In 2010 I published a book on Sustainable Investment entitled “Practical Greening”. In the preface I wrote:
“We are living in a unique time, facing unimagined challenges: global economic crisis, peak oil, climate change, social and geopolitical shifts. And these are the high-level concerns. At the ground level we are dealing with aging infrastructure, an inadequate energy grid, primary fuel sources in foreign hands, diminishing croplands, a newly regulated playing field and unemployment reaching double digits in some cities. Like a ‘perfect storm’, few could have imagined these events arising in concert. But they have - complexity is increasing, changing the world as we’ve known it.
We need the capacity to evolve, to innovate, be agile and flexible and ultimately, resilient. We need to engage and lead. The imperatives of climate change and resource scarcity will change the way we do business. “
For all extensive purposes, the fundamentals have not changed much. We are still facing epic challenges, and for most part - we haven’t done much - but, that does seem to be changing. Finally.
To quote Jim Collins - “We’re heading into a world characterized by big events, big forces, massive storms. We’re going to be vulnerable little specks on on the mountain when when the storm hits out of nowhere.” [apropos to the 2021 Texas energy grid crisis]. “And if we’re not prepared, we’re going to die up there. Or we’re going to be in real serious trouble.”
Over the next few weeks I’ll begin to unpack what’s still the same (climate risk - on steroids now), what has changed - a pandemic, awareness around racial inequities and the importance of diversity, equity and inclusion, increasing interest in strategies that address climate risk, + a new administration which has named Climate Risk, Racial Justice, Economic Recovery and the Covid Pandemic as their top priorities.