President’s Corner – An End to Chapter 1

Hey Net Impact,

This is my last President’s Corner. This will be my last ramble, final thoughts, and a conclusion of my two-and-a-half year leadership of the chapter. It’s been a wonderful journey working with four sets of leadership teams entwined by the continued support of past officers. In a time of transition, I am happy to say that I am leaving our club better than the way I found it.

In my first week at Wash U, I was introduced to the administration at Olin. In the fourth week, I went with three other students as a delegation for Olin to a conference at William and Mary, hosted by their chapter of Net Impact. By the end of my first semester at Wash U, I founded our chapter. If it wasn’t for my fast track to leadership at this school, looking back I can now say that my experience would have been much different and less rewarding. Leading Net Impact has shaped me as an individual, and has defined a significant part of my undergraduate experience at Wash U.

My advice: Lead with passion. Let your ambitions drive your will to work, and follow the path that not only excites you now, but will prepare you for the future. Learn a vast array of skills to hedge your bet against external forces that life presents. Experience as many opportunities as Wash U lends, and when that is not enough, pop the bubble to enter into the the community around us. Attend conferences, compete in competitions, lead student groups, and graciously work with others to promote and enhance the world around us all. Your only asset in college is time – DON’T WASTE IT.

Lead initiatives and committees, set short-term and long-term goals to shape a path. Use your machete to whack away the hurdles so that it is easy for others to follow. Help others. Realize that hard work, diligence, and persistence are what you need to accomplish any worldly ambition, and that you have the mental capacity and physical tool set to achieve each and every one.

I’m not going anywhere today, tomorrow, or even the next day, but this post represents the finale to my three years of hard work. I will do my best to make it to as many meetings as possible, and continue to support any and every member that comes to me for help. Use me as a resource, a connection, and a sounding board. My new goal for my Net Impact involvement is to act as an accelerator for any initiative in need of help – I will be there to push you ahead of each speed bump you encounter. You can count on that.

A Final Toast, and Cheers,

Harry

President’s Corner: Consumer Privilege

Consumer Privilege: It’s Complicated

Human exploitation of the planet is reaching a critical limit while our demands are ever increasing.

The two most complex systems on Earth are the environment and human society. For the entirety of our history we have existed together in harmony. However, our gift of manpower is creating a dynamic shift in the natural equilibrium we have come to enjoy. Humans have evolved to be the species leader of the Earth and we are leading in the wrong direction, to the destruction of a biological-supportive nature. We have been given dominion over nature, and as such, feel separated from our ecosystem. However, in no way can we ever be completely disassociated with nature. Expectations, politics, and selfishness govern our human-created environment that enforce separation with all other living things, and nature itself. Our existence on this planet is dependent on nature – for it’s diverse natural processes that keep our atmosphere intact, and for its abundance of vitamins, minerals, and resources we take for granted.

We must undergo a cultural transformation to understand the balance of consumption. It’s time for us to get away from a continual growth model, as we are constrained by a finite level of resources. Our role as students is to become responsible and well informed activists to show our government that ecology must be intertwined with all legislation. Maybe if we can create the common appeal, and common level of education on the matter of the proposed future if we stay on the same track, then change will happen. Everyone has the power to vote; and I’m not talking about for the President. We have the power to vote on products and services, and our vote is carried out through the purchase of a good for us to enjoy. There must be a common understanding on the need for frugality and the disassociation with corruptible wealth. Everyday we do something different, now, let’s use that power for the good of our friends, family, community, nation, world, and life itself.

Growth is a means to an end. The wrong kind of growth reduces our quality of life, and we must take economics back to a human-environment optimization. The human mind created the concept of the future. We look ahead, recognize where the opportunities are and where the dangers lay, and choose accordingly to survive. No other living organism carries the same intellectual capacity. Constant growth is an unnatural term created by the lack of foresight in humanity. The only model for comparison is the entire universe, which some believe is constantly growing from the original big bang. Even if this is true, do we really have the audacity to think we hold a parallel power to the whole universe in that there are no boundaries to our reach (major God-complex)? If we do, I am unbelievably scared for our future as a species, especially on our home planet.

Here’s two facts for thought for you to enjoy:

• Consumers can recognize hundreds of company logos but most do not know 10 native plant species in their hometown.
• Americans spend more money on lawn maintenance than India receives in tax revenue

Your President,

Harry

P.S. How many native plant species of St. Louis are there, and what are they? Can you name five of them?

President’s Corner: The Sacrificial Lamb (Parts 1 & 2)

The Sacrificial Lamb, Part 1

From the dawn of humanity on this planet to modern day, culture has existed through the activities and rituals that individuals and communities partake in. The basics cover nutrients, shelter, the desire to live, and to help others. Viewpoints change over time, and with new perspective comes variance in activities. Communities revolve around a center of ideas and commonalities. People join into interest groups, societies, and organizations because of shared interests or have interests bestowed on them by others. Religion too.

 

In Monotheistic Religions, historical interpretations of biblical textures called for a sacrifice for the common good. In earlier times, the lamb was a highly valued possession, which was offered to God as a sacrifice for the forgiveness of sin. Communities that practiced such religions believed that a sacrifice was necessary to make right the situations when common law and ethics were not strictly followed.

But why kill a lamb? The stature goes that the sacrifice was equivalent to the price of the sins committed. This act of slaughter proved faith and commitment towards becoming a better person and acceptance of sin. However indecent this may seem to some, each and every one of us sacrifices something for change. Our viewpoints on rituals and ethics continually revolve through advances in society, but the notion of sacrifice stays constant.

What are you willing to sacrifice to achieve your personal goals? Your community’s goals? Before agreeing to kill a lamb, think about alternative sacrifices that are beneficial and that provide a clear path as a milestone on your endeavor. Changing a practice is never easy, but understanding the sacrifice made and the outcome achieved is the first step.

Diligence. Once committed, stay on track, and do not lose sight of the original objective that prompted the “sacrifice”. Mistakes happen, but habitual routines are psychologically ingrained. Consider these five points:

• Comprehension (of overall outcome; what it means to you)
• Acceptance (of willingness and desire to change)
• Sacrifice (one’s comfort with old practice for new)
• Diligence (staying on track)
• Achievement

Look forward to next week’s president’s corner on modern examples of beneficial sacrifice for the betterment of yourself and others.

……………………………………………..

The Sacrificial Lamb, Part 2

 

Comprehension, Acceptance, Sacrifice, Diligence, Achievement.

The Sacrificial Lamb can be viewed as the turning point in daily routines towards sustainable activities. From carnivorous diets to vegetarian, gas-guzzling cars to all-electrics, and constant indoor air temperature to changes depicted on outside conditions, creating beneficial change in one’s daily habits is a milestone in the individual quest towards working with the world for the future. In each decision made daily one goes though a cycle of instantaneous emotional response and higher level reasoning. Poor-form spontaneity, in this case the depiction of unsustainable activities, is primarily caused by a dull in the consistent level of satisfaction one receives day by day. When faced with a decision that harms the environment on a nuclear, or global level, it is in most cases out of the mental sketch of the rapid-fire decision-making we all carry out on a second-by-second basis. So how do we create the global picture in the minds of the individually and socially focused?

Step 1) Figure out what the world means to you. Understand your personal position in the world around us. Know the facts.

Step 2) Accept the fact that your actions play into a larger picture; that everything you do is scalable, and, as a mental activity try to universalize your action. When you leave the lights on in your apartment or dorm room when vacant, you may shrug off the action; but, let’s imagine a scenario where every person in the world leaves their lights on for the same time period. Seven billion people multiplied by let’s say 1 kilowatt-hour consumes 7,000,000 kWh of electricity. This would take a typical coal power plant (500 megawatt capacity) two years to produce. Remember that 100% of this electricity produced is being wasted. Now, consider how many times you leave electric devices, lights, and machinery on when not in use, and for how long. Using a benchmark of 1 kilowatt-hour for a wasteful activity shows you the universalized ramifications of an individual action. If everyone in the world was like you, how many coal-fired power plants would it take just to produce the electricity/energy being wasted?

Step 3) Commit to sacrificing the comfort of continuing the negative activity. This step of commitment serves not only as the willingness to change but also the ability to overcome the obstacle ahead of you. A negative habitual routine is similar to an addiction in that the change in and of itself is mentally taxing, can be physically uncomfortable, and is even more difficult to work on alone. Committing to an action with a friend, group, or campaign provides the external motivation to keep you in line when the mental anguish is internally unbearable. Finding others to commit to a similar change is easy, especially with the strength and friendship of everyone in Net Impact.

Step 4) Discipline and diligence serve as the final step towards obtaining the goal of personal achievement. It won’t be easy, but the rewards are substantial. Just as you universalized the wasteful electricity practices as an example in Step 2, universalizing the outcome makes for sweet satisfaction. One more fact. Our electricity grid is unbelievably inefficient. From the stages of fossil fuel extraction to production, distribution, and end use efficiency, it takes more than five times the capacity of coal at a large electricity-generating plant to produce the same electricity for the light-bulb in your home as it would a solar panel attached to your roof.

We have the choice, the ability, and the reason to change many of current practices for personal betterment and for the livelihood of our friends, family, neighbors, and citizens of the world alike. Each step we take to minimize our negative impact on the world will lead to a better, more promising future. Isn’t that what we all want?

If you would like to try one or more changes in your own life, come out to our next meeting and learn about the Small Steps Campaign. Through the friendship of our chapter we can help each other make positive choices in our lives and lives of others.

Your President,

Harry

President’s Corner: Building Community Through Program Effectiveness

Building Community Through Program Effectiveness

This semester when you go to BD, the Village, or other dining facilities on campus you’ll notice a small change. Instead of disposable to-go boxes, you now have the opportunity to eat out with ECO TO-GO reusable boxes. This program, with a $5 buy-in, gives you a key-chain that you use to get the to-go box. Basically when you go to get your food, you trade a box for a key-chain. When you return the box, dirty or clean, you get back another key-chain. Pretty neat, right? For more on the program, read the newest blog post here. For a chance to get a free key-chain, check out the WasteBusters Table on Monday from 6 (until key-chains run out) in the BD and Village.

What I want to focus on though is not reusable boxes, key-chains, or buy-ins, but instead, community. Creating a program is in and of itself a nightmare because it involves a change; a switch of activity from one form to another. Some are easier than others, but the implementation is only half of the story. ECO TO-GO is a prime example of a outstanding offering by Bon Apetit that exemplifies their will and mission to foster a sustainable dining experience. One goal is to mitigate waste; but from the Net Impact perspective we see another; building community. This community runs through the veins of everyone who participates, and also those who are even simply aware of the program. By knowing the alternative is there to the old, paper boxes, one carries the strength to make the decision to switch out. The change of common practice from throwing away a box, to giving the box back to the place of origin serves as a milestone in the routine of cleaning up after a meal.

The narrative of waste is a harmful one – it creates imperfect markets and disrupts the natural theme of conservation. Think of breakfast, lunch, and dinner with no waste. That’s what we are going for. The community of environmentalists expands through the program to include those who just get it: students, staff, and faculty whom understand waste is a backwards practice that must be abolished. Recycling will always have its place in society, with composting as one form of such, that we must incorporate into every activity. WALL-E sized mountains of trash, seen here, shows us one route for our future. I don’t think that is the right direction for us. Do you?

Join the community through participation. Get yourself used to skipping the step of throwing a box a way, and instead giving it back to be used again. Feel proud of doing your part to mitigate waste. Use this small change in routine to prompt others, and build the momentum of rapidly moving away from a system that cannot continue to function. Let’s leave the mountains of trash to science fiction movies and provide for a better future.

What’s the next step? Finish the food in your box!

Sustainability As a Means to An End (3:3)

Quality of life is determined by our ability to provide ourselves with more than basic needs. Technology is one major component as it allows us to accomplish more than we can without it. But who defines what is needed beyond the basics? What makes one action or outcome more desirable than another?

Society. We provide for ourselves within a defined infrastructure of rules, norms, and obligations. Social pressure outlines our need for commonality, but also for innovation. We see novel as momentum, and understand momentum within society as a means to achieve long-term goals. We value the future personally and externally for factors very far out of our control. Because of this, we depend on technology to provide us needed assistance.

When you think about the future, are your thoughts nuclear in the sense of a specific outcome or grand in scope and idealism? Our beliefs and education help us mentally paint a picture of our desires, but they can be easily influenced by effective marketing and emotion-triggering advertisements. When those in control of marketing are allowed to use unethical tactics, they provide informal education to systematically have public appeal for something that at its roots is either immoral, bad for the public and society, or harmful to the environment.

Our social need for innovation did not come from a preaching radical living in a downtown alley.  I’ll leave it to you to think about how your decisions are made for anything as simple as purchasing a pack of gum, or as complex as deciding what you want to do as a career; however, try and think about general trends in collective thoughts. Think of a time where you and a couple friends are trying to figure out where to have lunch. You have to think about what you are hungry for, how much you want to pay, how far away the place is, what you are trying to do afterwards, if you are willing to go somewhere that the rest of the group likes but you don’t, etc. This simple exercise explains the difficulty that we face on a larger scale. I don’t believe that my decision-making for anything even as simple as figuring out where to go to lunch is definitively rational. Putting satisfaction as high on my factor list for most actions, I let intangibles greatly influence my decisions.

So where am I going with this? The future of our society depends on technology; fact, but, it also depends on our international ability to come together to collectively make the hard decisions. It’s not going to be lunch that we talk about in politics, and the items that are discussed most surely have insurmountable ramifications. I stated in the beginning of this trio of blog posts I’d provide an answer to our problem of sustainability, but will defer to you. I’ve discussed the relationship of technology, decision-making, and sustainability; however have left the question open-ended.

As an umbrella term, sustainability encompasses the interrelationships of tangibles, intangibles, and the grey area between them. Do you think we are using this trend to our advantage, are we capitalizing on sustainability; what is the end goal? In a capitalist society the goal is continual growth, equity, improvement, and innovation. What about in a sustainable society? Is growth continuity realistic, or do we need to define a new path to take to ensure a brighter future?

It’s Not an Ordinary Lamppost

The first installation of the Simon Hall Solar Courtyard Initiative

Sustainability As A Means To An End (2:3)

In last week’s corner I discussed the negative ramifications of technology in society – at least, a few. A technocentric society is cyclically dependent on the use and advancement of technology. We use a computer, innovation creates more desirable components, and we buy a new one.

Our desire to keep up with the cutting edge creates industry momentum, but also an individual mindset of dependency. As technology advances solve more problems and challenges in our daily lives, we get hungry for more of its ability to satisfy our needs. Because of this almost sensual desire for novelty and innovation we expect that every problem we face can be solved through just that; new technology.

Say you don’t want to vacuum - you’re in luck with autonomous vacuum cleaners. And want to connect with anyone and everyone in the world – internet based social networking platforms. But what’s the different of a want and a need? Do we really need dozens of options for teabag holders, hundreds of options for cars, or thousands of options for the common pen?

If you think yes then game on.

The American Heritage Dictionary considers one who is dependent as “relying on or requiring the aid of another for support”. Now, every living organism depends on the Earth to survive, and usually other organisms for nutrition. However, when a mammal or insect manipulates their ecosystems for shelter, it does so in a way that is not harmful to the ecosystem.

Through evolution animals have adapted to fit in to a specific environment, and natural selection ensures no overrun of resources by an individual species. Our Earth is regulated by the single fact that when too much of one resource is used more than can be replenished in the same time period, the troublemaker gets put in detention. This act of nature explicitly tells us that nature cannot be controlled.

Side note: for brevity in these blog posts, I stay clear from the arguable details and encourage discussion from my roughed-out ideas. This blog is not to be used as credible evidence to state a case for educational research.

So again, technology can solve our trivial daily problems; it can help us live longer, live better, but also detracts from our need for each other and our instinct to live freely in nature. Environmentalists say caging animals is wrong when at the same time most Americans spend their days indoors cooped in an office or room on a computer or television – in essence, I see no difference outside of choice.

We, as rational human beings, have the ability to choose what we do, what we buy, and how we act. So how can we use this choice in our quest for a stable environment, one that will still be here as we know it for the future generation, and one where we will be excited to live in? What’s in it for us?

Key points:

1)    We have the choice to minimize our dependence on technology

2)    Technology cannot solve every problem

3)    Humans cannot control nature, but we can mitigate our negative impact

Look forward to the conclusion of this mini-series next week!

Sustainability As A Means To An End (1:3)

Food for thought: Is it better to live for today or for tomorrow? Which ideology is more impactful; which is more satisfying? Which is more rational and which provides the means for success in the future? Which rights are wrongs, and which creates wrongs for us to right? Which is more ethical and which is more meaningful? Where do you stand?

Patience. Our generation is the first, ever, to have everything at our fingertips. From Facebook to pictures of cats, online ordering of any good or service, and gaming, as long as a computer is in front of us we make due. The life of our generation is one that is dependent on the computing power of the tools our parents created. What if we lacked computers – how would we cope? I think we would revert back to the means that our parents had, and would have had our daily lives slow down tremendously. We could acclimate to the circumstances and not complain about the lack of intangible substances we view as necessities today. Our lifestyles as we know them depend on technology. Until our time, dependency was a term to describe the relationship of sons and daughters to mothers and fathers, and to fulfill our basic needs. We were dependent on those who could provide shelter, water, food, and care. Now, we take the last necessity to a quasi-liberal south with a dependency on technology. And since modern technology puts everything at our fingertips, we feel that immediate response to our needs is now a necessity. So I ask again, what if this was taken away?

Well – I know I’d cry. I would cry for awhile, sober up a bit, and look around. And hey, look guys, there is a lot to see.

But is dependency on technology such a bad thing? Computers allow an efficient mechanism for global communication, commerce, and knowledge sharing. Technology as we know it provides a means to accomplish any task, achieve any goal, and create the future. It is in itself the answer of all problems. Continuing on with this thought however, where does this dependency lead us to? I’ll tell you – it leads us on a path of further dependency. Every human starts out dependent on the natural familial unit, but most will grow to become independent of the care from parents. We become independent to survive, care for ourselves and our families, and continue the natural cycle. However, our dependency on technology does not follow this natural cycle. The more advanced our electrical circuits become, the more we need them. The more stuff we create, the more stuff we want. The higher the computer power and relevancy of Google searches, the less we need to know. Why memorize the first 100 digits of pi when you can find the first 100000000 by asking Google, or Siri for that matter. We advance technology to solve our problems, but what happens when computers have the ability to do everything for us?

We are creating a world which will ultimately make us irrelevant and outdated. If sustainability is truly about providing for the needs of the future without compromising our present needs, how can we let this happen? How is it so easy for us to talk about sustainability while we are creating the tools for our future irrelevancy? I’d sure like to know.

But, OK. if technology is not the answer to solving our environmental and social problems what is?

Look forward to next week’s President’s Corner to find out. In the mean time, please share any comments you might have for me to address in part 2 of this Corner Series.

Is it Winter Already?

It’s been awhile since we’ve held a regular meeting. Sorry about that guys, but this week we are meeting so please join us at the regular place and time. It’s been an unbeleivable two weeks of events from the Net Impact Conference to this weekend’s Sustainable Cities Conference. Two fully packed weeks. I hope that everyone was able to make it to at least one session at the conference. Before I left for the weekend I was able to make it to hear the keynote speaker, Bill McKibben. His talk really inspired me on my personal journey with renewables, and how we must take immediate measures to elleviate the need of fossil fuels in our society. Bill is a journalist and educator by trade and his true impact has been the ability to spread the message of getting away from fossil fuels. His lecture was by far the best I’ve heard concerning the issue – very rational with his objectives and strategy to achieve them. I cannot wait to help him out, and at the same time help the environment, through the advocacy of building a clean energy infrastructure.

The Penny War: We have one more week to raise funds to support those affected by Hurricane Sandy. For those who have no clue what I’m talking about – in Flag Hallway (in Simon Hall) you will see a table with six empty large water containers. The school has placed every student group on a team, some alone and some in collaboration with multiple groups, pushing us in a competitive manner to raise funds. The competition is a little quirky, but basically we are trying to have the least amount of money in our own jug. The rules are on the table, but so you don’t have to scratch your head too hard, here’s the layout. Please donate at least a few dollars and put it in any jug except ours (Team 3). Feel free to put a ton of pennies in our jug too, but no other coins or dollars. Last day to donate is this Friday, November 9. 

Clouded by Intuition

Sometimes the sustainable choice is not always intuitive. This is because our intuition does not take into account every factor of the situation. Sometimes even, intuition gets in the way of sustainability. Every day we make choices – about going to class versus sleeping in, eating a Philly cheese steak or a Greek salad, throwing away a can in the garbage instead of the recycle, cheating on an assignment or following the honor code. In the time it takes to decide whether or not to take action, do something, or accomplish what we set out to do, we can’t examine the possibilities of each outcome of the activity. The time it takes to determine whether an action is “sustainable”, which in most cases can be seen as the best for the environment and others, is endless. Without the facts we are forced to make assumptions; but, without the facts, we don’t know if what we are doing is in fact the “best” action. Because of this, we are at a standstill.

When do you decide whether or not to trust your intuition? Well, this is tough. As long as our emotions plays into each decision we make, we know the facts are not our sole motivator. Without the facts, is sustainability a secret code word for THINK BEFORE YOU DO – or, do we eliminate the notion that facts are needed?

I think it’s a little of each. Every day there is a new opportunity to change your routine; every day some ice melts somewhere; every day brings forward something new. What can be scary is that, we don’t know everything and we don’t have all of the answers. Our impact is determined on the metrics we use to define it. This will never change, but what can change is our ability to put more thought into our actions. Proactively considering what you do may delay activities by a few seconds, but it gives you the time necessary to understand if what you are doing is right – based on your conception of right and wrong. So, where am I going with this?

We all have points in our life where our intuition turns upside down – we doubt our previous ideals and consider different courses of action. In terms of sustainability, this should not scare you. By taking the time to consider if there is a better way to do something, you are contributing to the thought-power behind the movement to create a vibrant community that lives in conjunction with the resources around us. Do we have hard facts to sway each decision – rarely, if ever – but what we do have is the power of change. Sustainability is about how we adapt to incorporate others – from people to resources – to provide for a better future. Every time you think about an action, and change it if you find a better way, you are providing for the future. You are contributing to the health and well-being of others, and you my friend, have a Net Impact.