Thank you Governor Brown - Next Step For Creating Jobs and A Regenerative Economy?

Dear Governor Brown,

Thank you for your action to protect the environment this year and continuing your record of environmental stewardship.

In addition to thanking your for signing the following bills listed below, I would like to ask you to think hard about developing and launching a bold new environmental-economic innovation program capable of blasting us out of our economic malaise and onto a path of authentic wealth creation and prosperity.

This enviro-economic innovation program would have the capacity to follow the emissions reduction trajectory required to mitigate global warming to a peak of 1 degree C and otherwise eliminate violations of sustainability systems conditions (see here and here).

Such innovation uses those goals (ecological constraints) as design parameters to jump-start a new economic trajectory of on-going enviro-economic innovation. That economic innovation path will create the transition to a regenerative and restorative economy and society with higher levels of prosperity than business as usual, and also durable and secure economic prosperity and community well being.

This idea would sound like warmed over 1960s idealism if the smartest people on the planet and the smartest businesses on the planet had not already been doing it for the past 20 years. More businesses are getting on board every day (the growing arena of business sustainability).

To learn more, read Paul Hawken/Lovins Natural Capitalism, Peter Senge's The Necessary Revolution, Thomas Friedman's Hot, Flat, and Crowded, and Lester Brown's Plan B (go here for quick links and description). Sustainability is about more than a little incremental eco-efficiency. It is about a fundamentally different economy, a different business model capable of producing authentic, durable wealth without destroying the larger economy of nature on which the human economy depends for non-substitutable inputs). It is-in a very real sense--humanity's last frontier, only remaining basis for authentic wealth creation and prosperity, and final exam for our regenerative success in the universe or degenerative demise (Buckminster Fuller's thought).

In addition, I strongly recommend, if you do nothing else, that you spend at least 10 minutes reviewing Amory Lovins' and the Rocky Mountain Institute's Reinventing Fire initiative, a voluntary program that will get the U.S. off our oil addiction by 2050, generate wild profits from doing so to those who get on board early, and generally benefit the economy immensely by growing 50% larger by 2050. This program would be the engine for sustainability success for any economy that undertakes it, from the U.S., to California, to China or India. Those economies that do undertake it will be the next economic winners, but only if everyone gets on board. Humanity finds itself in the classic game-theory prisoner's dilemma, both cheat and both lose or both cooperate and win, but at lower levels than if only one cheats and the other does not. However, the only real win is collaboration because unless we all win, the apparent "winners' of the non collaboration options are only fleeting wins until the larger operating system of the planet crashes. Humanity seems to have arrived at that tipping point of system crashing now, as it faces a just-in-time opportunity to avoid it, maybe, if we hurry.

RMI's proposal for a voluntary program to get off oil is, in a sense, the distillation and culmination of the best thinking and innovation in this arena of "business sustainability" of the past 20 years. It is well worth understanding deeply.

Embedded in it is the intellectual DNA of a new long wave of authentic wealth creation, durable and secure economic prosperity and community well being. It can and will move forward on a voluntary basis, but government policy would accelerate it tremendously, and the world does need results as quickly as possible.

You would be the first political champion to understand it and take on the challenge. As a center piece of your administration's work, it would create a political legacy that would rival no other. I can't think of a smarter political move nor a more noble one.

Beyond that, it would provide the lightening rod for integrating the myriad of California's/your environmental, climate change, economic development, community development, and public health programs in a way that would support this new regenerative economic trajectory AND simultaneously generate the larger synergistic benefits in each of these policy areas arising from a whole-systems approach than would otherwise be the case with traditional single-focus approaches.

I am available to speak with you further about undertaking such a program at your convenience should that be useful. I am a certified planner, with a background in economics and expertise in strategic sustainability. My bio is here and the easiest contact is scott-e@sustainability2030.com.

In closing, you are uniquely qualified and capable of taking on this political challenge of orchestrating the jump to a regenerative economic development trajectory. As a youth and supporter during your initial tenure as Governor, your vision and actions were inspiring and set in motion a relatively unappreciated legacy that was the foundation for California's green building movement and energy conservation success over the past 30 years. Embracing this challenge of jump-starting California and the world on to the trajectory of regenerative economic development driven by the motor of enviro-economic innovation would be the obvious next step for your legacy to California and beyond the environmental bills you signed during this past legislative session, as follows.

1. SB 1x 2 (Steinberg), which sets an aggressive goal for renewable energy production in California and maintains our role as a national leader in pursuing clean energy solutions.

2. AB 376 (Fong), which will go a long way in helping to protect shark populations, which have seen a rapid decline over the last several decades.

3. SB 790 (Leno), which strengthens existing law relating to Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) to foster fair competition and allow local governments to pursue CCA without undue barriers and excessive burdens. Local governments can use CCA programs as a tool to increase the use of renewable energy generation resources, achieve substantial reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, create new local jobs and foster new business opportunities in local communities.

4. AB 1112 (Huffman), which will ensure that our state's oil spill prevention and response programs will have sufficient funds to adequately protect our beaches and coastal waters.

5. AB 1319 (Butler), which will prevent the further introduction of toxic BPA in baby products.

6. SB 454 (Pavley), which will enable the California Energy Commission to enforce compliance with the state's appliance efficiency standards.

Please jump-start the new trajectory to regenerative economic development for the people and planet of today and the children and planet of tomorrow.

Sincerely,

Scott Edmondson

Scott T. Edmondson, AICP
Strategic Sustainability Advising / Environmental Review
Sustainability 2030 - Strategic Understanding, Information, Initiatives
(415) 992-6473   |   scott-e@sustainability2030.com   |  scottss2030 (skype)
www.sustainability2030.com   |    http://twitter.com/Scott2030