It’s time to wake up 👀
The world of sustainability and resilience is severely misunderstood in today's politically charged world.
You probably know I’m passionate about impact. I’m also very passionate about simplifying and bringing attention to misunderstandings within the space. Resilience is one of these.
The value of resiliency can be hard to see, but it’s measurable if you pay attention.
Whether it’s your investments or your personal property, the decisions of others and the lack of action by many are creating a storm that will increase costs and reduce your wallet. No person and no company is immune, but they can prepare, protect and minimize.
Most people will be impacted by this because of misinformation, lack of awareness and the belief that someone else is going to fix it.
Resiliency isn’t about being green, It’s about being smart
The real truth
Proof hidden in plain sight
It doesn’t affect me
The Real Truth
It really doesn’t matter what your opinion of climate change is. The world is changing and you need to be aware of what is really happening.
America is 248 years old and much of what we have infrastructure wise in our country, while not that old is by design standards old. What do I mean?
Much of the U.S. electric grid was built in the 1960s and 1970s. While we’ve had improvements with automation and emerging technologies, it is struggling to meet our modern electricity needs. 70% of transmission lines are over 25 years old and approaching the end of their typical 50–80-year lifecycle.
FACT: Back in the 1970’s and 1980’s after suffering from the oil embargo, Denmark set out to minimize the impact of this happening again. They built a series of micro-grids using wind, solar and wood pellet power plants. The result, independence and resiliency.
The costs of not doing something ends up at the end user. Whether you are a building owner, a consumer or all of the above, you pay the price for the under preparation of others.
Proof hidden in plain sight
When our system is impacted, we are ALL impacted and that impact is on the costs of utilities, groceries to clothes and everything in between.
Here are a few examples of how this impacts you example.
I own an Assisted Living Facility in Hollywood, FL and we recently received a letter from the local utility company that we will have a surcharge added to our bill to pay for the damage to their systems caused by the past years hurricanes, The result, a 10% increase in our bills. What happened to their insurance?
If you live in CA you might have had your power shut off by the utility company PG&E to avoid forest fires. We of course don’t want forest fires, but honestly turning off power is the solution? NO, it is not, but poor oversight and financial instability means this is where we are and we will stay in this cycle until something is done.
It doesn’t affect me
You might be thinking, I don’t live in those states so it doesn’t impact me, but this is where too many get it wrong.
We are a country of interstate function. Power plants often service more than one state, our roads for trucking, our factories for production and our ports for importing/exporting products are all connected.
So if you buy something coming from Florida or a Florida port the odds are it will be more expensive because the businesses there will have higher expenses.
On top of all of this, the Biden Administration just approved the largest utility loan ever for PG&E to help them “upgrade” their systems. Don;t be fooled, these upgrades are not for nextgen tech, many of it is for basic repairs and upkeep.
What Can Be Done?
A lot of people will read this and say it is what it is. In fact, many political figures and business owners are saying just that .
Why, because it’s easy to pass costs on to you the consumer.
But what if you could minimize these impacts? That question, and the action taken from it, is Resiliency.
My simple solution and my advice is be aware and understand. If we all see what is happening and organize around it we can create a larger collective of change and eliminate the extremes on both sides of the aisle that stagnates everything.
What do you think? Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments.
Until next time
Jon
You have expressed my thoughts exactly. We are all connected, and what affects those in Florida concerns those in Alaska.