We are pleased to support WSU's new Institute. I am excited that two oldies like us are set out to explore new concepts in sustainable design. WSU is a little older than Weyerhaeuser, but we have both passed our first century. We both owe our success to the land and because of that we have both operated using many of the concepts of sustainability.
Agriculture and silviculture demand a view of the world that is rooted in conservation. Both are non-starters without the earth's fundamental capacity to nurture and grow.
Today my subject is sustainability and my purpose is to explore the meaning of this relatively new word. I will discuss a multi-disciplined approach and tell you why I believe it is necessary. You will see that I believe that sustainability is an expression of the sum of the parts of the entire human endeavor.
This is the approach that you are employing within your institute--it's an approach in which early WSU leaders would take pride. Let me explain. Most of us are familiar with the most prominent landmark here on the Pullman campus: the Bryan Clock Tower. It's named after an early university president, Enoch A. Bryan. Bryan's influence shaped the early years of the university. He expanded the curriculum to include a strong liberal arts education. Whether majoring in literature or agricultural, students were required to take chemistry, US and European history, trigonometry, English literature and two foreign languages.
Bryan also added music and art to the curriculum, saying that empirical knowledge alone was inadequate. He regarded study of music and art as essential in the education of the human soul. Most likely, Bryan would consider similar broad-based study a pre-requisite for tackling global sustainability.
Interestingly, sustainability wasn't a concept or even a word in Bryan's time. Our language evolves. We recruit new words and give new meaning to old words to reflect new realities.
"Bling." Not heard of just yesterday. Fashion headlines today. How is it exactly that words happen?
To assemble a dictionary the editors first enlist readers. Each reader is assigned several words. Readers then scour the literature in their language and collect examples of usage that best illustrate each word's meaning. As a pattern of usage emerges meaning is deduced. In other words, a dictionary captures meaning given to words by human action and thought. Language is dynamic, living and breathing. It reflects changes in technology and society. Here's another example--suitable for early October consideration.
My 1966 edition of the Random House Dictionary does not include the word "atbat." The 1992 edition of the American Heritage Dictionary includes "atbat" with the following definition: "A player's official turn to bat, counted in figuring a batting average unless there is interference from the catcher. . ." "Atbat" will undoubtedly be one of the most frequently spoken terms for sports broadcasters over the next several weeks.
I conducted a similar review with the word sustainability. The first dictionary I consulted was the one I used through high school and college: Websters 1959. No mention of sustainability or sustainable--only of "sustain," as a verb. My assistant has a Websters 1990. In the thirty years between 1959 and 1990, a new adjective based on the word "sustain" had crept into the language: our new friend, "sustainable."
It is a forward-looking word, as in this example: Although Tiger Woods had stretches of impeccable form at this year's British Open, they weren't sustainable.
Finally by the year 2000, the adjective "sustainable" had spawned an even longer noun, "sustainability," which appeared in the American Heritage Dictionary. The word appeared without definition, which is what dictionary writers do when there is no commonly accepted meaning. This word with the skimpy resume is surely packing a lot of social and political weight.
Today many assert a meaning, in calls for action, aspiration or debate about the future. But there is not yet consistency or common context. Dictionary editors await consensus. Dictionaries lag, they do not lead.
At Weyerhaeuser, we are leading. We have sought sustainability for many years, although it is only recently we have used that term.
Not too many years ago you could see and smell our manufacturing operations from many miles away. Not so today. We operate more cleanly and more efficiently than ever before. This is an example of progress toward sustainability. We reduce our environmental footprint and increase our productivity. Science is often called on to inform company decisions. That is also the case with the current quest for a global framework for sustainable practices.
But is sustainability a purely scientific concept? Is it an economic concept? Is it an ecological concept? How should we factor in variables for future unknowns? When information seems inadequate, what course should we take? Science, economics, and ecology, all illuminate the past. Sustainability is an expectation for the future. How do these disciplines help us forecast what will be? Let's look a bit further at these complex relationships.
1564: the year of the birth of Galileo Galilei. You know the story of Galileo's experiment. He dropped different weight stones from the tower of Pisa. The result? The stones fell at the same rate, regardless of their weight. Galileo discovered a fundamental principal of gravity. Galileo did a lot of thinking before he dropped his stones. He puzzled out many alternative explanations for what he thought might happen.
This probing for understanding is how science works. We non-scientists remember just the great discoveries when the lab echos with "Eureka!"--but the scientists know that those moments of clarity are separated by long periods of argument and doubt. Often strongly held beliefs must be pushed aside. In many cases, what's originally accepted as fact ends up being fiction. I am reminded of flying horses.
For centuries, people thought that when a horse ran, all of its legs left the ground at the moment when the front legs reached forward, and the back legs kicked back. Look for this depiction in early 19th century paintings--easy to find on the web if you don't plan a visit to an art museum.
So real was this belief that viewers were shocked when slow motion film was invented and revealed that the horse has at least one hoof on the ground when its legs are extended. The moment the horse takes flight is when its legs come together underneath its body.
Said Albert Einstein: "No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong." Science is disciplined experimentation: pose an hypothesis and then affirm or discount it through experimentation. The method works best with isolated variables--such as falling stones and a focus on only one thing.
This, of course, takes time. And proof requires replication by other scientists. Taking even more time. And you can't always isolate variables, or replicate results.
Consider the challenge represented by our eco-systems and climate, where experimentation with isolated variables is simply not possible. Ecological relationships can appear chaotic, synergistic, opportunistic and random--all at the same time. Eco-system sustainability anticipates thoughtful action on many fronts with many variables and agents of change. Science will be necessary but not sufficient to the task. The late Harvard paleontologist Stephen J. Gould explains why.
He examines the relationship between science and the humanities which include art, literature, religion, and philosophy. Gould concludes that both hold a rightful place in seeking understanding. In a popular science essay in 1982 Gould wrote: "...nature contains no moral messages framed in human terms. Morality is a subject for philosophers, theologians, students of the humanities, indeed for all thinking people. The answers will not be read passively from nature; they do not, and cannot, arise from the data of science. The factual state of the world does not teach us how we, with our powers for good and evil, should alter or preserve it in the most ethical manner." In other words science explains what "is" and the humanities, what "ought" to be.
So let's turn to a discipline that bridges science and the humanities: let's turn to economics to try to understand sustainability. Economics is thought by some to be dismal and formulaic, always dispassionate and by others a clever capture of the human condition.
Economists like game theory. They look hopefully for models of what they call "rational bad behavior" that can predict how greed, anxiety, or irrational exuberance will influence human actions, production or consumption. But these models are far too limited to anticipate or predict future behavior. Just look at recent issues on Wall Street and in our credit markets and you'll realize that the economist's crystal ball is quite murky when it comes to predicting rational bad behavior or its cousin irrational exuberance.
Economic models are even more limited in informing the sustainability debate. Nobel prize winner Robert M. Solow, describes the difficulties of using economic theory to define sustainability. He focuses particularly on the economic principle that the present generation should not disproportionately employ the world's resources.
This view assumes that unchecked "bad" behavior will exhaust nature's supplies. Solow asserts that this concept of sustainability is an inappropriate application of economics. He shows that economic models measure only short-term dynamics in the marketplace. What economics can't do is predict what future generations will want or need, or the tools and technologies at their disposal.
You have probably heard it said that the Stone Age came to an end--but not because the world ran out of stones. To manage resources as though demand will be constant makes no sense. There are many famous examples of economists getting the future all wrong.
In 1798, British economist Thomas Malthus published his Essay on the Principle of Population. He projected that by early in the next century extreme poverty and famine would result from unchecked population growth. He had some pretty convincing economic models, but his predictions never came true. Nevertheless, he is still cited in literature about population growth. Malthus was wrong then, and those who cite him today are wrong, too.
As American economist Henry George observed: "Both the jayhawk and the man eat chickens; but the more jayhawks, the fewer chickens, while the more men, the more chickens." Put simply, Malthus failed to account for human ingenuity. Human discovery and invention are sustainable agents of change.
If we turn from economics to ecology to help understand sustainability, we learn that it might not just be people who are ingenious. Some ecologists wonder if plants use us just as much as we use them.
World renowned botanist David Mabberley says that human influence on crops like wheat, oats and barley is no different than the dispersal of seeds by the birds. The wheat presents desirable attributes and is subsequently propagated by man. Where is the dividing line between the species? In this view, I don't see one. I see instead that it is important to understand and embrace the dynamic inter-relationship in order to protect all.
Henry David Thoreau couldn't accept the dynamic embrace. He left Walden pond when he noticed the track he had worn on his daily walks. He had gone to nature to simply observe. His observations changed his beloved woods. He saw himself as a problem and decided to leave. People are not the only agents of change, plants and animals not only adapt to change they can and do cause it.
It is time for a new language in ecology and a new view. I celebrate those who view people as part of the solution. Successful societies increase their productivity by constantly discovering and inventing new ways to optimize both what can't be renewed, and what can.
In many instances, oil reserves are greater today than were originally expected, even after years of production because of new drilling technologies and improved subterranean mapping. Some of us are old enough to remember the 1980 sustainability wager between economist Julian Simon and biologist Paul Ehrlich.
Ehrlich was a pessimist. He predicted massive shortages in virtually all natural resources and asserted that whole countries would starve by the end of the 20th century. His book "The Population Bomb" spawned cultural hysteria, including the Charleton Heston movie "Soylent Green" about voluntary euthanasia and cannibalism.
Simon was an optimist. He possessed an unshakable confidence in the resilience of human beings. Simon believed that sustainability was not the result of hoarding or saving, but instead was the result of man's ability to discover, develop and adapt.
In their wager, Simon gave Ehrlich the opportunity to pick five metals with a combined worth of $1,000 dollars. If--after 10 years the metal prices increased that would indicate the metals had become more scarce and, therefore, more precious. If the price decreased, then the metals were more abundant and therefore less valuable. Ehrlich bet the price of each metal would go up. Simon, down. Ehrlich chose copper, chromium, nickel, tin and tungsten.
After 10 years the price of Erlich's basket of metals had decreased. Simon won--even without the benefit of and adjustment for inflation. Ehrlich lost and sent Simon a check for $576.07. Simon was vindicated. His great contribution to the sustainability dialog is that natural resources are just rocks and stones until well mixed with human intellect, which is itself an infinitely renewable resource.
At Weyerhaeuser, we've been harnessing the power of human ingenuity for more than 107 years. In North America, we harvest rationally and forest land acreage is actually growing. Yet misperceptions and lack of understanding persist. Let me drop a few stones from my tower.
How often have you heard, the exhortation "save a tree?" We see this measure touted in sustainability metrics. It seems intuitively right, but it is not. After all, we can't save individual trees they're not immortal. They will die and rot. They decompose, returning nutrients--and their stored carbon--to the earth and atmosphere.
We can't save a tree, but we can save a forest--a forest can last forever. A forest can be "saved" in two ways. It can be set aside from commercial use, foregoing economic value but serving other purposes such as recreation or refuge. The public may choose this forest use for public lands and will pay for its care through taxation. But 57% of our U.S. forest land is owned privately. There's a way to save private forest land, too. It is to ensure that the trees have economic value. If the trees have value, the landowner will retain the land for growing trees. Land and water will be protected and new trees planted as soon as possible.
If people do not use forest products, timberland values are diminished. If the highest and best use is not tree growing, the land will be developed for other purposes. The forest is not threatened by cutting down a tree. It is threatened by lost value in the marketplace.
Therefore, to save a forest one must grow, cut, use and regrow the trees. Through this cycle of growth and renewal we remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, save energy and improve the well being of people and the planet.
Managed forests themselves store a "pool" of carbon, preserve habitat and shelter a diversity of plant and animal species. In the United States this carbon pool is growing at the rate of 200 million metric tons of carbon per year, offsetting over 10% of US greenhouse gas emissions. A fact rarely discussed in the global warming debate.
Homebuilding, remodeling, and home improvements are collectively the largest single use of lumber and wood products, accounting for about two-thirds of domestic wood-product consumption. Lumber is the "right"--"green" choice for the sustainability-seeking consumer. It takes 16 percent less energy to produce a home framed with wood than with concrete or steel.
Approximately 45% of the carbon remains stored after a tree is manufactured into products. And about 10% is stored for more than 100 years, which is the emerging standard for tradable carbon credits. This pool of carbon storage is growing at the rate of over 50 million metric tons of carbon per year.
Other wood-based products show great potential for greening the world by replacing petroleum-based products for clothing, absorbents, and even fuel. Think about how this empowers consumers: by choosing wood products, they can build a personal bank of stored carbon. Your personal storage capacity is unlimited, and it is all in addition to the stored carbon we tree growers hold in our sustainably managed forests.
The International Panel on Climate Change is the scientific body that compiles the scientific literature on climate change science, mitigation, and adaptation. The IPCC advocates wood. Listen to their report on climate change strategy: "In the long term, a sustainable forest management strategy aimed at maintaining or increasing forest carbon stocks, while producing an annual sustained yield of timber, fiber, or energy from forest, will generate the largest sustained mitigation benefit"
"Cut a tree and save the planet"--doesn't have the same emotional ring as "spare a tree and save the planet," but it is true and environmentally sound. Sustainability is a new word--still used in so many ways as to defy clear definition.
So what is it, really? It is at least the intersection of all the disciplines of human endeavor. Sustainability is about the potential of the human mind to solve important problems for people and the planet. You will need to follow Enoch Bryan's curriculum to understand this concept. You will need to believe in your own ability to be both rational and passionate. You will need to call on everything you know.
As a final thought, I encourage your optimism that the intersection of different disciplines is not a collision. I encourage you to consider the close association between probability theory, double entry bookkeeping and art. All three are dependent on the concept of proportionality which was a revolutionary mathematical breakthrough in the 15th century.
Leonardo da Vinci studied with the bookkeeper Luca Pacioli, who first applied the mathematics of proportion to counting inventory. Before Pacioli, merchandizing was unchanged for thousands of years. Items coming in and going out were counted and recorded separately. Pacioli saw the opportunity to enrich his employers by counting in context--one bale in for one ducat out. The pile of inventory should be proportional to the original pile of ducats.
This is the basis for the system of double-entry bookkeeping that we use today. Pacioli tutored da Vinci in the emerging mathematical solutions to proportionality.
Da Vinci used the new math to gain his mastery of perspective. It is illustrated superbly by his famous "Last Supper." Perhaps you had not previously noticed that you can see the feet under the table and the meal upon the table. Da Vinci allows the viewer the seemingly impossible opportunity to look up through the basketball net while at the same time looking down at the rim. Such art proves that rationality need not be tedious, and that creativity allows even the most logical minds to soar.
Sustainability is within our grasp. There are answers all around us. There are flying horses, too. It is up to us to drop stones from our towers to learn the difference.
The forest products industry has a proud story to tell. To understand the power of our natural resource--just look at the weeds sprouting in an open field. Photosynthesis yields new green growth at a rate that you can almost see in good growing weather. Trees and human ingenuity: both are remarkable, infinitely renewable resources. We can release the potential in both--with products we have today, and products we have not even imagined.
In this, we begin to understand the definition of sustainability. Ultimately, it is inextricably tied to all human endeavor. It is about our ability to adapt in ingenious ways to protect the world around us without getting in the way of progress. It is about tapping into the power of markets to fuel growth and prosperity while finding better ways to meet our needs. It is about our willingness to confront new truths.
WSU's Center for Sustainable Design plays a role in contributing to a high quality of life for humans using the robust natural resources of our planet. Weyerhaeuser is proud to contribute to the Institute. We look forward to its success.
Thank you for inviting us here.
