The Green Blues
For Yalies who want it, green advice from Yalies who know.
November/December 2007
It is not true that Yale alumni
invented the environmental movement. It just looks that way.
Yale alumni founded the first U.S.
forestry school (at Yale). Wrote two of the movement’s seminal books, A Sand
County Almanac (1949) and The Greening
of America (1970).
Founded Conservation International, Ecotrust, the Natural Resources Defense
Council, the World Resources Institute.
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Yalies have had a
disproportionately large influence on a relatively small sector. |
Various Yale alumni are recognized
as: the father of the international agreement on protecting the ozone layer;
the leading advocates for mining reform, clean air law, and efficiency policy
for utilities; major thinkers in the environmental law movement; and the first
person to coin the term “biological diversity.”
Yale alumni recently started a
venture capital firm that invests in green companies. Founded a student action
network on global warming. Have run a huge and diverse mix of green
organizations, from Big Apple Solar Installation Commitment and the Connecticut
Fund for the Environment to the World Wildlife Fund, the Humane Society, and —
But we’ll spare you.
Even for Yale, it’s a
disproportionately large influence on a relatively small sector. All of these
alumni are a considerable mitigating factor in Yale’s environmental footprint.
It occurred to us that they could also help those of you who want to mitigate
your own footprint. So we asked five seasoned environmental players: what green
tips would you give the readers of the Yale Alumni Magazine?
Frances G. Beinecke ’71, ’74MFS
President, Natural Resources
Defense Council; former member of the Yale Corporation
“Step number one is to set an
example in your community and your business, in your own life, to improve the
environment. Hopefully we’re all changing the lightbulbs and taking
environmental steps in our homes—but what’s required is leadership in all
sectors. Whether you work in a for-profit or a not-for-profit, every single
place has an impact on the environment and can improve. Making the environment
part of your personal and professional framework, and calling on others in your
workplace and in your life to do the same, is the key first step.
“Curbing global warming is the
number one priority. There are many ways to reduce our carbon emissions, and
the first and easiest is to improve energy efficiency. Every building in the
country and the world can be made more energy-efficient through design and
technology. Having energy efficiency top of mind in new designs or renovations
is key.
“Water is number two. Water is
going to be the limiting factor in this century, both in the United States and
worldwide. We don’t use water efficiently and we continue to pollute, so being
conscious of how water is used and looking at how to make that use as efficient
as possible is critical.”
Donald D. T. Chen ’98, ’99MES
Founding executive director and CEO, Smart Growth America
“One of the most significant ways
people can reduce their carbon footprint is to replace one or several car trips
as part of their daily or weekly routine. Fifty percent of all trips people
take are less than three miles. That can easily be done on a bike. Twenty-eight
percent are less than one mile.
“The second way is: location,
location, location. People who might want to reduce their carbon footprint by
driving less may not be able to if they live or work or shop in places that
require a person to drive a car everywhere.
“It’s also essential to support
green development. If there is a green neighborhood being built—in other
words, compact and walkable, not too dependent on cars—citizens should
get up and advocate for those as strenuously as they might oppose something
that’s grossly inappropriate for them. Unfortunately, a lot of neighborhood
activists oppose good development that saves the environment—a more
compact development near a train station or other types of things that are
greener. People ought to be strenuously for what’s good. We’ve seen communities
succeed when their citizens are active, informed, engaged.”
Fred Krupp ’75
President, Environmental Defense
“Overwhelmingly, the most important
thing an individual citizen can do on global warming is engage politically.
This problem is not going to be solved by the sum of voluntary actions. It’s
only going to be solved globally when the United States' political system
moves, because we are the only industrialized country in the world which has
not agreed to a mandatory limit on greenhouse gas pollution.
“I feel so strongly about this that
if you had me give you the five most important things to do, I would probably
say, Number one is engage politically. Two is, specifically, contact your
senator. Three would be contact your congressman. Four would be contact your
governor. Five would be make all your political donations coupled with this
message: that the United States needs to enact a strong mandatory limit on
greenhouse gases.
“I have a vision that if a portion
of the Yale alumni decided to really get behind it, the linchpin of this
problem—the United States—could be restored to its role as a leader
instead of a laggard on this issue.”
William K. Reilly ’62
Founding partner, Aqua
International Partners, which invests in companies engaged in water and
renewable energy; former administrator, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
“The first and most serious impact
of climate change will be felt in water scarcity. I live in San Francisco. We've
seen a 50 percent loss on the West Coast in snowmelt in the last 50 or so
years, and it’s expected we’ll lose another 50 to 80 percent in the next 50
years. That potentially could transform not just economics but a culture.
“Obviously we have significant
irrigation commitments. But industry and agriculture have been quite good over
the last 30 to 40 years at improving the efficiency of their water use.
Coca-Cola recycles 90 percent of its water now. I don’t think we’ve made the
same kinds of adjustments to our household use and particularly to landscaping
uses. The average household uses something like a hundred gallons a day. The
major portion of that is often for landscaping.
“But there are some very
encouraging trends. Seattle, Los Angeles, and a number of cities have seen
their population grow threefold over the last 30 to 40 years, without any
increase in water use. That shows that it can be done.”
Thomas E. Lovejoy III ’64, ’71PhD
President, Heinz Center for
Science, Economics, and the Environment; chief biodiversity adviser to the
president of the World Bank
“We have to think in terms of the
less advantaged of the world, who are going to be most hurt by environmental
degradation. In some instances they’re major contributors [to the degradation],
because they have minimal options. A substantial amount of the deforestation
all over the world is driven to some extent by poverty, by people looking for
opportunity or survival. Among other things, it does require intelligent
approaches to foreign assistance.
“Everybody has a role to play for
the environment—whether you’re a poet or you’re in commerce or you’re in
politics or you’re working at the community level. When young people come to me
and ask, 'What should I do? Should I be a scientist?' my answer is, Follow your
heart. You make your contribution through what you love to do best.”  |
