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A Better World is Possible

By Peter Steinbrueck

What happens when your body temperature rises a degree or two above the normal 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit? You start to feel sick. Well, so as the earth's temperature slowly rises, our planet is feeling sick.

Most of us now accept as real the dire warnings from the world's leading atmospheric scientists about the threat of global warming. To avoid irreversible and devastating consequences to our planetary systems - air, oceans, polar ice cap and life on the planet - we're told we need to dramatically reduce green house gas emissions caused by human activity by 2012. That is only four years from now, and is only one dimension of this complex problem. Perhaps the biggest challenge the world faces today, aside from but integrally related to global warming, are the combined effects of climate change, population growth, rapid urban migration, and the limits to growth. One Planet Living, a project of the World Wildlife Federation, estimates that if the rest of the developing world consumed as much as Americans do, it would require five and one half planets to support today's world population.

The U.S., with less than five percent of the world's population, consumes 22 percent of the total world resources, 25 percent of the world's petroleum, and produces nearly a third of the world's greenhouse gases. By 2050, the world's population is expected to grow from the current of 6.7 billion by as much as 2.5 billion people to 9.2 billion. Yet today, more than 2 billion people live in extreme poverty, on less than two dollars a day. They are ill-housed, in poor health, hungry and thirsty; premature death is common. Survivors migrate to the cities by the millions, to seek a better life. If world living standards and development patterns were to mimic the profligate lifestyles and consumption levels of U.S. culture through mass urbanization, humanity would literally cook and devour the planet.

No panacea exists for dealing with the convergent global challenges of population growth, urbanization, and climate change. To live within the planet's carrying capacity and avoid massive human suffering and species die-off, we need to lower consumption. This means we will need to balance the utilization of natural resources. For millennia, people have lived in communities in close harmony with nature. We don't need to wait for government to force change, each of us can begin to reduce our ecological footprint immediately by driving less, buying locally grown foods and other products, and walking, biking or riding public transit more frequently. American cities must re-tool to become less oil dependent and more energy efficient. Communities that provide ways for residents to get around without automobiles are more livable, attractive, healthier and socially interactive. The sustainability movement is growing fast, and offers hope for the future.

Peter Steinbrueck, Fellows of the American Institute of Architects

Steinbrueck spoke in Olympia at the Neighborhood Sustainability Fair. He served on the Seattle City Council from 1997 - 2007


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