This October 2001 paper by David Morris looks at how plant matter must be an important element in a sustainable economy because it is the only renewable resource from which we can fashion physical products. In the next few months and years we will be making decisions at the local, state, national and international level that will channel tens, perhaps hundreds of billions of dollars of money into certain areas and markets. We are changing the rules. A carbohydrate economy is a strategy that can marry environmental and national security and economic development objectives. Yet the very nature of biomass makes it a controversial and complex arena for decisionmaking.
David Morris
David Morris is co-founder of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance and currently ILSR's distinguished fellow. His five non-fiction books range from an analysis of Chilean development to the future of electric power to the transformation of cities and neighborhoods. For 14 years he was a regular columnist for the Saint Paul Pioneer Press. His essays on public policy have appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Salon, Alternet, Common Dreams, and the Huffington Post.
Latest posts from David
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