Cradle to Cradle

The inaugural West Coast Green Conference took place in San Francisco on 28th-30th September 2006. 3 days of educational sessions, meeting and greeting and an Exhibit Hall with booth loads of environmentally friendly products. I registered as an individual, but most people were either Architects, Designers or Builders. I think I might have been the only 'non-professional' attendee!

Green, organic, eco, environmental - all those words and more have been niggling away internally for a long time. Reminding me constantly that something needs to be done. You see I think it's patently obvious that the life cycle we have created for ourselves is hugely separated from the Earth we inhabit. We have lost respect for the Earth.

But we ARE Earth, that's what's so whacky about all this. We are doing it to ourselves. I believe we have managed to evolve ourselves away from the very source of our existence. We have become creatures of 'stuff' - the second car, the huge SUV, the kitchen utensils that will peel, chop, grate, grind, blend, toast. The flat screen TV, the 3 TV's in a single house. More and More and MORE. With less and less happiness. Less and less personal responsibility. Less and less community and less and less family.

I heard the phrase 'Cradle to Cradle' at the Conference. And it made so much sense to me. Basically big business has trained us to be a throw away society. If it's broken then don't fix it, don't re-use it, throw it away - buy a new one! Go head, be a sheep, follow the crowd blindly, line the pockets of the rich and wealthy. Does big business care about you? Sure, for as long as it can hood-wink you into thinking you need more 'stuff', and your old stuff should be replaced. With, of course, their latest version, newest colors, trendiest trend... for now.

With the Cradle to Cradle philosophy, yes create 'stuff'. But create environmentally friendly stuff. Re-use, fix and repair broken things or equipment. Make them continue to last. Produce quality long-lasting products! Our grandparents knew the value of quality, long-lasting products. And the value of maintaining and repairing them. In a Cradle to Cradle philosophy once something reaches it's end of life take it apart, re-use it and make it into something new. How smart is that? How Earth friendly is that? How resource conscious is that? How proudly would we be able to hand the Earth onto our children in a state they could actually enjoy and use without fear of chemical contamination or termination of resources? How much more ethically responsible and happier children would we be raising? We would be raising a generation that cared!!!

Think about this number 200,000,000,000 (200 billion).

What we create from the Earth and it's resources will eventually go back into the Earth. The TV's, the SUV's the peel, chop, grate, grind, blend and toast utensils. Apply that to every object in your house, then mutiply it by 200 million people. My house has probably 1,000 (conservatively) household and personal items. 1,000* 200 million = 200,000,000,000. Given our current life-style choices, that translates into 200 billion pieces of debris that will eventually go into landfill. And that's just today. What about when China and the other 3rd world developing countries come on-line? That's another 1 billion people who will be collecting 'stuff'.

If we could just manage to follow the Cradle to Cradle philosophy we would have an Earth to be proud of. Instead, we fight about whether or not there is global warming, who's to blame. The political manoeuvering is destroying our Earth.

Over time, reading books, thinking about eco-toursim, thinking about objects and their impact on our Earth and even begun gardening a very barren and bland concrete back yard to bring more Earth into my life. I am trying to make myself more Earth friendly. And for me Earth friendly means thinking about those every day objects and events in my life and trying to make them more 'Cradle to Cradle' rather than Cradle to Grave.

At first I thought what a lofty goal - give the Earth back in a useable state to our children. After all our current human nature is to buy, use, throw away-buy, use throw away-buy, use throw away. But it's not a lofty goal, it's a responsibility. And each and everyone of us has our piece of the responsibility pie. What are you doing with your piece?

I'm by no means a 'good' Earth citizen, but I'm making efforts. One of which is to educate myself about Green stuff. Hence I paid a whopping fee to go to the 3 days of a very professional conference where I was probably the only individual among bundles of Architects, Designers and Builders.

It was very gratifying to see that what I had believed inside for many years was in fact true. That people DO care about the Earth, and people in places of responsibility care. The Architects and the Builders - the people we trust to tell us 'how to' do this green stuff. The people who actually use the materials and create green homes in which we wish to live.

The first two days were filled with sessions that opened my eyes on what takes place in the designing and building process.

There are many, many systems and processes that go into building a single house. Not only that, there are teams of people working in the background that all have to understand the green goals for a building and implement them properly. As with anything, it's always possible for rogue individuals to say they are following the green goals but that cheat and use non-green in the building process. Educate yourself, be vigilant, ask questions, visit your building site regularly.

But I too have an ulterior motive. I'm learning about green building so that the cabinas and house I plan to build in Costa Rica will be Earth friendly, will be community conscious, will do as little damage to the surrounds and its peoples as is possible.

Costa Rica is an awesome place for many reasons. But my mileage is different to yours. I like knowing that 25% of Costa Rica's land is National Parks and preserves. I like the fact it has no army! I like the life-style that pays attention to the important things in life, family, community and friends.

Here's a thought. Imagine the US with no Army. Better still - imagine the whole world with no Army. A world where we finally get it. Where we finally realize the Earth doesn't belong to us, we belong to the Earth. No one man or Nation can 'own' land. We can allot it's use for the good of it's local social communities and sustaining life, but we can't own it. We are shepherds with a responsibility to return the Earth in the state we found it. Right now we are failing, we are not shepherding it, and we will be returning it in an unusable state to the next generation. Our children will not have the same use of the Earth as we did. We will be handing them a used-up, chemically altered and dangerous place to live.

If I can reduce my payload on the Earth, so can you. And one by one we can make a difference, we can hand down an Earth that is less depleted, less chemically altered and more capable of supporting our children. But only if we chose to make that difference. A one by one difference adds up to a whole lot of people - eventually damaging the bottom line of corporations to such an extent that it will be economically viable for them to 'care' about the Earth. To change their destructive use of resources and to give us what we want, a Clean Well Cared For Place to live.