McKinsey Quarterly just published this interview in which Economist Nicholas Stern says that we should use the economic crisis to address climate change.

“We need to have a reflationary package, which lays the foundation for future growth. And if we look into the future, it’s actually quite exciting. Because what we see is the biggest technological opportunity that we’ve had for a very long time: as big as the railways, as big as electricity, as big as the motorcar, and, most recently, information technology. It’s the opportunity to go for low-carbon growth.”

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This BBC produced show, which aired as an episode of PBS’s series NOVA, is in no way fringe science. Yet somehow this huge subject is still not part of our environmental debate.

Global Dimming argues that the planet has been experiencing both global warming and global dimming. Particulate matter from air pollution rises into the atmosphere where it attracts water. The water crystallizes on the particulates and reflects sunlight back into space.

The amount of sunlight reaching the earth has dropped approximately 22% between 1950 and today. This dimming has likely kept global temperatures much cooler.

Many countries have made significant reductions in particulate pollution, which means that the amount of sunlight reaching the earth is likely to increase.

If we do not also immediately reduce greenhouse gas emissions, we could see a steep rise in global temperatures - as much as 10 degrees. Even a rise half that high and we can kiss the polar ice caps good bye.

I have to admit that the kid in me feels vindicated. Through out my school years, many of us kids worried about the soot and smoke pouring out chimneys - only to be told that just the invisible greenhouse gases mattered.

Now it seems that both do. Great.

My sixth-grade earth-science-self is happy. The rest of me is looking for property on a hilltop.

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Branding a city

Brian Lehrer had a fascinating piece today on how the public sector took on a private sector strategy to save New York during the 1970’s. The city invested in Branding. Faced with a failing economy, rising crimes rates and a bad reputation New York officials created the iconic campaign “I Love NY”.

My main takeaway from the piece was the comment Miriam Greenberg made about branding. She said that branding is a combination of both marketing and material, that you need more than just a great message. I completely agree.

There’s a lot of discussion about what companies and governments should invest in during these times. There’s healthcare, or education, or infrastructure. If anyone said branding, I bet the suggestion was widely dismissed.  But if you take Ms. Greenberg’s use of the term, its really not such a bad idea.  Branding helps people identify with products and if anything needs support of the people right now, its the economy. Its our cities and local businesses.  Its going to be the new products.

So for every project that we are launching, stimulus or not, lets make sure we put a solid branding effort into it too.

A lesson for the public and private sector alike.

That our greatest challenges are our best opportunities for a sustainable future, if we all work together.

There are enough blogs today commenting on the beginning of a new era and the renewal of the American spirit. It’s enough to say that I by and large agree with them.

However, for Salvage this is a particularly poignant time.  Salvage is about harnessing the power of the diverse units that make up a community under a common purpose- a unity of purpose, as some have put it. We have been circling around this topic for sometime with our network of partners as a way to innovate and grow despite limited resources. Our network must now turn this conversation into a mandate and combine our collective efforts.

Salvage Research will be continuing to produce content, broad and deep, that covers how communities are able to come together and create new social capital. The next four years are sure to produce many chances for us to test and prove our hypothesis. We hope you all join us.