Green economy: does it include you? For many local governments, the answer is yes. Investments in green economic growth have paid off for many cities, counties, and towns across the country.
The green economy presents significant growth opportunities for local governments. While all industries have been hit by the recession, investments in green technology, including federal and state funding, have fared better than conventional sectors. And between 1998 and 2007, green jobs grew at a faster rate than overall job growth.
A green economy represents the confluence of economic development, workforce development, and environmental stewardship. Green economic practices are unique in that they encourage city and county development and workforce departments to account for the environmental impacts of the their decision-making, while environmental departments are encouraged to account for the way their policies affect economic growth and job creation. A green economy is mutually beneficial to both economic prosperity and environmentalism.
Here are five strategies that local governments of any size can implement for growing a green economy:
Green Economic Development
Traditional economic development focuses on increasing production of goods and services. Production and exportation are vital for generating local income. Consequently, building export bases dominates much of traditional economic development strategies. In a green economy, traditional economic development strategies are adapted to build business that improves environmental outcomes.
Resource Efficiency and Green Purchasing
In addition to green economic development strategies that increase production and supply, there are additional, often more effective, methods for building green local economies. Resource efficiency and green purchasing are two broad strategies for addressing the consumption-side of the green economy—harnessing community buying power and demand for energy, water, and green products.
Simply by more efficiently utilizing resources, local governments can:
- Reduce the cost of running local government
- Reduce the cost of doing business for existing green businesses
- Lower barriers of entry for new green businesses
- Reduce utility costs for homeowners, improving community quality of life, and attracting a stronger workforce
- Reduce the negative impacts on the environment caused by resource use.
Local Production and Utilization
Producing and consuming locally builds community wealth, increases regional self-reliance and economic security, and eliminates the environmental impacts associated with transporting goods over long distances. Due to the multiplier effect, the positive impacts of local expenditures ripple throughout entire local economies. The local economic chain works something like this:
- Manufacturers create jobs by producing goods in a community.
- On-site jobs and income are created by distributing and installing the goods.
- Additional jobs and economic activity are created by supplying goods and services to people in the primary green activity.
More specifically, local manufacturing can produce high-quality jobs and export products. Locally-sourced food can provide better quality food at a lower cost to communities. Locally-sourced renewable energy can reduce the cost of living for local residents, the cost of doing business for businesses, and create security in the energy supply.
Waste Stream Management
By reducing the costs and negative externalities associated with waste disposal, local governments are creating jobs and reducing the costs of doing business. Many local governments have adopted aggressive solid waste management programs. Hawaii County, for example, has declared its intention to develop a zero waste future. Achieving this goal will require innovative technologies to reduce the waste stream, increase recycling rates, and transform waste to energy without relying on incineration.
Green Infrastructure
Land use decisions significantly impact resource use, environmental quality, and economic activity. As a result, planning and zoning authority provides local governments with powerful tools for influencing the green economy. By encouraging smart, coherent land use decisions, local governments can increase the quality of life of local residents and improve the local business environment.
This article was excerpted from a recent issue brief, Growing a Green Local Economy: County Strategies for Economic, Workforce, and Environmental Innovation, written and published by the National Association of Counties (NACo).
FAQs
A green economy is a type of economy that reduces environmental risks and ecological dangers. Its core principle is that it encourages sustainable development without degrading the environment.
What is the green growth in the economy? ›
Green growth seeks to spur investment and innovation in ways that give rise to new, more sustainable sources of economic activity and jobs.
How can we achieve a green economy? ›
Resource Efficiency and Green Purchasing
- Reduce the cost of running local government.
- Reduce the cost of doing business for existing green businesses.
- Lower barriers of entry for new green businesses.
- Reduce utility costs for homeowners, improving community quality of life, and attracting a stronger workforce.
In a green economy, growth in employment and income are driven by public and private investment into such economic activities, infrastructure and assets that allow reduced carbon emissions and pollution, enhanced energy and resource efficiency, and prevention of the loss of biodiversity and ecosystem services.
What are examples of green economy? ›
Low-carbon development: the green economy is based on the use of renewable energy sources - like solar, wind, hydroelectric and hydrogen - that generate little or no amounts of CO₂ emissions.
What are the disadvantages of a green economy? ›
Disadvantages. You might wonder how transitioning to a green economy can threaten certain jobs. A quick answer to this is that it creates danger in the jobs related to fossil fuels and non-renewable sectors.
What does green economy focus on? ›
They focus on economic sectors like forestry, farming, mining or fishing, among others; concentrate on environmental factors like protecting water sources and biodiversity, or reducing greenhouse gas emissions; support social protections and workers' rights; and home in on specific parts of production processes.
What is the primary aim of a green economy? ›
The green economy is geared to support sustainable consumption and production. An inclusive green economy is low-carbon, resource-conserving, diverse and circular. It embraces new models of economic development that address the challenge of creating prosperity within planetary boundaries.
Is going green good for the economy? ›
Implementing green practices in the workplace can have a positive impact on both the environment and the bottom line of a business. The economic benefits of going green, such as improved profitability, productivity, and reputation, are too significant for businesses to ignore.
Is it possible to have a green economy? ›
Absolute decoupling – i.e. increasing gross domestic product (GDP) with decreasing environmental damage – has hardly ever been observed empirically, and if so, then only in clearly limited periods of time. This is why some researchers doubt whether "green growth" is even possible in the long term.
keeping in mind the three pillars of sustainability, the social, the economic and the environmental, defines a 'green economy' as based on six main sectors: renewable energy, green buildings, clean transportation, water management, waste management and land management.
What are the 5 pillars of the economy? ›
Presents the major results of a research project identifying the 5 major areas for reform necessary to sustained growth and poverty alleviation – macroeconomic stability; investments; climate; governance, social reforms; environmental management.
What is a green growth strategy? ›
Green Growth means fostering economic growth and development, while ensuring that natural assets continue to provide the resources and environmental services on which our well-being relies.
What are the disadvantages of going green? ›
Initial costs can be high
Although going green is not a new concept, much of the technology associated with it is fairly new and certainly more expensive than conventional technology. This means that steps to become more environmentally friendly can be costly initially. Take installing solar power for example.
What are the challenges of a green economy? ›
The first challenge is the conventional economic paradigm. Some other challenges are political economy, domestic policy space, and commitment. However, there are strategies that can overcome all four. The conventional paradigm can be overcome by the presence of the state when the economy is not functioning properly.
What is green economy also known as? ›
Also known as sustainability standards, these standards are special rules that guarantee the products bought do not hurt the environment and the people that make them. The number of these standards has grown recently and they can now help build a new, greener economy.
What is the primary goal of a green economy? ›
The green economy is geared to support sustainable consumption and production. An inclusive green economy is low-carbon, resource-conserving, diverse and circular. It embraces new models of economic development that address the challenge of creating prosperity within planetary boundaries.
What is the answer to the green GDP? ›
Green GDP is calculated by subtracting net natural capital consumption from the standard GDP. This includes resource depletion, environmental degradation and protective environmental initiatives.
What is the green economy one that results? ›
[A] green economy [is] one that results in improved human well-being and social equity, while significantly reducing environmental risks and ecological scarcities.
