Sustaining environmental propaganda

The adjective “sustainable,” meaning capable of being sustained, has been misused by environmental propagandists to further their phony causes. They have coopted the noun “sustainability” to suggest that we can’t maintain our lifestyles without changing our evil, wasteful ways—especially our use of earth’s natural resources. The planet just can’t handle it.

A recent article in the Wilmington StarNews by Wayne Faulkner reported that the Wilmington Chamber of Commerce promotes a “Green Plus” program sponsored by Piedmont Natural Gas. (link) Chris Carmody,(link) executive director of the “green” nonprofit came to town peddling more environmental snake-oil—to help “save companies money” and “achieve community environmental goals.” (link)

Saving money sounds good, but sustainability schemes usually end up costing taxpayers and consumers more. Further, communities don’t have goals; only individuals plan for the future; most often to improve their personal conditions. In this case, business owners want to maximize profits. Chasing green ghosts ends up wasting time and money. Environmental collectivists want to indoctrinate business people with their meddling agenda—hoping to recruit supporters by deceptively promising savings and competitive advantage. When we look into what’s behind this the usual suspects are found lurking in academia.

The Green Plus scheme was incubated at Duke University and UNC-Chapel Hill. Surprisingly—or maybe not—co-conspirators included the Raleigh and Durham chambers of commerce. Chambers once supported the best interests of their members; now, it seems, some are more interested in other pursuits. (link)

Mr. Carmody targets small businesses because, he said, “big ones had lots of resources to improve sustainability.” Yes, many have aligned cozily with government—a process sometimes referred to as crony-capitalism; or maybe a better term would be “conflict of interest.” Business people cannot serve government and themselves at the same time. However, many have dutifully joined “green” schemes believing the public will think better of them. (link)

Local CPA Adam Shay has bought in. He thinks recycling saves money and is a wise thing to do. (I wonder if he is aware that this scheme wastes more than it saves.) (link) Viewed as “having a positive impact on people in the community” Mr. Shay will recruit others to the “idea of sustainability.” In my opinion it’s a meaningless effort, but Shay apparently believes it will raise his business image. Good luck with that.

As with all scams eventually people figure out what’s really going on—in this case distinguishing deceptive environmental projects from the hard work of succeeding in business.