Radical Sustainability

“For example, a mainstream sustainable development program might propose installing a series of solar panels in a rural village. But solar panels only have about a 25-year life span, provided they’re not damaged sooner, and after this period the panels are useless. Typically these projects don’t consider whether or not the village has the technical expertise, access to tools or manufacturing, or money necessary to repair or replace the panels. Without these resources the village finds itself in a position of dependency. When the panels fail they must wait for someone to donate another set…

…instead of installing solar panels a radical sustainable development project might use locally harvested wood to construct a windmill that powers alternators made from scrap cars and other salvaged materials that are locally plentiful. The windmill’s design would be simple enough to be easily repaired, giving it a lifespan considerably longer than solar panels. Equally important, the design could be replicable, giving neighboring villages independence from charity.”

-Scott Kellogg and Stacy Pettigrew, Toolbox for Sustainable City Living

This is an immensely relevant point. Look at what most mainstream sources are calling sustainable. Solar panels? By what definition is a solar panel sustainable at all? They take an enormous amount of energy to produce, usually making use of electricity that’s powered by one of the non-environmentally friendly sources, whether coal or nuclear or hydroelectric. They’re expensive. And it’s unlikely the price will go down anytime soon. To top it all off, they don’t even last that long, and then what? What do you do with solar panels who have overstayed their welcome?

At best solar panels are a temporary solution- and not a very effective one, either. Better than burning coal, certainly. But think of this, as well: who buys solar panels? Not electric companies, that’s for sure. The majority of solar panels go on private buildings, or homes. Consumers are spending more money, supposedly to reduce greenhouse gases, but homeowners aren’t using nearly as much power as say, major industries. Who are doing little if anything at all to “reduce their footprint.”

No, most companies are just looking for something else to sell. Does the fact that Toyota is going to halt production on large trucks and build more Priuses mean they’ve wisened up and decided to be more environmentally friendly? No. They just realize trucks aren’t the moneymakers right now. Are Priuses anywhere near sustainable? Absolutely not. They may have fewer emissions- but what about the building process? Doesn’t that require an absurd quantity of resources? And what about the cars we already have? What happens to them?

The point is, the things we’re calling sustainable now are by no means so. It’s basically a poor justification to maintain a consumer economy. Because if we really wanted to look at sustainable alternatives- communities living off little or no power, generated entirely by processes they’ve built themselves from local or scrap materials they didn’t have to pay a distant company for- well, we’d really have to start questioning our entire economy, wouldn’t we? If people generated their own power- think it through. Imagine the implications.

And then ask again if our present society really wants to be sustainable.

I know I do.