“Green Swans, in essence, are about regeneration—of our societies, economies, and, most fundamentally, of the biosphere. This is where things must now go seriously exponential, in a good way.” — John Elkington, Green Swans: The Coming Boom In Regenerative Capitalism
“The Earth is what we all have in common.” — Wendell Berry
Ecology, Economics, and Ethics (ENST-305-01)
Ramapo College of New Jersey
September 13, 2025
Professor Polsky & Students: Alex Benedetto, Kailee-Rose Casey, George Charbonneau, Romari Ebuen, Kayla Hurevitch, Kyla Merino, Jordan E. Rivera, Segall Sanchez
Editors: Professor Polsky, Romari Ebuen, Nina Rivera, Jordan E. Rivera, & Sandy Polsky
These Appendices are my own views, as opposed to my students in the body of the Report. These sections tend to be more opinionated, based on over four and a half decades trying to promote and accelerate thinking and change on this issue.
Appendix I looks at aspects of the Rutgers Forum my class did not address.
Appendix II shows my comments about eight other related forums by NJDEP and others: the New Jersey Green Buildings Association, New Jersey Economic Development Administration (NJEDA), New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (NJBPU), Rutgers Corporate Innovation Center. If needed, it can help provide a look from different angles at possible opportunities.
Appendix III is a reprint of an article from 2023, itself a compendium of earlier works, of ideas for NJDEP to consider. It offers perspectives on how the agency, but really also other state agencies, students, and others, can approach this issue going into the future.
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“You can have the Green New Deal and your hamburger, too” —Embriette Hyde, Writer, SynBioBeta, & Luisa Schetinger, Photographer, Unsplash
“Some men see things as they are, and ask why. I dream of things that never were, and ask why not.”
—Robert F. Kennedy
By Matt Polsky, Jillian Connelly, Candace Barr, Jazmine Garcia, Dillon Negrao, Dana Ogden, Zachary Potter, Matthew Wojciechowski, Brian Woodward, Andrew Wortman, Margaret Cawley, Mary Dragone
For the course I teach at Ramapo College in Mahwah, New Jersey, Economics, Ecology, & Ethics, we studied the Green New Deal in the last third of the spring semester. We read and discussed articles and viewed videos about it, featuring both its fans and critics. This was after we had explored the course theme: how do we best put economics and the environment together, pulling in equity issues, while learning to identify economics ideas inconsistent with sustainability.
We find that your Resolution already is doing much that is right and is unusually admirable. It is extremely bold, because, as you have pointed out, it has to be to deal with the problem of climate change. It also boldly integrates economic and social issues with it. It is blunt. Its approach is unusual and very challenging, but consistent with tenets of the sustainability field that it invokes.
Much of this, though, has bought the Resolution a lot of criticism, both fairly and unfairly.
The eleven students and I aim to provide ideas to you, your staff and advisors that would build on its strengths, while providing responses to some of the criticisms. For example, as the Resolution has been criticized as “light on details,” this report provides more of these.
In any group report it is best not to assume that all contributors agree wholeheartedly with every point or recommendation, although no one expressed any reservations to anything in the report itself. As this was largely the students’ report, while I guided their exploration, for the most part I went with their views. The nuclear one was tricky. I concurred with it, partially because of the stakes, and the power of their arguments and those of some guest speakers we had. But I want to point out the necessity of the associated conditions with that recommendation discussed there for reluctantly “coming out” on the “pro-nuke” side. Another is the hope that the “new nuclear technologies” advocates cite really does result in less waste and potential for proliferation of plutonium, although I’m still not persuaded that the argument “nuclear waste is a political problem, not a technical one” gets us anywhere. But—still—as climate change is one of the biggest challenges for the next generation… there is that compelling “carbon-free” argument.
Montgomery County, the most populous county in Maryland, was recognized today – Day 1 of the International Decade for Emergency Climate Action – by President Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Congress and the United Nations as the first Post Carbon(P-C) community in the United States and the largest jurisdiction on the planet to reduce its net Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions to zero, while also removing millions of tons of GHGs from the atmosphere.
The county government in partnership with its one million residents achieved this ‘moonshot’ goal through the transformation of its energy, transportation, building and agricultural systems, while strengthening the ability of its residents and businesses to withstand the increasingly frequent and severe physical and socio/economic shocks resulting from accelerating climate change.
The Green New Deal resolution introduced in Congress calls for a massive U.S. mobilization over 10 years to achieve the goal of net-zero greenhouse gas emissions while creating millions of high-wage jobs and sustainable economic growth. Unfortunately, while the science and need for federal action on climate change are clear, we can’t expect serious policymaking on the topic to come out of Washington until 2021 at the earliest.
Fortunately, it’s a new day in Wisconsin and the state is well positioned to make headway on many of the goals and objectives as outlined in the Green New Deal. For example…
The idea of putting a broadly-applied price on carbon dioxide emissions from combustion of fossil fuels from all major sectors of the U.S. economy is gaining traction. Several national organizations are actively supporting a carbon tax, including Citizens’ Climate Lobby[2], the Climate Leadership Council[3], the Carbon Tax Center[4], and PUTAPRICEONIT[5].
A number of nations and other jurisdictions already have some form of carbon pricing. A group of Princeton University students, the Princeton Student Climate Initiative[6], is exploring ways to strengthen New Jersey’s effort to cut greenhouse gas emissions, including development of a state-level carbon tax.
While state-level programs to price carbon could be effective, carbon pricing approaches will be more effective if they are national and, ideally, international in scope.
We recently came across a series of podcasts by our personal Financial Advisor, Jim Cox. Jim focuses on sustainable investments, but we had no idea he was actively interviewing experts and activists from across the country on a variety of topics related to the emerging green economy. Jim writes, “Sometimes it feel like I’m a voice in the wilderness…” which led us to the idea of posting his podcasts for a wider audience.
James Cox is a financial advisor with FFG Advisors. He focuses on wealth and risk management for clients of the firm. He is on the board of several organizations. James joined FFG/DFP in January of 2012. Many of Mr. Cox’s clients are entrepreneurs and business owners. His practice helps individuals manage risk within their finances, even as they are striving toward creating successful companies. To learn more go to http://jamesacox.com.
The first one that came to our attention was the conversation with Janet Kirsch, a physician and public health specialist, who is devoting her life to climate mobilization.
Mobilizing for Climate Disruption (September 21, 2018)
Janet Kirsch is a physician and speaker with 350 Bay Area. We had initially talked days before hurricane Florence made landfall. We chat today about the need to approach climate disruption with increased vigor and commitment.
And here are some other selected podcasts from James Cox, available on iTunes and elsewhere.
You’re invited to our
