Creating A City or Region's Sustainable Economic Development Strategy? Start with These Assumptions

A set of seven market assumptions can assist cities/regions in understanding the Sustainability Revolution, and to formulate the sustainable economic development strategies they need to embrace economic opportunities offered by building a sustainable economy.

1. The goals of improved environmental performance and energy independence (climate mitigation; climate adaptation; resource/energy efficiency; and alternative energy development) are driving the development of new products, services, companies, and markets that will outperform their non-green counterparts over the long run.
2. Many of the specific climate-change mitigation strategies (such as clean renewable distributed energy and large-scale building energy-efficiency retrofits) have natural economic development potential for stimulating new businesses and jobs.
3. Environmental gains must generate tangible economic benefits to be successful. Sustainability solutions that combine improved environmental performance and economic benefits are the key to successful climate-change mitigation/adaptation strategies.  If the benefits of reduced greenhouse gas (GHG) production are externalized, distant, and delayed, the motivation to make voluntary large scale reductions will eventually dissipate. Goals for reducing GHG emissions need to be translated into self-reinforcing market dynamics.
4. Leadership on climate change and regional/global economic competitiveness can reinforce each other rather than cancel each other out.  Environmental performance can drive economic prosperity that can be equitable for different groups and places.
5. As energy and natural resource efficiency become increasingly important competitive advantages in regional and global economies, urban sustainability strategies can be integrated with economic development and community development strategies to leverage the competitive advantage of urban density.
6. Economic benefits can be realized in two basic ways: (1) Increased participation in the emerging sustainable economy can generate new enterprises, new jobs, and new wealth. (2) The hidden advantages of “urban form” can create significant reductions in the cost of living and the cost of doing business through the integration of community design, energy-efficient buildings, and mobility/transit systems.
7. A “sustainable economic development” strategy can use many of the same best practices as other kinds of economic development strategies--it is just focused on different kinds of technologies, products, processes, companies, markets, and career pathways.