Volume 3, Issue 2
Fall 1999
Contents
Old Name, New Ideas
by Robert A. Thomas, Ph.D.
EnviroDecisions is pleased to return with a new sponsoring organization, in a different format, with
a wider audience, but a familiar theme.
ENVIRODecisions began as a project of the Louisiana Nature Center in New Orleans. When the Nature Center merged with the Audubon Institute (which operates the Audubon Zoo, Aquarium of the Americas, Audubon Institute Center for Research of Endangered Species, and more), ENVIRODecisions shifted to its new Office of Environmental Policy.
Loyola University’s Center for Environmental Communications (LUCEC) (a program within Loyola’s Department of Communications) is the new home of this newsletter. LUCEC’s purpose is to educate practicing and future journalists about environmental coverage, to foster better environmental communication among stakeholders within the Greater New Orleans community, and to nationally discuss Louisiana’s environmentally challenging and opportunistic heritage.
The format is the same in that we want to challenge some rather anchored notions about the environment, while clarifying confusing, often conflicting information. There is ample opportunity for you, the audience, to submit your thoughts to these pages.
And who is that audience? In addition to the 1200 nature centers who received it in the past, ENVIRODecisions is mailed to many environmental journalists, the education departments for most zoos and aquaria in the U.S., and lots of other folks who are interested in environmental communications.
The theme remains the same–to explore the whole story of environmentally important issues and to provide interesting, thoughtful op/ed pieces that stimulate discussion. Along the way, we’ll keep you informed of LUCEC activities and those of our colleagues around the world.
Let us hear from you. We value your opinion.
What Shintech Should Have Done
by Robert A. Thomas, Ph.D.
Throughout the country, but especially in Louisiana, the announcement of the siting of a new chemical plant
is greeted with excitement in the economic sector and with grave concern by the environmental community. The
former have great expectations about jobs, taxes, and an improved economic climate. The latter have deep concerns
about a new battery of pollution issues, and they and the citizens living where the plant intends to locate don’t
buy the “jobs and taxes” refrain.
Logically, the large facilities are typically sited in rural areas where education levels are low. The chemical industry is very high tech, and it just doesn’t hire poorly educated people. Almost all chemical plant employees are imported, so locals don’t get jobs. These new employees typically live away from the plants, so they spend little of their income in the nearby areas. Louisiana gives multi-year tax exemptions to entice industry to locate in the state, so for some time there is nowhere near the tax impact that the huge budgets suggest. This deprives boards of education of tax revenues, so education does not improve.
On top of these issues is placed an overlay of environmental racism (a harsher construct of environmental justice)–the notion that there is racist intent in siting the plant in a place that disproportionately impacts the lives of minorities. Such accusations are extremely confrontational, and always elicit a variety of emotional responses.
Under these conditions, discussion is volatile and every segment argues its agenda. Government and industry want the plant for economic development (assuming confidently that the present regulatory climate protects the citizens), most environmentalists don’t want the plant because of possible pollution and environmental racism, some environmental groups just want to use the situation to fight for their own agendas, some local groups of concerned citizens fear health issues, and other locals just don’t want a new huge facility in their neighborhood (they like seeing trees and fields when they look out of their windows, and they don’t want the sky brightly lighted at night). And oh, yes–the media have a field day with pens and cameras.
In the case of Shintech, the company lost. A book could be written about why, and about all the side issues that developed. But I believe the company made a drastic mistake that could, and should, have been avoided.
In this case, my opinion is that Shintech’s site location process identified the best place for the plant. It has all the requirements: enough land at the right price, adjacent industry from which to obtain byproducts, natural supplies of salt (for chlorides), access to all forms of transportation, cheap energy, and a huge river for water and cooling. All these factors say that the Convent, Louisiana, region was a technically correct choice. They did the right technical thing.
Then they did the wrong human thing. They arrived and tried to sell the project on the basis of jobs and taxes. In fact, they would have provided jobs (but not for the locals), and eventually they would have provided taxes (but not for a while). In my eyes, the major failure was what they didn’t do.
They didn’t show that they were willing to consider the needs of people whose lives they would impact in doing business in the neighborhood. They were good business persons (in the narrow sense of only considering business), but they did not offer anything to advance the needs of the local citizens–human beings. So, the “little people,” with the help of a number of organizations (some from out-of-state to be sure), stopped a $700 million project–and the incredibly large profits the parent company could have made.
So what could Shintech have done differently? I believe they should have studied the real issues that concern Louisianians and addressed them directly:
- Pollution: They should have communicated that they would have a state-of-the-art pollution prevention program. I don’t mean just meeting the regulations of the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality, I’m talking about being leading-edge. I mean recognizing that the Louisiana petrochemical corridor has one of the densest assortments of industry in the nation (St. James Parish already has 14 plants), so it is important for our plants to be the nation’s best in pollution prevention.
- Education: The people of Convent expressed at the public hearings that they know that they don’t have the type of education required to work in the proposed plant. Why didn’t Shintech say, “We know we can’t hire you, but we want to hire your children. Therefore, we will insure that Convent has an excellent school system, and we will do everything possible to educate your children so that we will have a future local work force.” This is the perfect situation for an industry-supported charter school.
- Jobs: In the public hearings, the people of Convent also expressed that they knew there would be no jobs for them. One gentleman turned to the crowd and asked, “How many of you have family working in any of the 14 local chemical plants?” Very few hands were raised. He then said, “Stop talking about jobs, because I know that you are gong to buy your office supplies, equipment, and everything else from stores in Baton Rouge and New Orleans.”
All of these steps serve the needs of the plant and of the citizens. I can’t help but think that this three point approach–pollution control, education, and jobs–would have resulted in a different discussion and solution. Call me an eternal optimist, but I think that enlightened corporations will someday realize that they have social responsibilities to communities where they make their money. This is fair, and not a hand-out. It is fair to the unemployed, and it is fair to the presently employed who have been paying taxes.
Had Shintech spoken to the needs of the citizens in Convent, instead of to their original supporters, they might now be in Convent and not waging yet another battle in Plaquemines.
Do you know what would speak volumes about Shintech? Imagine if tomorrow they actually did something to improve the lifestyles of people in Convent, even though they won’t be located there, and that they did it simply to show that they care. Dare I predict a new paradigm?
Dr. Robert A. Thomas holds the Loyola Chair in Environmental Communications at Loyola University New Orleans. Readers may contact him at lucec@loyno.edu.
Business Without the Fossil Fix
Part I
by Charles Reith, Ph.D.
Cheap fossil energy is like a drug that weakens the resolve of industry to become efficient and sustainable.
Somehow we must change the rules to discourage this dangerous addiction and reward those enterprises that are
disciplined enough to succeed without perpetual petro-fixes.
The analogy is unpleasant, especially for those of us who are pro-business. But I am not using the metaphor to engage in self-righteous finger pointing. My purpose is to open a dialog on how best to understand and confront the seemingly overwhelming challenge of making industry sustainable.
I welcome a constructive dissection and rebuttal of my assertion, but the truth is: until we find ways to deliver value and create wealth without burning vast amounts of hydrocarbons, we’ll be digging an ever-deeper hole for ourselves and our progeny. It is time to face up to the problem TODAY.
But first, let’s recognize how incredibly helpful and important fossil energy has been in human history. Coal powered the industrial revolution, and oil fueled the subsequent expansion into today’s global, convenience-laden economy. We owe much of our progress in science, technology, culture, and social opportunity to the enduring boost provided by fossil energy. And we have now learned how to develop and use this energy quite cleanly, especially in the case of natural gas, which combusts to CO2 and water.
The problem is that we generally don’t practice what we have learned about producing clean fossil energy. Sure, in the US, Japan, and western Europe, we extract, transport, refine, and combust fuels in a relatively protective way, ensuring the health, welfare, and political loyalty of our voters.
But elsewhere in the world, fossil energy is developed with appalling damage to the environment and those who depend upon it. Go to Latin America, Africa, Indonesia, and the Middle East and you will see landscapes smeared with oozing oil and atmospheres dulled by sulfuric soot.
To compete in the world economy, developing nations feel compelled to deliver their resources as inexpensively as possible, which causes them to externalize the environmental costs of resource production onto their own people and local economies.
You and I in the US pay just over a dollar a gallon for gasoline at the service station. The rest of the price is paid by the Mexican farmer who can’t sell his damaged land, by the Arabian fisher whose catch is ever dwindling, or by the Nigerian teenager who struggles in school because of his asthma. America’s cheap gas comes with an immoral price tag.
The solution is actually quite simple: to paraphrase the famous economist Pigou, we must “correct maladjustments” in the price at which commodities are delivered to market. In the case of fossil energy, this means that coal, oil, and gas may continue to be available, but they must be produced, purchased, and used in such a way that the consumer pays to protect the environment.
For instance, the consumer needs to pay for blue-water drilling, double-hulled tanking, zero-flare refining, and carbon-offset combusting.
These environmentally protective approaches are possible, but generally viewed as “sub-economic,” except where oil has been developed under the highest environmental standards such as in Britain’s North Sea, California’s coast, or Alaska’s north slope.
In these cases, the economics of oil development have been influenced by the high expectations and aggressive negotiations of empowered environmentalists.
If the consumer pays the full cost of consumption-rather than externalizing part of the cost to those who lack power-then this is called “full cost accounting.”
If all the peoples in the world were empowered to protect their interests-to prevent their victimization by externalized costs-then all goods would be delivered to market “fully costed.” In the sustainable economy of the future, all goods will be fully costed.
This piece will be continued in the next issue of EnviroDecisions.
EnviroViews is an Op/Ed feature of EnviroDecisions. Readers are encouraged to submit, either original articles or works written in response to a featured article. Readers may e-mail works to lucec@loyno.edu.
Charles Reith provides management consulting through his firm Sustainable Systems. He also serves on the Board of ExTen, a Denver-based recycling company. He teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in Environmental Management at the AB Freeman School of Business at Tulane University.
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