Bush's State of the Union Address; System Change

Just in time for Davos, president Bush delivered his State of the Union address yesterday (the address is like the annual review of the U.S. of A.)

"Tonight, I ask Congress to join me in pursuing a great goal. Let us build on the work we've done and reduce gasoline usage in the United States by 20 percent in the next 10 years. (Applause.) When we do that we will have cut our total imports by the equivalent of three-quarters of all the oil we now import from the Middle East.

To reach this goal, we must increase the supply of alternative fuels, by setting a mandatory fuels standard to require 35 billion gallons of renewable and alternative fuels in 2017 -- and that is nearly five times the current target. (Applause.) At the same time, we need to reform and modernize fuel economy standards for cars the way we did for light trucks -- and conserve up to 8.5 billion more gallons of gasoline by 2017.

Achieving these ambitious goals will dramatically reduce our dependence on foreign oil, but it's not going to eliminate it. And so as we continue to diversify our fuel supply, we must step up domestic oil production in environmentally sensitive ways. (Applause.) And to further protect America against severe disruptions to our oil supply, I ask Congress to double the current capacity of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. (Applause.)

America is on the verge of technological breakthroughs that will enable us to live our lives less dependent on oil. And these technologies will help us be better stewards of the environment, and they will help us to confront the serious challenge of global climate change. (Applause.)"

The main points:

• First ever mention of the words "climate change" in a Bush address
• Push for alternative fuels and more fuel-efficient cars
• Focus on technological discoveries to curb energy use
• What does stepping up domestic production in environmentally sensitive ways mean? Hopefully still no drilling in protected wilderness
• Strategic petroleum reserve: approximately 57-day oil supply for the US; doubling it would mean the U.S. would be holding about a third of a year's oil in emergency storage

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In other news, an article on system change argues that "traditional corporate responsibility approaches focus mainly on corporate level activities. Yet probably eighty percent or more of the unsustainability problem resides at the system level. Many good system change programs have been developed. But most have low implementation rates." More on system change here. The writer of the full report challenges some of the basic CSR tenets and proposes major systemic changes.

(Systems thinking, by the way, is a term often used in futures studies - a field of knowledge that is founded on the idea of foresight and looking into what doesn't as yet exist to create desirable futures.)