When we fail renters, we fail society

Scrolling through my newsfeed this morning, I came across a good article in the Washington post about retrograde landlords who hamstring their tenants’ energy conservation ambitions, and the failure of our regulatory measures to address this. Here’s a excerpt that captures the gist of the article:

“Douglas is one of a growing number of Americans who want to lower their carbon footprints — but are stymied by their landlords. Homes and apartments burn oil and gas, suck up electricity, and account for about one-fifth of the United States’ total greenhouse gas emissions. But current attempts to green America’s homes, including billions of dollars in tax credits for energy efficient appliances and retrofits, seem aimed at the affluent owners of detached, single-family homes — in short, Mad-Men-style suburbias.”

I’ve written in this community before about the problem with America’s approach to the electric transportation transition. In my eyes, it’s a consequence of the mentality that the WaPo writer terms Mad-Men-style suburbia. Since ww2, America has cultivated a highly inefficient living model around the single family home. Now, we’re trying to make that model green but it’s not going to work because it’s innately inefficient. To cut emissions, we’re not only going to have to electrify, but we’re going to have to radically change the way we live (more density) and drive (far less).