Somebody Get Me A Sustainability Coordinator!
So, I was reading an article on Alternet this morning entitled, “We Must Imagine a Life Without Oil.” It’s basically a warning about peak oil, but near the end, the author, Mark Hertsgaard, writes:
Activists in scores of towns and cities around the world are trying to prepare their communities for the transition to a post-oil economy. Rather than wait for national governments and multinational corporations to save them, these ordinary citizens are examining how their communities can produce their own energy, food, buildings and other essentials using local resources rather than materials that arrive from afar via oil-based transport.
That got me thinking about the town I live in. Poultney, Vermont is a small town in rural Vermont, about twenty-five minutes west of Rutland. It has a population of roughly 3,600 people, most of whom live in the village, but about 1,000 of whom live on the outlying hills and fields.
Poultney is also home to Green Mountain College, which bills itself as “an environmental liberal arts college.” All the students who graduate from GMC are required to take 37 credits in the ELA (environmental liberal arts) program, which includes four core classes:
- Images of Nature, which explores the environment through literature and philosophy;
- Voices of Community, which expands the concept of the environment to include human relationships and community;
- Dimensions of Nature, which is a kind of introductory class to scientific thought;
- A Delicate Balance, a capstone class that “helps students understand what might be required to create a sustainable future in their world and in their lives.”
The rest of the credits in the program are electives, with classes ranging from Astronomy to the Western Imagination.
With such a background, it seems fair to say that the students and faculty at Green Mountain College are perhaps more prepared than any other small liberal arts college to address the challenges posed by peak oil, and that the town of Poultney is small enough to actually consider implementing any innovative solutions that the college might create.
Doesn’t it seem like a no-brainer for the college and the town to start working together to fully remove themselves from an outside dependency on energy production?
The way I see it, the benefit would be at least four-fold.
First, the obvious: if Poultney can remove itself from a dependency on “foreign” energy, its residents won’t be victims of any global collapse in energy production or global spike in energy prices.
Second: If Poultney truly wishes to become self-sustainable, then it should require that a significant percentage of the labor needed to implement the solutions be contributed by Poultney residents. Not only would it increase the town’s employment rate, but it would also increase the town’s pride in their community.
Third, the novelty of an American town attempting to become self-sustainable is a public-relations dream. Think of all the tourists (scientists, environmentalists, green entrepreneurs, journalists, etc.) who would stay in the town’s bed and breakfasts, eat in the town’s restaurants, and frequent the town’s shops (let’s hope these folks are really into scrap-booking, quilting, and sewing, ’cause that’s what we got).
Fourth, Green Mountain College would benefit phenomenally from such a partnership. The college’s national reputation would improve significnatly, resulting in a higher-quality of applicants, not just in the student body, but also among the faculty. The increased reputation would also make it easier for the college to receive grants and funding. And lastly, the partnership with Poultney would improve the relationship between the town and the college, which would only increase as the situation outside of Poultney becomes more dire.
And just who could coordinate such a massive project? I don’t know, but his job title might be “Sustainability Coordinator.”
If only I knew such a person.
