Everything in Moderation: The threat of the “Green Curse”
Though it might seem counterintuitive at first, green power is not always the sustainable option it is made out to be. Green power — like any investment — has to be made at the cost of other investments and sometimes the other investment is the preservation of natural habitat. The most severe presentation of this problem is a specific kind of natural resource curse, dubbed the ‘Green Curse’. To understand what the green curse is we must first understand the natural resource curse.
The natural resource curse was first used to describe a peculiar condition that arose in African countries in the 20th century. These newly independent nations found that they had massive stores of natural resources which could be developed and exported around the world for hefty prices. Unfortunately, with these discoveries came a number of problems.
The first problem occurs if everything goes according to plan. In this case, the country becomes severely export focussed and tied to the international market, becoming reliant on it for its income. Not only does this lead to instability — since foreign economic conditions are outside of the country’s control — there is also a lopsided development of only the export sector. This results in other important industries like agriculture falling behind, making the nation even more reliant on foreign support to make a living.
That is of course if nothing goes wrong. More often than not, this isn’t the case. In many African nations, conflict over natural resources breaks out with rebel groups seeking to take control of the resources themselves and embroiling the country in years-long civil wars. Even if this doesn’t happen, there is often the chance of widespread corruption in the natural resource industry, costing the country millions if not billions of dollars.
The green curse is just like the natural resource curse in this way. Green resources like lithium and other rare earths are in high demand as countries turn their attention to sustainability, creating conflicts around these resources. In the case of Greenland, which is rich in rare earths, there are a number of firms which seek access to these resources and given the chance would set up nuclear power plants in the country to generate energy using Greenland’s natural resources. Not only does nuclear energy pose dangers in any country, the clearing away of forests and indigenous communities land presents a problem in itself, afflicting Greenland with an acute case of the Green curse.
It appears then that it may have been better for countries to not have massive natural resource deposits at all. Of course, this is an unhelpful suggestion in the existing circumstances. What is more prudent to suggest is that countries do not pursue a lopsided mode of development, use these resources to help build other aspects of their economy, and reign in the exploitation of the natural environment. This may be the only way to overcome the Green Curse.
