The mirage of green jobs and green technologies blinds us to the reality, the need to attack waste and loss in what we do now, in the existing built environment and within the change capabilities of existing cultures.
I remember attending an ARUP presentation on Dongtan around three years ago and the most suprising fact that came out was that the development would have to be protected from rising sea level at great resource intensity.
As with all evolution, those cultures resistant to change will die and be replaced by others that can.
dd
China’s Grand Plans for Eco-Cities Now Lie Abandoned
……………………..But there’s another side of the story. The most highly publicized eco-cities, including Dongtan and Huangbaiyu, drew upon expertise from some of the most vaunted international architectural and design firms. The vision for an eco-city on the outskirts of Shanghai was first hatched by the international consulting firm McKinsey & Company. The well-regarded UK-based design, engineering, planning, and business consulting firm, Arup, designed what its Web site describes as the “master plan” for Dongtan. In 2005, British Prime Minister Tony Blair even hailed collaboration on Dongtan as a sign of strong U.K.-China relations.
And William McDonough — a U.S. architect, author of Cradle to Cradle, and a celebrated figure in the American green architecture movement — worked on the design of Huangbaiyu, as well as “conceptual plans” for other eco-projects across China…………….
See full article at http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2138
see also
Keeping Ahead of the Oil Curve 