The Clumsy Solution Space
As if to prove that a good expert is someone who begins a conversation, instead of ending it; we heard some wonderful sparring between Michael Shellenberger and Hunter Lovins about the price of renewable energy; the pragmatics (or not!) of nuclear energy; and whether we have the answers we need and must simply put them in place, or if we still desperately need solutions to the problems we face.

Hunter talked about the “clumsy solution space” that lies between government regulations, market forces, and civil society, that we need to bring all these groups to the table to make it work, with Shellenberger pointing out that whatever solutions occur will need to be win-wins, because negative solutions like trying to tax carbon out of the market will simply be too punishing to be palatable.

Shellenberger noted that as much as we decry the environmental impact of fossil fuels, all our wealth is built on fossil fuels; and we should be grateful for the fabulous mobility, freedom and standard of living they’ve brought us. But just as nobody in Silicon Valley would use a computer from the 1960’s, we shouldn’t have a society that runs on an old energy source. There’s been no innovation, he said, because it’s a cheap, old technology. At which Hunter pointed out that it’s the $240 billion dollars in global subsidies that make it look cheap, but with peak oil upon us, and coal plants being cancelled by utilities as less profitable than wind, those days are numbered. And then a numbers argument began over how much exactly a kilowatt-hour of nuclear or solar energy costs.

I could listen to these two argue all day!

The Law of Two Feet
But we had a whole roomful of exciting people who had ideas to share. So unconference facilitator Kaliya Hamlin opened up the schedule board, and people came to the front, announced their idea for a panel and put it on the board. Some had been pre-arranged, but many were simply created by participants. Some panels were merged, the flexible schedule was re-arranged, and instead of spending months vetting speakers and organizing panels, it all happened in a matter of minutes.

If you’re thinking about running your next conference this way, the organizers gave us some principles for a successful unconference: Whoever comes are the right people to be there, whatever happens is the only thing that could have, and when it’s over you’re done. As a safety there is the Law of Two Feet – if you’re bored or unfulfilled, simply go to another session. Using the guiding principles of passion and responsibility, find the place you’ll be most active, useful, or fulfilled.

There were an overwhelming array of panels including:  web 2.0 and other media engagements, fostering sustainable behaviour and involving youth, greening personal transportation, the relevance of CSR reporting, sustainable supply chains, working with local governments, and the impact of video games on sustainability.

BreakThrough authors Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus talked about their vision for a “Politics of Possibility” that shuns a philosophy of limits and argues that we need to tap humanity’s natural aspiration, and innovation, because it’s only when people have their material needs met that they can worry about postmaterial needs – which include climate change. They argue that major government investment is what brought us the space age and the computer age, programs which revolutionized our lives and stimulated the economy for decades. Now, they argue, we need to seriously invest in clean energy to jumpstart a green economy worth trillions of dollars, that will lift billions of people out of poverty, and offers our only practical hope of repairing our relationship with the natural world. And while many people agree with them, getting business and government to invest tens of billions of dollars a year is a definite challenge.

Gil Friend of Natural Logic talked about his plan for Sustainability Dashboards, interactive tools to drive change in companies and communities by open-sourcing carbon accounting software, tapping regional data, and allowing larger pools of users.

Tom Feegan from Live Earth gave us a sneak preview of some short films which support the mission “Our Simple Changes can Make a World of Difference,” to be aired at the Tribeca Film Festival. The Live Earth Film Series commissioned dozens of film makers from around the world to make short films, some funny, some stark that reveal our impact, and our choices. My favorite line was from a British farce where one neighbor calls his recycling neighbor an “eco-path.”

I attended a session called “Visioning a Sustainable Future” led by NASA consultant Justine Burt   – where participants brainstormed what a green future could look like in the Bay Area. Dividing ourselves into groups, we brainstormed how our food, energy, transportation and buildings would look 25 years from now. We came up with everything from community-oriented zero-footprint buildings, and producing 75% of our food within a 100 mile radius, to cities driven by bike lanes and bullet trains, and powered by solar, tidal and geothermal power.

Paul Wingate led a session on Financing your Green Idea where we talked about bringing the micro-loan concept to the green movement, and leveraging social equity to bundle small ideas into a size and shape that the burgeoning field of venture-capitalists, angel investors, and socially committed financial organizations can tap into.

It was an exciting day over all, which brought together the entrepreneurial and problem-solving passions of silicon valley, with the consciousness and optimism of the green movement. At the end of the day everybody was full of enthusiasm, and offering up next steps to take our ideas forward.

First stop? Green Drinks , of course.