If you want to read an eloquent and powerful article about the way the American lifestyle is going to change as a result of higher gas prices and the environmental crisis, check out this one, from today’s Washington Post Op Ed page.  It is by Bill McKibben from Middlebury College and the author of Deep Economy.   He argues that we are undergoing a profound and (most likely) permanent change in our way of life.  As he puts it:

Pulled back by the inescapable gravity of higher prices and the growing scarcity of fossil fuels, we’re starting a slow recoil into more dense and compact regions and localities. The frontier of endless mobility that we’ve known our entire lives is closing.

Americans are feeling it and things are already changing.  He points to the fact that we are driving less (amazingly we drove 6% less vehicle miles this May than last May), airlines are contracting, and small farms are on the rise for the first time in a century.  Closer to home, I just learned about a friend of mine that is starting to make biodiesel for his contracting business.  His trucks and equipment all run on diesel, which seemed like a good idea 3 years ago, but the current fuel bill is threatening to put him out of business.  So he bought $5000 worth of biodiesel conversion equipment and did deals with 2 local restaurants that use (and throw away) about 100 gallons of cooking oil a week and he and his wife are going to start making their own fuel in the barn.  If they hussle, they should make about 80 gallons of good diesel a week which should eliminate the entire fuel bill for the company.  Projected ROI on the $5000, about half a year, including the labor to make the diesel. (Current fuel cost = 70 gallons per week X $5.15/gallon this morning at the pump X 50 weeks = $18,025).

I really feel like we are at the same point we were at in about 1995 with the Internet.  We are entering into an age of remarkable change, and optimists like myself see unprecendented opportunity when there is this much change.  The Internet revolutioninzed everything about what it means to be a business and how we communicate.  Sure it caused pain to some businesses and eliminated outdated business models, but this churn also released trillions of dollars in new economic growth.  Green should dwarf the Internet in terms of impact.

With that said, this ride is going to change our lifestyle a lot more than most of us are thinking.  As Professor McKibben puts it in a paragraph that is worth reading several times:

For the moment, watching gas prices roll relentlessly higher, we’re transfixed by the slightly terrifying novelty of it all. But it won’t take long for these changes to become permanent realities. This shift will change our sense of identity and expectation more than anything that’s happened in decades.

I couldn’t have possibly said that better myself.  No really, not a chance. 

All I wanted for father’s day was to enjoy a very relaxing, kicked back day.  It worked out great…I didn’t do a single dish, didn’t cook for myself, I took a nap and laid on the couch to watch the US Open - and that’s when things feel apart….that was THE WORST GOLF COVERAGE I’VE EVER SEEN!

I mean, can we PLEASE have a few more hours of commentary about Tiger’s knee while we only bother to show about 3 shots an hour, and not a single shot of a golfer out of the top 3?   Painful. 

And since I had plenty of time to channel surf, I found “An Inconvenient Truth” on Showtime.   I know many (most) of you have seen this film by now, but I hadn’t seen it in over a year, and it is well worth watching again.  It is powerful, to the point and drives home why we need to move to solve this problem as quickly as we possibly can, and why America needs to take THE leadership role.  I have been so focused on determining how to help businesses make more money while going green, that it was good to have myself scared silly a little bit.  The discussion of the movie led to some heated discussion at the dinner table that night (with the in-laws), but the question was not should we do something, but how to do it.  I think that people (and businesses) everywhere are waiting for the answer to the question, ‘what should I do?’

Americans are already figuring it out on their own, and so are American businesses.  If you have an idea that has worked for your business already - regardless of your industry - click on the ‘Green Collar Forums’ icon on the top of this blog and add your story to our “Success Stories” forum.  We can’t solve this problem on our own, and we need to share solutions that work, or we’ll never succeed in time.  Looking at An Inconvenient Truth again, really brought that home to me.

Communities around the country are organizing to find ways to become green, and in my hometown, we are no different.  Independent groups of concerned citizens are taking up the baton and running when there is no help from government, and the group in my town, the Newton Green Decade Coallition, has come up with a simple and exciting idea that should be replicated around the country.  A green welcome wagon basket. 

When new familiies move into town, they are  provided with a welcome basket filled with hundreds of dollars of green lifestyle goodies.  Lighbulbs, green cleaning supplies, reusable grocery bags, outlet insulators, coupons for energy efficiency audits, etc  (see the whole list here).

What a simple and powerful idea, and what a great way to welcome new residents to town.  It shows the new neighbors how progressive the city is, encourages them to go green and makes it easy for them.   It provides them with something that is meaningful to all of us right now, as opposed to just a bunch of stuff that would all be put aside and most likely never used (except the baked goods, we all eat the baked goods).  

Of course my business mind started taking leaps about how to take this concept and roll it out nationwide.  The welcome wagon association must be out there somewhere, and this is an idea that they should pick up and run with.  

When it is 1.5% of overall US electricity consumption. 

Believe it or not, this is how much of the total US electricity supply computer data centers consume each year according to the EPA.  According to a research report by McKinsey, cited in the current issue of The Economist, data centers worldwide are responsible for releasing more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than (the entire countries  of) Argentina or the Netherlands.

There are a variety of reasons for this, including poor system management at many locations (servers running with nothing on them, etc.), and hardware developers that never had to take energy consumption into consideration.   The good news is that new products are definitely going green…many new servers, cooling systems and powering mechanisms will cut down on electricity consumption by 45%.  This is a great example of the green collar economy in action.  Businesses (hardware manufacturers) driving a new environmentally-focused  line of products that save their customers money and help them become more green.   Customers are thrilled, producers are thrilled (a great new sales pitch to every existing customer – not to mention the professional services that come with it), and even though there are only a handful of hosting facilities that are actually powered with alternative energy, eliminating that much electricity usage in traditionally powered data centers is good for all of us.  As The Economist sums up:

Greenery does not have to be motivated by altruism; and it is far more likely to be effective when it is not.  If it helps to reduce carbon emissions, self-serving greenery is as good as any other kind.  The planet cannot tell the difference.

I couldn’t agree with that sentiment more.  As a matter of fact, it is the entire premise behind Green Collar Media….make more money, save the planet.