4 R's Aren't Enough

Cradle to Cradle deals with many of the issues we have talked about this semester. They cover the industrial revolution, our flawed production system (cradle to grave), over use of resources and sustainability. Of all the things the book brought up I thought that their understanding of "eco-effectiveness" was the most profound.

Instead of arguing for eco-efficacy Cradle to Cradle argues for a complete change in our production system. Macdonough shows that simply making products more efficient is kind of like a band-aid. Just like recycling is an aspirin. The book clarifies these ideas in the term eco-effectiveness. The authors right on pg 76, "Our concept of eco-effectiveness means working on the right things - on the right products and services and systems - instead of making the wrong things less bad. Once you are doing the right things, then doing them 'right,' with the help of efficiency among other tools, makes perfect sense." I had never thought about something like this before.

I mean I knew that as a society we would have to change our lives to stop the environmental degradation. But while I knew this, I imagined a world where we had the majority of the same products and services we do now. I imagined that we would have efficient and systemic mass transit systems. I imagined closed loop production. But during all of this I never thought that we might have to strop producing certain products and services to save the environment. Eco-effectiveness brought my mind one more step further.