Oh so many risks are associated with sustainability: safety, claims related to social and environmental issues, health claims.
3. The "Retirement"-approach. This is about CEOs that are getting to their retirement and want to "do something good for the world."
4. The "It couldn't hurt"-approach. Let's do this thing and we will probably get some benefit out of it.
5. The "Step-by step"-approach. Stay very close to your business and see how you can incrementally do the right thing.
6. The "Beyond-my-grave"-approach. Also known as the visionary approach. Some CEOs love to take this route, because they will never be held accountable for their promise 10 or how many tears ahead.

Anyway, my main message today is that lots of sustainability efforts are being started upon with some pretty off track motives. Sustainability is actually about making money while doing good. And you need very, very creative people to be able to accomplish that. And I see loads of fear associated with sustainability. Not just with starting to work on sustainability because you are afraid of the consequences otherwise, but also while working on it being on the alert all the time because somebody could get after you. That leads to a minimalistic policy, avoiding the real business. Even for companies that do their bit.

Fear drives out vision. And without that it becomes sauerkraut. An acid type of doing good, only because you fear the consequences. Be transparent and engaged, and you will be complimented for that. That gives hope. The other way around you remain paralyzed in the incremental steps. Let;s get rid of the fear. Let's step out and just say what we want to do, why we want to do it, how we want to do it, what we know and what we do not know. What worked and what did not work. Then, and only then, can be we become really creative in integrating people, planet and prosperity.

Dutch supermarket industry now turning towards sustainability?

Earlier this week the Dutch supermarket umbrella CBL published its plans to become more environmentally sustainable. For whatever reason the CBL choose to go public with the weakest element of the plan: stop giving away free plastic bags at the cash register. Mind you: only at the cash register, we still have all those bags at the fruit- and vegetable counters. No clue how much bags we talk about? Plastic bags in itself are a big sales item, so we do not expect them to go away for a long time. Maybe time for some recycled designer bag ideas...

Anyway, the plans are solid in general. By 2020:

• reduce transport CO₂-emissions by 20% 
• improve energy efficiency by 20%
• green energy 20%

I could not find the baseline, bus I guess that might be hidden somewhere in the plan. Just wait, I found it: "In 10 years time..." Now, that means they will publish the baseline hopefully and report on progress. When I compare these targets against the European targets: "The European Council ... targets on reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 20% compared to 1990 levels; increasing the share of renewables in final energy consumption to 20%; and moving towards a 20% increase in energy efficiency.", then I conclude that the first CBL target might be weaker than that of Europe, because it only relates to transport. At the same time the baseline of 2010 might make it more challenging. As for energy efficiency and the green energy target, they are both an end state, so here CBL equals Europe. I must say that the Dutch target for green energy is 14% by 2020. So related to that CBL will be outperforming.

Overall a promising sign. One challenge remains: how to get the consumer to reduce his or her footprint. That will be the debate: who is and can be responsible? How to get that consumer pure and honest at the same time.