Time to reframe 'green' jobs

Graham Russell

Search the Web on “green” jobs and you get quite a few hits. "Definition of a Green Job" brings up about 6.6 million. "Millions of Green Jobs" yields 6.8 million results. "Green Jobs in Colorado" alone nets one 27.9 million options to click on. While hardly scientific, these results certainly point to the interest out there in “green” jobs. But are all those “green” jobs actually “green,” or are they just tangentially related to a more sustainable economy? And should the United States be more interested in creating marginally “green” jobs or an economy based on sustainability anyway?

A staggering amount has recently been written on the subject of green jobs, a concept that didn't even exist 5 years ago. As the recession lingers and unemployment rises, it's become very convenient for politicians to talk up the idea of "going ‘green’" as a source of economic salvation and "millions of new ‘green’ jobs" as governments seek to justify shoveling billions of stimulus dollars into their economies.

The upsurge of interest in all things “green” is generally a good thing because it shows that more people are signing on to the idea that we need to do things differently if we're to have a truly sustainable economic model that will allow future generations to enjoy a good quality of life. However, the vast majority of what’s written on “green” jobs is focused on trying to define what one is and to predict how many will be created over the coming decades. These exercises might be useful from a political standpoint but many of them range from the fanciful to the downright absurd. For example: The widely quoted American Solar Energy Society's green jobs report suggested that by 2030 the largest category of green jobs in the US would be  cashiers! The guy stacking shelves with CFLs and concentrated detergent bottles at my local Safeway is in a green job now, whereas a year ago he wasn't? Millions of new green jobs? Really?

Another problem is that the debate focuses largely on jobs in renewable energy, with a minority interest in energy efficiency. Wonderful visions are conjured of Americans, formerly employed in the auto and steel industries, now working in factories churning out and maintaining solar panels, wind turbine blades and smart electricity meters. These predictions ignore the fact that China and other cheap labor countries will quickly master the art of making this stuff, so the likelihood that a massive increase in renewable energy in the United States will create a renaissance in American manufacturing is slim indeed. China is already the largest manufacturer of solar equipment in the world and growing quickly. Moreover, many of the installers and repairers of this equipment are the same folks that were working in our existing energy infrastructure, so their new "green" jobs are just old jobs relabeled- just like the Safeway shelf-stacker's.

Here's another way to think about how "greening" our economy will create wealth, jobs and robust economic development that cuts through the clutter, confusion, rhetoric and  irrelevance of  the current “green” jobs debate.

More and more organizations, especially the world's largest corporations, are using sustainability thinking to drive innovation and competitive advantage. As everyone knows by now, Walmart (NYSE: WMT) has committed to a strategy based on the principles of sustainable business management. Whether or not you're a Walmart fan, the scale of its commitment and the range of sustainability initiatives under way at the company are truly staggering. Walmart readily admits that its sustainability strategy is driven largely by self interest rather than a desire to save the planet. 

In 2007 Walmart approached Lennox International, a $3 billion HVAC system manufacturer, to see if Lennox could deliver Packaged Rooftop HVAC Units for its stores and distribution centers that met its new energy efficiency standards at a price at which Walmart could earn an acceptable return on its investment. Turned out Lennox engineers were able to design and develop the required equipment and, as a result, the company picked up a significant amount of new business from Walmart, adding 80 new positions to its manufacturing plant in Stuttgart, Ark.

Likewise in 2006 Walmart fitted its 8,000 fleet tractor units with alternate power units (APUs) so that drivers didn't have to idle their engines all night to keep their cabs comfortable for sleeping. That measure saves Walmart $25 million in annual diesel costs, drastically reduces carbon emissions and has provided an opportunity for the manufacturer of the APUs to add jobs and strengthen its competitive position.

Whether these jobs are "green" or not, none of the studies I've read on the subject of green jobs captured them or even considered how sustainability thinking can drive innovation, competitive advantage and job creation.

Walmart has now formed the Sustainability Consortium, a group of its largest suppliers that includes major corporations like Proctor & Gamble, Miller, Coors and S C Johnson, to drive sustainability down its massive worldwide supply chain. So when I look at the thousands of major corporations around the world that, like Walmart, are basing their strategies on the principles of sustainability, I realize that it would be more useful if the money spent on all these reports were spent instead on helping every company learn how to think like these global leaders and use sustainability thinking to drive competitive advantage, generate new wealth and create jobs.

Graham Russell was born and brought up in England, Russell has spent 32 years in the US, largely in CEO roles in the transportation and environmental services industries. Later, he devoted himself to consulting work in the recycling, environmental services and cleantech sectors. He became Executive Director of CORE in August, 2008.  He can be reached at graham@corecolorado.org