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1-Page Summary of Natural Capitalism
Overview
“Natural Capitalism” is a book written by Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins and L. Hunter Lovins that outlines the principals of natural capitalism, which is an ethos where the resources of the natural world are as highly valued as financial resources have been in previous human history. The first chapter describes how unsustainable our current industrial practices are and suggests ways to make them more environmentally friendly. One strategy involves making cars run on clean energy sources such as solar power; another suggests redesigning cities so that they’re safer for pedestrians.
The authors state that industry should be modeled after nature, which means it should not waste anything and reuse everything. It would mean eliminating unnecessary materials from factories before goods are produced, as well as reducing the amount of material used in buildings by working together with plumbers, electricians and architects to eliminate waste.
The authors also explain how the simplicity of these systems will eliminate waste and cost. The example given is carbon fiber cars, which are made from a material that’s stronger and lighter than steel. This eliminates the need for a heavy drive train because the body itself can support all the weight. Another great example is service-based businesses vs buying appliances outright to provide those services themselves, as well as making them more efficient so they don’t have to buy new appliances every year just to keep up with demand.
The authors argue that the best way to protect our planet is by protecting nature. It’s important for businesses and livelihoods to protect the environment because it provides everything that makes life good. The book explains how we can follow nature’s example of waste-free processes and produce resources efficiently, too. The book also describes a delicate food supply chain in which corporations manipulate whole species of plants, which destroys them instead. Therefore, allowing nature to function as unaltered as possible is the only way we will be sure it continues to survive on Earth.
The climate is another of the systems that must be protected from human influences. Fossil fuel burning and other activities have an effect on the balance of greenhouse gasses, so we need to stop releasing them into the atmosphere. Government has a responsibility in this area to subsidize beneficial practices for the environment and penalize harmful ones, so that people will factor environmental costs into their decisions about what they do.
The last two chapters give examples of how these principals can be applied. The authors also describe the current culture and how to change it so that we can see all sides of this issue.
Section 0 Summary (The Next Industrial Revolution)
This book is based on two of the most influential books in business and economics: “Factor Four” and “The Ecology of Commerce”. The author lays out four strategies that will lead to a green revolution. He describes how we can achieve clean industry, universal high standards of living, and an economy where welfare gives way to family-wage jobs.
Modern industry is depleting natural resources at an alarming rate. This will lead to a loss of the natural capital that makes industry and life possible. The authors propose a strategy for dealing with this problem, which requires four kinds of capital: human capital (intelligence, creativity, labor), financial capital (investment), manufactured capital (factories, infrastructure), and the natural capital of living ecosystems and resources. Industry has never had to factor in its cost to the ecosystem or worry about its waste before because it’s always been able to use unlimited amounts of free natural resources without any consequences. However, simply assigning monetary value to these resources won’t solve this problem; we need some other way besides just assigning numbers so that people can understand what they’re doing when they take something from nature without thinking about how much money it costs them or how long it took nature to make those things in the first place.
