Thinking and acting green is all the rage these days, but commentator Neal Peirce ponders if it can ultimately be more than just a passing fad?
"A "green revolution" is burgeoning in America's cities and towns."
"Six years ago, as we exited an economically exuberant but perilously polluting 20th century, the idea would have seemed chimerical."
But today we talk about hybrid cars, compact fluorescent bulbs, wind farms, green roofs ad nauseum.
"Yet however welcome, even startling, the new developments seem, the somber truth is that the great ocean liner U.S.S. Consumption has so far shifted its direction barely a degree. With 4.6 percent of the world's population, the United States continues to burn a quarter of the globe's fossil fuels and to emit 25 percent of its greenhouse gases."...and growing.
While the green revolution is getting lots of media attention, it remains to be seen if the right changes can be made to truly create sustainable cities, rather than green facades.
Read the full story: Do Sustainable Cities Have a Future?
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Rutgers University, Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy
One Hundred Miles
University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability (SEAS)
Hunter College, City University of New York (CUNY)
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