<![CDATA[Grist - Comment Feed for Green-collar jobs mean standing up for people and the planet]]> Grist Comment Feed en Comment #1 by Pompey Road http://www.grist.org/article/memo-to-candidates/ Fri, 25 Jan 2008 06:56:40 -0800 http://www.grist.org/article/memo-to-candidates/1 Civilian Conservation Corps:

When talking rural, Appalachia is about as rural as it gets. In the 30's during the Great Depression Mr. Roosevelt started the Civilian Conservation Corps so men could find work and send a little money home to support their families. Those were the days, and if this recession drags us down to the depths I fear it will the old CCC may not be a bad idea again. I know everyone would rather have a tax rebate so they can run down to WalMart and pump up the Communist Chinese economy. They will just pump up their coal fired power plants to help the sweat shops meet their new demand. If we ever put an end to Mountain Top Removal and Valley Fills in Appalachia it will take years to heal the land. Well we all know the valleys are gone forever but we may be able to heal some mountains. Years of environmental conservation and restoration work to be done. When the unemployment problem gets as bad for the rest of America as it is in Philadelphia for young Afro-American men the old idea may become new again. Instead of a tax rebate earn a check from the CCC doing badly needed environmental work...Just a thought

The eons of time and nature was good to us down here. It was not until we become civilized that destroying our habitat become fathomable or fashionable.

]]> Civilian Conservation Corps:

When talking rural, Appalachia is about as rural as it gets. In the 30's during the Great Depression Mr. Roosevelt started the Civilian Conservation Corps so men could find work and send a little money home to support their families. Those were the days, and if this recession drags us down to the depths I fear it will the old CCC may not be a bad idea again. I know everyone would rather have a tax rebate so they can run down to WalMart and pump up the Communist Chinese economy. They will just pump up their coal fired power plants to help the sweat shops meet their new demand. If we ever put an end to Mountain Top Removal and Valley Fills in Appalachia it will take years to heal the land. Well we all know the valleys are gone forever but we may be able to heal some mountains. Years of environmental conservation and restoration work to be done. When the unemployment problem gets as bad for the rest of America as it is in Philadelphia for young Afro-American men the old idea may become new again. Instead of a tax rebate earn a check from the CCC doing badly needed environmental work...Just a thought

The eons of time and nature was good to us down here. It was not until we become civilized that destroying our habitat become fathomable or fashionable.

]]> Comment #2 by GreenMom http://www.grist.org/article/memo-to-candidates/ Sat, 26 Jan 2008 10:44:43 -0800 http://www.grist.org/article/memo-to-candidates/2 Let's campaign on the Clean Energy Economy


Hey Pompey Road, that seems nicely complementary to the push for green jobs training.  

It's a great plan -- get off coal, jump start the clean energy economy, and by the way, clean up the mess coal has made.

Now that Van Jones et. al. have captured the attention of the Democratic candidates, let's "help" them shape this message for the fall campaign.

Then maybe President [Obama? Clinton?] would take office in 2009 with the clean energy economy high up on the agenda.

Hey, a girl can dream.

]]> Let's campaign on the Clean Energy Economy


Hey Pompey Road, that seems nicely complementary to the push for green jobs training.  

It's a great plan -- get off coal, jump start the clean energy economy, and by the way, clean up the mess coal has made.

Now that Van Jones et. al. have captured the attention of the Democratic candidates, let's "help" them shape this message for the fall campaign.

Then maybe President [Obama? Clinton?] would take office in 2009 with the clean energy economy high up on the agenda.

Hey, a girl can dream.

]]> Comment #3 by bmilani http://www.grist.org/article/memo-to-candidates/ Sun, 27 Jan 2008 14:39:25 -0800 http://www.grist.org/article/memo-to-candidates/3 The Scope of Green-Collar Jobs

Congrats to Van Jones for his positive impact on politics and activism in the US.  The work of the Ella Baker Center and the Apollo Alliance are inspirations for some of the work we'd like to do here in Green Enterprise Toronto, a BALLE affiliate.  Van's list defining "green collar jobs" is right on and quite helpful.  But, while a focus on energy is appropriate for many of us during a time of rising awareness about climate change, creating a green economy is about much more than clean energy--it's about redefining the very nature of economic activity.  It's not just about environmental protection, but about the regeneration of communities and ecosystems.
     Even back in the 70s when Lovins was first talking about the "soft energy path" he put the biggest emphasis not on efficiency, or on cleanness, but on "end use"--that is, putting the emphasis on meeting needs, and then working backwards to devise the most elegant and efficient ways of meeting those needs.  By the 90s, many industrial ecologists were calling this the "eco-service" economy--where the focus would be on access not transport, illumination not lights, nutrition not food commodities, etc.  In other words, we can get a tremendous amount of what we need without any additional energy or resources at all, simply by organizing ourselves properly.  
     A preoccupation with the energy sector can sometimes be a diversion.  Some experts have pointed out that the food system might be considered the biggest contributor to CO2 emissions if one includes food transport.  Thus a green jobs strategy should also be targeting sustainable food system alternatives.
     Similarly with waste--which by rights should really be considered simultaneously with manufacturing as part of a resource cycle, because of the implications of product design decisions.  We need to be moving extraction industry from the hinterlands to the cities--to mine the waste stream. Deconstruction services (connected with used materials depots) have great potential for massive job creation--and, as with energy retrofit work, they are easily assessable, mid-range skill jobs that can lead to higher skills and incomes.  
     These are just a couple examples of the range of "green collar jobs".  Because they rely on close connection with end-use, and with multiple overlapping functions, proximity is important--so green is in most cases synonymous with local or bioregional.   Most can be initiated with small capital investment.  
     It's too easy to get caught up in an energy-preoccupation, even when it's renewable energy.  While energy discussion should first and foremost be about end-use, or the purpose of energy use, it too often degenerates into issues of efficiency.  Our concern shouldn't be to become more efficient destroying the planet and our communities. We want to become efficient in meeting real needs and creating a qualitatively new world.  For this reason, we're talking about far more than "jobs". Especially in low-income and disadvantaged communities, the focus seems better on enterprises that can directly target need.  This is not to disparage the quest for more environmental jobs in the mainstream economy.  But for qualitative change, we need action in every area of human life, and we have a responsibility to be revealing this green work everywhere, true to the "distributed" nature of most green production.  
                              Brian Milani,  York U. Faculty of Environmental Studies

Brian Milani Green Enterprise Toronto / Business & Environment, York U. FES http://www.greeneconomics.net








]]> The Scope of Green-Collar Jobs

Congrats to Van Jones for his positive impact on politics and activism in the US.  The work of the Ella Baker Center and the Apollo Alliance are inspirations for some of the work we'd like to do here in Green Enterprise Toronto, a BALLE affiliate.  Van's list defining "green collar jobs" is right on and quite helpful.  But, while a focus on energy is appropriate for many of us during a time of rising awareness about climate change, creating a green economy is about much more than clean energy--it's about redefining the very nature of economic activity.  It's not just about environmental protection, but about the regeneration of communities and ecosystems.
     Even back in the 70s when Lovins was first talking about the "soft energy path" he put the biggest emphasis not on efficiency, or on cleanness, but on "end use"--that is, putting the emphasis on meeting needs, and then working backwards to devise the most elegant and efficient ways of meeting those needs.  By the 90s, many industrial ecologists were calling this the "eco-service" economy--where the focus would be on access not transport, illumination not lights, nutrition not food commodities, etc.  In other words, we can get a tremendous amount of what we need without any additional energy or resources at all, simply by organizing ourselves properly.  
     A preoccupation with the energy sector can sometimes be a diversion.  Some experts have pointed out that the food system might be considered the biggest contributor to CO2 emissions if one includes food transport.  Thus a green jobs strategy should also be targeting sustainable food system alternatives.
     Similarly with waste--which by rights should really be considered simultaneously with manufacturing as part of a resource cycle, because of the implications of product design decisions.  We need to be moving extraction industry from the hinterlands to the cities--to mine the waste stream. Deconstruction services (connected with used materials depots) have great potential for massive job creation--and, as with energy retrofit work, they are easily assessable, mid-range skill jobs that can lead to higher skills and incomes.  
     These are just a couple examples of the range of "green collar jobs".  Because they rely on close connection with end-use, and with multiple overlapping functions, proximity is important--so green is in most cases synonymous with local or bioregional.   Most can be initiated with small capital investment.  
     It's too easy to get caught up in an energy-preoccupation, even when it's renewable energy.  While energy discussion should first and foremost be about end-use, or the purpose of energy use, it too often degenerates into issues of efficiency.  Our concern shouldn't be to become more efficient destroying the planet and our communities. We want to become efficient in meeting real needs and creating a qualitatively new world.  For this reason, we're talking about far more than "jobs". Especially in low-income and disadvantaged communities, the focus seems better on enterprises that can directly target need.  This is not to disparage the quest for more environmental jobs in the mainstream economy.  But for qualitative change, we need action in every area of human life, and we have a responsibility to be revealing this green work everywhere, true to the "distributed" nature of most green production.  
                              Brian Milani,  York U. Faculty of Environmental Studies

Brian Milani Green Enterprise Toronto / Business & Environment, York U. FES http://www.greeneconomics.net








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