"Recession’s Green Lining"
Written by Amy Meyer | Photos by Andriy Semenyuk



Layoffs, salary cuts and lost investments are vaporizing cash from wallets around the country. Just look around town to notice car dealerships’ motionless lots, grocery carts with lighter loads and thermostat dials set low despite the cold. Keep looking and you might notice smaller garbage cans and bigger recycling bins, hinting at a more sustainable future for consumers.

The economic downturn is causing turmoil in the financial world and putting a damper on consumer spending. But in the midst of a recession, Americans are making daily decisions to save their greenbacks – and it just might be the green thing to do.

For environmentalists concerned with overconsumption, the recession is a blessing in disguise. Decreased consumption in homes and businesses may mean less packaging and production waste, and therefore less waste in landfills, according to Finance Markets, an independent online publication.

Garbage is a good indicator that Bellingham residents are finding ways to cut back on unnecessary spending and waste. According to Rodd Pemble of Sanitary Service Company, Whatcom County has seen a decrease in the amount of garbage compared to last year’s figures, while residential recycling has increased.

Some renters and homeowners have been making attempts to cut back on unnecessary spending and are consuming more cautiously.

"I’ve tried to start making decisions that will save me money each week," said Elise Nelson, a senior at Western Washington University. "I drive less. When it’s cold, I keep the heat off and put a sweatshirt on."

According to a Gallup Poll, retail sales dropped 1.2 percent in September, the biggest drop in three years. Consumers have also said they will be more conservative in their holiday spending, according to the polling organization. It may be a bad sign for the economy, but responsible consumption could be just what the doctor ordered for a threatened environment.

According to the Whatcom Transit Authority (WTA), driving less is also an increasingly common theme. Fuel prices and crunched budgets have encouraged increased use of public transportation, resulting in WTA ridership soaring to its highest level ever. According to Business Week, auto sales have slumped for the third year in a row. The only vehicles with strong sales, they reported, are small, fuel-efficient models that save people money and are better for the environment.

Beyond using public transportation, Phyllis Shacter, a retired Bellingham resident, said she has cut back her household spending with several techniques. Not only does she create her own environmentally-friendly cleaning products out of household staples such as vinegar and vegetable oil, Shacter also hung insulated drapes and closed off her upstairs air vents in order to save on her energy bills.

"Little things begin to make a difference," Shacter said. "We cut way back on spending, and our quality of life didn’t decrease. What we valued—health, relationships, being in nature—that didn’t change."

Bellingham City Council member Jack Weiss believes that the economic downturn will force businesses to be more efficient. He said he foresees less wasteful packaging, more telecommuting, less shipping, less business travel and more value placed on materials and resources used in business.

Sustainable Connections, a Bellingham non-profit organization, is working towards environmentally-friendly business practices by illustrating the financial savings of going green. Their 2008 Towards Zero Waste campaign unites locally owned and independent businesses to reduce waste and save money doing so.

April Claxton, Sustainable Connections’ office manager and volunteer coordinator, said construction-related companies are receiving some of the biggest savings after implementing environmentally-friendly practices into their business models.

According to their Sustainable Connections’ Towards Zero Waste profile, Louws Truss, Inc., a roof truss and manufactured wall panel provider, was able to eliminate 90 percent of their waste, as well as most of their waste removal costs, after working with Sustainable Connections. By learning to reuse and even sell scrap lumber that was previously being thrown away, the company now profits from recycling and selling the scraps instead of paying to have them sent to a landfill.

Rick Dubrow, president of A-1 Builders in Bellingham, said he is optimistic about his building and remodeling business this year, despite the recession. Dubrow’s building business promotes the use of minimal and high-quality building materials since many of his clients are looking for efficiency and long-term savings. And Dubrow said the sustainable construction techniques he uses that actually cost less than traditional building practices.

"Then you can take that money you saved and put it towards better products," he said. "Maybe you have better windows, better doors, better insulation and a more efficient heat plan. You can save on your heating, and you can save the planet."

At Brigid Collins, a local non-profit family support center, staff brainstormed office techniques that were both cost- and resource-saving. Executive director Byron Manering said he is promoting a "lean and green" image. He said he and his staff have started maximizing the supplies they already use, rather than purchasing wasteful duplicates. They started small, turning off lights and rethinking individually printed meeting agendas, but Manering said the savings—financial and environmental—are worth the extra thought.

"The more we embody honoring the resources we have, the more we can share that with our clients," he said.

But despite environmental gains made by financially-conscious consumers, the recession is weighing on the progress of the green movement. In a recession, consumers have an increased tendency to overlook environmentally-friendly products and services because of cost. However, the lower price of conventional products does not reflect their social externalities – costs that aren’t paid directly by the consumer, such as pollution from manufacturing, said Dan Hagen, an environmental economics professor at Western Washington University.

"When someone’s budget is squeezed, they ignore savings to society as a whole," Hagen said. "And they discount too heavily their future private savings, which leads to consumers buying products that are not very green."

The conversation about responsible consumption will continue with or without a recession, and perhaps these environmentally-friendly, cost-saving habits will stick. If these trends continue, saving money may have a hand in saving the planet.

"If people do it right," Weiss said, "they have the ability to really work on changing their whole lives."

Amy Meyer studies environmental education. This is her first published piece.