Rhetorical Analysis Of Forget Shorter Showers By Derrick Jensen

Engineering a Sustainable World: What Does It Take to Come Out on Top?
The modern lifestyle, full of one time use items and pollution generating machines, is harming our environment, and, without a plan, the death of our planet is certain. Environmentalist and author, Derrick Jensen uses a comparison of possible outcomes to persuade his readers to take action that would help stop climate change; political resistance is his preferred and recommended course of action for his audience. Throughout his essay, “Forget Shorter Showers”, Jensen makes clear his desire to reduce or even reverse the effects industrialization (476-478). He advocates an approach where society makes changes to industry and to government over the current methods of voluntary

personal change (Jensen 477). Consumers account for only a fraction of wasted items, such as water, energy and refuge (Jensen 487). Jensen’s idea for large scale change over a personal approach must be utilized. Governments, corporations, militaries and agribusiness are responsible for the vast majority of resource consumption and environmental destruction (477). Only through advances, in science, engineering, agriculture, and other technology driven industries, are we able to mitigate the negative effects of being an industrialized society without sacrificing our modern amenities. Changes in individual lifestyles are woefully inadequate and will yield miniscule amounts of positive effects result.
“Simple living” even at its most extreme would not be enough to save the planet, according to Jensen; “Simple living” is an active choice made by individuals to reduce their carbon footprint through voluntary reduce, reuse, and recycle methods. The author expands on these ideas when he cites Kirkpatrick Sale; “The whole individualist what-you-can-do-to-save-the-Earth guilt trip is a myth. We, as individuals, are not creating the crises, and we can’t solve them” (Jensen 478). This means that individual effort can only go so far toward rebuilding the global ecosystem. Instead, there needs to be a greater response from the groups that cause the bulk of the issues. Changes in Governmental, corporate and agricultural organizations are imperative. Most importantly, we need to have major technological breakthroughs in these sectors to stop the damage being done to the planet. Current sources of renewable energy are great ideas, but are cost prohibitive and inefficient, making widespread use impossible for most developing countries. Developing countries need major advances in lower cost energy to break their dependencies, of environmentally costly fossil fuels. Additionally, developed countries need to do more to deploy the existing technology and cut back on the wasteful energy expenditures that go along with our creature comforts.
One way to reduce energy usage on things like heating and air conditioning is to build LEED certified buildings.

LEED, or Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design, is a certification program for green buildings with stringent requirements for building energy efficient and environmentally responsible structures. Some requirements of this program include specific building materials, smart grid capable, gray water reclamation systems, green space minimums, high levels of insulation and low thermal transfer glass (US Green Building Council). Green buildings are a must if we are to sustain our current level of growth. Despite the higher initial cost of these buildings, the long term energy savings make these buildings a smarter choice for

businesses.
Advances in agribusiness are real tributes to what modern science and technology are capable of achieving when it comes to reducing our impact on the environment.

As Jensen points out, farming and industry accounts for the vast majority of total water usage in the world (477). The increasingly scarce resource is a necessary ingredient when growing food. Technology continuously improves to make it easier for farmers to grow crops while using less water. Scientists at the University of Georgia utilize what they term “variable rate irrigation” to let farmers automate the current systems of irrigation to water only the crops that need it (Gies). This is an example of retrofitting current farms, but there is a new way of farming coming to cities that reuses practically all of its water and stakes claim much less acreage in the process. The future of agriculture belongs to vertical and urban farming. These types of farms reduce the use of water, chemicals (such as pesticides, herbicides and fungicides), soil and space (The Economist). These farms are so cutting edge that they are mostly in the experimental stages. Firms like Famgro farms are testing “stackable” farming systems that can scale with demand, even further reducing waste. Famgro’s stackable farms are ideal for cityscapes where land is at a premium; furthermore, reaping the added benefit of being in close proximity to the customers that they serve. Customers will enjoy high quality, fresh produce at only a slightly

higher cost. With the cost of electricity being expensive relative to the cost of the free energy of the sun, one can expect prices of the produce grown on these farms to be closer to that of an upscale organic market (Fehrenbacher). Unavoidably, energy will always be a major factor in the pursuit of a sustainable environment. In fact, one can measure the progress of a society by how well it uses the energy around it.
The Kardashev scale measures a civilization by its ability to harness the energy available in its current environment; a Type 1 civilization being one that can utilize all of the available energy sources on its home planet (Wikipedia). According to the Wikipedia entry, in 2012 we were at .724 on Kardashev’s scale and it is expected that we will reach Type 1 in the next 100 to 200 years (Wikipedia). To become Type 1, scientists need to discover ways of reclaiming the waste made during manufacturing and usage of goods. Waste heat, for example, is one of the most abundant wasted byproducts generated during these processes. Waste heat is generated by a number of sources: byproduct of burning fossil fuels, friction from moving parts in machinery, or even a high concentration of living organisms in a confined space; for instance, a building that houses college students. A research team from the University of Arizona has developed a way to capture waste heat using thermodynamics (Ramon). The process includes no moving parts and can be applied to almost any heat generating device. Heat passing through the device gets converted to electrical energy that can then be used as supplemental power for other devices (Ramon). These units will help increase the efficiency of current technology and forge a path to developing nearly waste free technology in the future. Google is developing its own source of free energy (LaMonica). The technology giant is looking to harness the power of waves to generate energy for its data centers (LaMonica). The waves cause movement that drives motors and actuators. These, in turn, produce electricity that can be stored and reused when needed. Above all, this energy is generated cleanly, without polluting the water or air around it. Wave motion energy is another example of how society is minimizing its impact on the environment.
There are many examples of how technology pushes us towards a sustainable future, much more numerous than the few that were presented above. Money and time donated by philanthropists and visionaries, such as, Bill Gates, Richard Branson, and Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, towards global resource sustainability projects, forge a new vision for a green future. We still have much to do in implementing changes with regard to individuals, corporations and governments. Changes require a social consciousness that can come through personal enlightenment, but ultimately, changes have to be made on a larger scale. We should push forth with industrialization while maintaining a level of responsibility to the environment. This responsibility will help redefine what it is to be human by encouraging humanity to solve the world’s problems with science, technology and engineering.