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How does the Charlotte region turn truly green – eco-savvy, climate-friendly and a respected model of sustainable development? What's the path to true sustainability? No one policy or approach gets the region there. But here are some suggestions:
Carbon is not only humanity's greatest shared threat this century; it poses opportunities for broad arrays of new, green industries. If the Charlotte region exhibits callousness on climate change, it won't attract those industries or their environmentally conscious workers. Plus, upcoming “cap and trade” or carbon-tax programs will escalate costs for high carbon emitters.
With the rest of America, Charlotte has a massive ecological footprint. With its high carbon emissions it's likely heavier than the nation's. Calculations by the Global Footprint Network and other environmental groups show the average American needs 23.3 acres to sustain his or her consumption of energy, food, fiber, building materials, water and other resources. The worldwide average, by contrast, is 4.6 acres. If everyone on earth lived as we do, we'd require 4.6 planets.
Stop building new homes and subdivisions “way out there” – so spread-out public transit will never reach them. Add incentives for infill – that is, building on vacant lots, industrial “brownfields” and abandoned shopping center “grayfields.” Recycle cheap commercial strips into tree-lined boulevards of apartments with street-level shops. Don't build if a place can't meet the “Popsicle” test: a community so compact a child can walk safely from home to buy a Popsicle within five minutes. Increase car pooling. Broaden telecommuting. Try “distributed workplace” sites, so employees need not drive to more distant central offices.
Not just Charlotte city government, but all governments in the region should aim for energy-saving LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) standards. Apply them to any government-paid new building at once, expand to all private buildings tomorrow. The LEED cost premium is minor, and evidence shows employee morale and efficiency are higher. Long-term energy savings can be substantial.
Build for 100, not 20, years. Make buildings so attractive and well-located that people will want to keep using and adapting them for a century. Aim never to repeat the ugliness and waste symbolized by Charlotte's vacancy-plagued, aging malls – now ready for energy-consuming demolition. Stop automatic approvals for cheap, quickly built franchise businesses. (Fact: The Charlotte region's construction and demolition waste constitutes its largest unrecovered recyclable and is a significant filler of limited landfill space.)
The region prides itself on its green canopy, but the canopy has lots of ugly holes. Street tree planting should be pushed aggressively to provide shade and livability and reduce summertime heat build-up from paving, buildings and air conditioning units. Trees can help make roadways pleasant for walking and biking. They may be one of the easiest ways to combat today's obesity epidemic – a trend virtually certain to inflate health care budgets and make some citistates less competitive. (To Charlotte's credit, it now requires street trees in new subdivisions – a standard others should emulate).
Around the globe, people who suffer from asthma and other diseases are harmed by today's dependence on coal, with its massive carbon and health-threatening contaminants. A truly green Charlotte region will demand rapid expansion of solar cell arrays, wind turbine farms and geothermal installations. It will keep questioning whether Duke Energy really needs its proposed Cliffside coal plant. It will push for big BTU savings by “distributed energy” – local energy grids to serve individual hospitals, campuses or neighborhoods.
Major Charlotte-based businesses can be leaders. Example: Bank of America, Charlotte's No. 1 symbol of corporate might, was accused by environmental activists of being the top banker/financier for some of the coal companies responsible for the mountaintop-removal mining defacing and polluting West Virginia. This month the bank promised to phase out any such financing – a signal of corporate responsibility businesses across the region should heed.
Recent droughts raised regional awareness of water supply limits. It's no mystery how to assure a long-term, adequate supply. Save the Catawba and Yadkin rivers and tributaries from man-made pollutants and runoff.
Solutions? Green roofs, rain barrels, swales, native ground cover, banning phosphorous-bearing fertilizers. Declare the region's constant expansion of paved parking lots for what it is – a big environmental threat. Wherever conditions permit, insist on pervious surfaces to reduce rapid runoff, allowing water to soak into the soil, which helps cleanse it. Vigorously enforce erosion control ordinances now blatantly disregarded on many construction sites.
Here's one blue-sky approach: Recognize the inherent limits of splintered water authorities. Create one eight-county water board to look at all relevant issues (akin to the Regional Air Quality Board). Avoid “I win – you lose” standoffs like court fights over water supplies in different river basins. Get local officials to meet and look first for integrated, regionwide solutions. Aim eventually for a multicounty, two-state board empowered by interstate compact.
Before it's too late, restrain the voracious consumption of field and forest. It's outpacing population growth, destroying scenic vistas and thwarting natural systems. It clogs creeks and reservoirs with sediment, the region's top water pollutant. State-financed land purchases by private land trusts is invaluable. But aggressive real estate developments keep devouring space with rarely a murmur of protest. A new mindset is mandatory: Prize forests and fields as highly as development.
Well-known author and food-industry expert Michael Pollan says every acre of good farmland within a day's drive of our cities should be preserved. He'd force developers to draw up “food system impact statements” before devouring supposedly “empty” land. Maybe develop new residential villages around farm plots, not golf courses.
To make progress on green and allied issues – the economy, housing, the arts, public safety, etc. – there's no substitute for careful regional score-keeping. UNC Charlotte's Urban Institute (coordinator of this series) has inaugurated a yearly Charlotte Regional Indicators Project to do just that. Its first report, for 2007, provided a lot of the basic data used in this report (though the conclusions are the writers').
Because attitudes and systems must change, a green regional future requires aggressive communication. This means more than just the news media calling attention to ill-advised, energy-greedy big developments. Schools should adopt nature-based curriculums. The region's highly influential religious groups should constantly help congregations understand the huge moral implications of less consumptive lifestyles and protecting the creator's world.
Not just Charlotte, but the entire 14-county region could benefit from a “green czar.” This “czar” wouldn't have direct authority but would be empowered and invited to comment rigorously on the energy, water, development and conservation choices constantly facing businesses and governments and suggesting new, greener solutions. The councils of governments' CONNECT program might well be the sponsor.
The bottom line is clear: Unless this vibrant and inventive region finds ways to go radically greener, its potential to be a true global competitor, the place of greatness it might be, will never be realized.
