The Mesh - Lisa Gansky [28]
People are increasingly seeking a sustainable lifestyle. The standards have been changing for the past decade, and these changes are now accelerating, even in the United States. One indication of changing attitudes is the phenomenal growth of so-called green drivers of purchasing decisions. In a recent study by the Boston Consulting Group, fully 73 percent of consumers reported feeling it is important or very important that companies have a good environmental track record. In a poll of consumers in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Japan, respondents said they are placing more weight on “green” relative to other purchase drivers than they were before the recession, and that they will continue to do so when economic growth returns.
Of course, ownership won’t become instantly passé. I’m not suggesting that people in the West will all sell their houses and live like monks. Nor should they. Most of us will want a personal computer, mobile phone, or new pair of jeans. But especially in many non-Western markets, people may skip the option of ownership in favor of convenient access to needed goods and services, just as they leapt over film to digital cameras and over landlines to mobile phones. There are already signs that some markets are primed to adopt Mesh models full-on and fast. For example, Singapore and Renault-Nissan have signed an agreement to make the city a testing ground for electric vehicles, or EVs. Singapore’s size and density, and the commitment of its government, create the conditions in which EVs could replace fossil-fuel-burning vehicles. Singapore’s commitment to innovation, including environmental and social projects, makes it a prime candidate for Meshing cars and other resources.
In the West, too, the widespread shift in values and perceptions has proved to be a boon for the Mesh. Like non-Mesh businesses, these new enterprises still need to serve customers and make a profit. The successful Mesh companies will be the ones that delight customers, grow trust in the brand and business itself, and make a profit.
the costs of climate change.
The throwaway economy contributes significantly to climate change. Landfills throw off methane gas, which accelerates global warming several times faster than carbon dioxide. Moving and disposing of waste requires energy. Power is required to sort and crush the trash and to refine one thing into something else. Energy, for the most part, is thermal, which generates greenhouse gases and pollutants.
For a very long time, the environmental liabilities of wasteful business practices have been hidden by government subsidies. Taxpayers have footed a lion’s share of the bill for the environmental, health, and social costs of mining, clear-cutting, air pollution, and now climate change. Just as Lehman Brothers and Enron used accounting devices to hide the true picture of their finances, companies’ environmental liabilities are often hidden. This is changing rapidly.
Within international business circles, there is growing recognition that company liability is often disguised by poor measurement, especially overreliance on the gross national product as a record of progress. In the words of Robert Kennedy Jr.:
Our Gross National Product, now, is over eight hundred billion dollars a year, but that Gross National Product . . . counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for those who break them. It counts the destruction of our redwoods and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl.