New Enlightenment

Summary

After installing regulations on the use of all resources and the outputs of all harmful substances, resources continued to decrease and the environment continued to deteriorate. Initially, it was easy to reduce harmful pollutants and reduce the use of some resources. However, as time progressed it became more difficult to reduce green house gasses and further limit the use of resources. The original reductions had consumed all of the low hanging fruit. The regulations needed to maintain sustainable levels became impossible to enforce. The inevitable collapse of the environment or loss of resources had only been delayed by market regulation. Long term-orientated people foresaw this collapse and changed from being less bad to being good. This means changing from reducing CO2 to producing something else that was not harmful, like water. This is cradle to cradle thinking.

Description

2010

The world faced serious threat from global warming, which also had negative effects on the ecosystems and biodiversity. Natural resources were reaching or had already passed the peak and became more and more scarce. The world had begun to move on from the era of high resource prices. Growth in population and consumption per person through the past fifty years put severe demands on the supply of commodities such as oil and food. Many people and countries were already aware of the situation and ready to resolve the problems through global cooperation instead of former individual and less effective efforts.

The leaders of governments with the largest economies meet and acknowledge that the climate is changing due to human influence. They set more stringent regulations on Carbon Dioxide production that included more industries and more countries. Unfortunately, the number of storms, sea levels, and the temperature continue to increase during the 2010’s. People move away from regions where storms are a constant threat, like Southern United States and Southeast Asia. The insurance prices are too high and they are tired of rebuilding after every storm or worrying about when the next one will hit. Droughts in other areas like Western North America and Australia begin to be unbearable. People move from dry areas to more stable environments. These conditions create massive movements of people. These movements cause businesses to collapse and local governments to miss budgets in the areas that people move from. Businesses prosper while local resources and governmetns are strained in the areas where people move to. Also during this period, resources and species begin to disappear, most notably blue fin tuna and the polar bear.

Watching these resources disappear wakes up several long-term thinking countries like China, Japan, and Europe. They begin to meet to review their regulations and agree to lower their requirements even more. They also agree to set market regulations like the cap and trade system for Carbon Dioxide. These market regulations bring other short-term thinking countries into the discussions. Short-term thinking countries use the size of their economies to weaken the original meaning of the new regulations and the new trading system.

2020

Unfortunately, the result of these weakened agreements is that nothing changes. The number of storms, temperature, and sea levels continue to rise. The movement of people away from undesirable areas multiply and resources dwindle. The long-term oriented people realize that the collapse of the environment is still inevitable with market regulation. They make a conscious change from reducing pollution to not polluting at all, this is cradle-to-cradle thinking. Instead of burning less fossil fuels that produce Carbon Dioxide, they don’t use any fossil fuels. Instead of eating less over-fished species, they eat none. This is not easy to do alone. The increase in people wanting this lifestyle starts several social networks that share information about which products contain pollutants or limited resources. These social networks start to lobby both businesses and governments to include an easy to read symbol system that simply shows whether the product is sustainable or not.

Some companies realize the demand for cradle-to-cradle products and come up with their own labels. The first companies in each industry to set their own standards for non-pollution have the best chances to set the standards for their industry. These first movers lobby the government to spread their standards across their industry. The government follow with cradle-to-cradle regulation of all industries. Companies that do not follow the cradle-to-cradle trend fall behind or collapse.

Long-term thinking nations make cradle-to-cradle regulations across their entire nations while short-term thinking nations leave cradle-to-cradle thinking to grow in its localized industries or regions.

2030

The deterioration of the environment slows but does not stop. There is a continual battle between the environment. Even when there is a gradual awakening of consumers to cradle-to-cradle living, there will still be a large part of the population that will want to continue to live as they once did before. The largest part of the population that will oppose the cradle-to-cradle movement will be the Americans with their high consumption lifestyle. The largest segment of the population that will push for the largest change are the Chinese with their high long-term orientation and collective movement.

The world temperature, storms, and sea level growth became close to flat. People shared an attitude of acting together in order to prevent a further drive towards ‘runaway’ climate change. Resources are consumed more rapidly by the short-term thinking nations for a short period due to low prices caused by the complete drop off in demand from long-term thinking nations. Local movements within the short-term thinking nations push them towards the cradle-to-cradle lifestyle. Energy consumption dropped off considerably. Energy came from a variety of sources locally from renewable resources with no emissions.

Since the climate change effect is mitigated and the world’s efforts of building water projects and pollution management to preserve available freshwater, the total freshwater supply increases. The rainforest is able to be saved from massive felling. Production and consumption of key wood products and wood energy are diverted to trees which are planted specifically for commercial purposes.

China, Japan, and Europe continue to push for global cooperation for cradle-to-cradle living. In the United States and India, local and regional regulations are aligned with national and international regulations.

Common Characteristics

Environment: There are an increasing number of violent storms and temperatures and sea levels are rising due to green house gas emissions.
Values: The difference between long and short term orientation will be the difference in success and failure.
Resources: Resources such as oil, tuna, and polar bears will run out within 44 years.

Key Uncertainties

The key uncertainty in this scenario is whether or not the habits of China, Japan, and Europe can influence the habits of heavy consumers and polluters like the United States. Will China move quickly enough away from its market driven economy to a cradle-to-cradle driven lifestyle? Will they put the environment as a higher priority than their people?