perspectives

Written to the head of GreenTV:

In trying to expand: Maybe you could provide clips/interviews exploring (truly exploring) the perspectives on LEED and other tools for greening up.

What I mean, basically: Quite often the lack of respect and a high level of judgmental behavior is based on a perspective issue and one party doesn’t understand or is truly not aware of that difference in point of view. Kind of like the blind men and the elephant story, where each blind man describes the elephant in totally different terms based on their personal experience. One says the elephant is like a broom (tail), one says a wall (side), one says a spear (tusk), etc. Each is absolutely correct from his own perspective, but in no way understands the whole. And none of them can work together (for sure) on anything to do with that highly disparate elephant(s).

What if, for example, a question were posed in a series of preferably tied-together clips (edited together?) about the cost of LEED? Talking to a government incentive giver, an owner, a contractor trying to shoe-horn LEED in late in the game, a novice Architect who has never used LEED on-line, a product vendor, a GBCI reviewer, a green globes board member…whatever.

People would begin to see that it is HOW YOU USE the tool that is important, and the costs of the tool that truly are “separate” from the design and construction process are what should be discussed when complaining about the “high cost of LEED” (qualifier, I don’t think LEED costs [use of system and even properly integrated sustainable goals]are excessive in any way). Then we could understand what these costs really are, perhaps begin to grasp if they are excessive or not, and then suggest actual approaches to change if needed. In the course of this exploration, all perspectives would be engaged and many people would come to realize the solidarity of our desire for improvement, and our work on improving.

Another topic might be product transparency – showcasing 1) proprietary concerns in product creation and the aggressive market for new goods out there 2) health concerns in the industry, 3) risk avoidance in dealing with chemicals on lists of concern, 3) materials management concerns at the end of the pipe, 4) cost concerns – what does transparency cost and what do less toxic ingredients cost?

Another topic could be the market of local – discussing 1) local economic strength, 2) burden to company striving to reach a broader market (should a craft distillery ship to a liquor store 2,000 miles away?) 3) how does this affect trade agreements state to state? 4) what is the decider between local in a less efficient or healthy way (toxic product made locally) and a clean product manufactured far away?

Basically in every issue there are perspectives.

Our issue, in the green building world, is that we know we are “right” and we seek to share that broadly and to convince people, but our real strength would come in understanding the other perspectives and then figuring out how green building can be supportive there as well. In most cases, I bet there is a way – that’s why true sustainability is win/win/win.

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