The Need for Nuance in Sustainability Rhetoric

I hiked the Appalachian Trail in 2019. On this particular trail, most thru-hikers don't carry hard-sided reusable water bottles or hydration bladders. I have tried both at various points in my hiking career, and neither the weight nor the irritation, respectively, were worth the hassle. Instead, most of us carry the kind of high-end plastic bottles of fancy water that you can buy for $2 at the grocery store in the beverage aisle—you know, the kind of bottle that every self-respecting person tries to shy away from nowadays.

In our defense, we tend to use them for many hundreds of miles, only replacing them when we start worrying about the microplastics in our digestive systems, or when we can't stand the dented, discolored look of them. But still, it's technically single-use plastic.

I feel a vague pang of guilt every time I buy one of these bottles, but I still buy them. They are just so much lighter than the alternatives, and they thread perfectly into my water filter. I use the reusable kind in "normal" life, when I'm not hiking 15-20 miles a day, but on a long hike, nothing else is as good.

I commented on this guilt to one of my friends one day along the trail, as we meandered through the aisles of a Virginia grocery store buying oatmeal and packets of tuna for the next section. "I feel so bad buying so much plastic," I said, looking down at the cart.

My friend made a face. "I don't."

At the time, his comment surprised me. True, we didn't buy much compared to the average, normal person—i.e., the person who doesn't walk really far for fun—but we still weren't trying very hard to reduce our consumption.

I still don't exactly agree with my friend. I believe it is our responsibility to reduce or buy more sustainable products whenever we can. But in the two years since the end of our hike, I've come to understand what he meant.

On the trail, we went into town maybe twice a week, buying only what we could carry, and using everything over and over until it broke or ripped. The piles of plastic left behind after we repackaged our food into our bear bags were not so much a sign of our individual failure to solve America's waste problem as a visible reminder of how as a society, we have reached a point where it sometimes seems impossible to end our dependence on single-use plastics.

My guilt over my own single-use consumption is not misplaced. I can, and I have, reduced my use, switched to reusable items when possible, and sought out products made without plastic. It's not hard to do, and I think it should become habit for everyone.

But individual consumers alone cannot save the planet—not when large corporations operate with near-immunity and contribute to the majority of emissions. Refusing a straw or swapping plastic bags for fabric ones are both admirable choices, and I would urge everyone to make these easy changes.

But it can't stop there.

Enter: Nuance.

By now, you have probably heard of the 2017 study that found that 71% of the world's emissions have been caused by 100 companies. In the wake of this finding, a shift, albeit a slight one, has begun to occur in conversations among my peers about climate change, plastics, and reducing consumption.

In May 2020, CNN tweeted an article about "5 ways to go green during the pandemic." This tweet was reposted all over social media, and was largely—at least in my echo chamber—derided, considering the growing awareness of the prominent role that corporations play in driving climate change. This is an indicator of the kind of nuanced questions that people are starting to ask.

Why, in rhetoric about "sustainability" and "going green," is it always the individual who holds the responsibility for reducing waste?

Why is there very little discussion of how the communities most negatively impacted by industry-driven climate destruction are communities of color?

Why is there a marked absence of education on how to urge companies to cut down on their emissions and use more sustainable practices?

These are the questions that have emerged in this new, urgent conversation about climate change.

Let's look at larger-scale change.

The Center for Climate and Energy Solutions has found that a market-based approach is the most effective way to reduce emissions that contribute to climate change, and that this method should "should be a centerpiece of comprehensive climate strategy." Such an approach includes methods like cap-and-trade and a carbon tax. These and other policies put pressure on businesses to ensure that their emissions are staying within reasonable limits.

Despite the advantages of these policies, they are difficult to pass in congress, and even more difficult to enforce. Only a handful of states have enacted market-based policies to curb emissions produced by businesses, including Washington, California, and Colorado.

Boulder, Colorado was the first city to introduce a set of "aggressive, city-funded programs and services designed to reduce local greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate climate change." Since 2005, local emissions have decreased by 21%. The goal is to reduce emissions by 80% by 2050.

This program is just one example of how jurisdictions across the United States could work on a larger level to enact sweeping, effective reductions in emissions—rather than always overemphasizing the need, for example, to stop using plastic straws.

The conversation doesn't end here, however.

A nuanced conversation about climate change does not mean that we should favor one side over the other. While companies objectively pollute more than individuals, there are still many, many things that we can do in our lives to reduce our impact.

After all, consumers are the audience for businesses. I'm no economist, but it doesn't take an expert to know that consumers' choices, behaviors, and purchases influence companies' decisions.

As long as we keep using plastic at our current rate, plastic will be produced. As long as we keep mindlessly tossing non-recyclable items into the recycling bin, the recycling process will remain largely ineffective.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't make changes. We absolutely should.

I'm saying that we need to have a conversation that includes multiple levels of awareness of the causes and potential solutions to the climate crisis. I'm saying that in addition to tweeting "5 ways to go green," we should also be considering "5 ways to support effective climate policy." In addition to articles about bags or straws or biking to work, we should also be talking about policies that make it possible for environmental racism to thrive, and how to put pressure on our representatives to address these issues.

The power of "and"

At the end of the day, this conversation is not an "or." It's an "and."

We should replace our plastic bags with cloth ones, and we should contact our representatives and demand that they support aggressive climate legislation aimed at market-based approaches.

We should swap paper towels for reusable cloths, and we should research the companies we purchase from to ensure that they are implementing sustainable practices.

We should use alternative forms of transport, such as walking, biking, or takin public transit, whenever possible, and we should put economic pressure on large corporations to adopt significant reductions on emissions and overproduction.

Let's not forget to include multiple dimensions in our conversations about reducing, reusing, refusing, and recycling. Only in the nuance, in the and, will we reach tangible and effective solutions to curb climate change.