A Community-Centered Carbon Strategy for American Manufacturing
President Biden’s new pledge to tackle America’s greenhouse gas emissions over the coming decade will require an order of magnitude change of mindset for Americans in every corner of the Nation’s economy, and a fundamental transformation of the way Americans get to work, heat and cool their homes, and operate their factories. While as a partner and director at Gehl, I led a design team working with electric automobile manufacturers in the midwest, and along with a talented team of experts, devised a community-centered carbon strategy that could be a catalyst for ecological and economic regeneration for the community and the region.
Over the last several years as part of Gehl’s Transportation and Mobility and Masterplanning and Design service offerings in the US, Gehl has begun to work with some major automobile manufacturers and mobility service providers such as Ford and SPIN. Recently, Gehl began working with a US-based electric automobile manufacturer on a masterplan for a midwestern campus expansion effort. Like many manufacturing locations in the US, the site is in a relatively rural area, adjacent to a small town embedded in an agrarian landscape.
Gehl is part of a multidisciplinary team that includes RIOS, Atelier Ten, Applied Ecological Services, Inc (now RES), Buro Happold and others. As a partner and director at Gehl, I led the Visioning and Program Definition phases of the masterplanning effort using our Vision Framework to focus on innovation in the domains of Culture and Society, Ecology, Architecture and Landscape, and Mobility and Infrastructure.
Overall, the masterplan focused on creating a human-centered factory. One of the key principles that emerged from the visioning process is that the campus could be a catalyst for ecological and economic regeneration for the community and the region.
What has been particularly exciting about this effort is the company’s intentional investment in American manufacturing and what it means for the future of the American manufacturing campus. The project highlights and counterpoints the differences in the type of work and health outcomes for workers from these new manufacturing jobs. The project also highlights the company’s unique commitment to a community-centered carbon strategy that goes beyond typical commitments to social and environmental sustainability for the company, its workers, and the region in which the factory is located.
Growing investments in electric vehicle production
The global auto manufacturing industry is undergoing a rapid transition from reliance on internal combustion engines (ICEs) to battery electric vehicles (EVs). This shift is essential for cutting greenhouse gas emissions in order to avoid the most catastrophic impacts of climate change and presents a major opportunity for the U.S. auto manufacturing industry. However, U.S. public and private sector investment in EVs lags behind that of other countries, threatening both the United States’ ability to reach climate goals and the long-term competitiveness of the domestic auto industry–a sector which has long been a source of high-quality, unionized jobs that support a strong middle class. Growing Investments in EVs and charging infrastructure can help mitigate the climate crisis, deliver a win for American workers, and ensure national competitiveness in key areas of economic growth, decarbonization, and technological innovation. 1
Nationwide, electric automobile manufacturers are poised to add thousands of jobs to areas of the country that have struggled with high unemployment and lack of economic opportunity. In meeting with workers from the company, we were struck by the tremendous pride they shared in in being part of the new, sustainable mobility economy and how today’s jobs and workplaces are radically improving conditions for workers, the transparency in relationship to management and executive leadership, as well as the desire to provide leadership in decarbonizing manufacturing in the US.
Managing carbon
A key component of the masterplan framework is the campus’s carbon strategy. As an electric automobile manufacturer, the company is a leader in the growing trend towards zero emissions vehicles, but what about the carbon footprint of constructing and operating the campus itself? The massive manufacturing campus has significant energy demand to heat and cool the buildings and keep the lights on. And once we have tackled the basic campus operations, would it be possible to reduce and or offset emissions from the energy intensive auto-manufacturing process itself to deliver carbon negative vehicles?
Greenhouse gas emissions are categorized into three groups or ‘Scopes’ by the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Protocol–the most widely-used international accounting tool. Scope 1 covers direct emissions from owned or controlled sources; 2 covers indirect emissions from the generation of purchased electricity, steam, heating and cooling consumed by the reporting company; and 3 includes all other indirect emissions that occur in a company’s value chain. 2
Our project team crafted a comprehensive strategy that includes a phased move towards building and operations electrification to reduce energy demand and water use, on-site regenerative agriculture and ecosystem restoration, a robust on-site renewable energy program combining wind, solar and direct carbon capture technology, and partnerships with the local utility provider to use the company’s muscle as a major employer to direct the utility to source more green power as part of its portfolio. Using this combination of approaches the company would be able to reduce a significant portion of their Scope 1 and building-operations related Scope 2 emissions.
However, the company’s vision was to go farther than “net zero core and shell”. In order to achieve the ambition of becoming a regional catalyst for ecological and economic regeneration, they had to tackle decarbonizing the vehicle manufacturing process itself. And to do so, it had to look beyond the boundaries of its own property holdings and forge a partnership with the surrounding community. Like many companies on the path toward decarbonization, the company would have to enter the voluntary carbon offset market. Rather than simply ‘buy the offsets’ the company could leverage its investments in voluntary carbon offsets (worth millions of dollars) to maximize co benefits for the surrounding community and ecosystem of which the company is as part. What emerged was a framework for a carbon strategy that avoids ‘carbon reductionism’ efforts that focus solely on tons of CO2, and instead maximizes the co-benefits for the surrounding community and ecosystem: a truly community-centered carbon strategy.
Carbon is the life-force that connects the company to farmed & urban landscapes
The Carbon Strategy proposes to incentivize the hundreds of farmers in the surrounding region to shift towards regenerative agriculture in order to reverse the existing course of the region’s farming economy. The financial subsidy from carbon farming can enable more farmers to stay on their farms, to be economically competitive, and hopefully to attract the next generation of farmers.
“What if [the company] was the center of the farming, food, and energy universe in the region? With their electrical demand being many times that of the community and perhaps for a 50 mi radius around the facility, all powerlines lead–like radiating spider webs–to the site. So, why not, tug on those strings and strongly influence the way the entire power grid, carbon emissions, feedstock, and food and water systems of the region work?” – Steven Apfelbaum
Working landscapes can play a significant role in reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and mitigating global climate change, particularly through the sequestering of atmospheric carbon in soils and vegetation. In addition to their carbon-related benefits, well-managed working lands confer significant benefits related to increased water holding capacity in soils, water quality, biodiversity and other positive environmental impacts 3. The pioneering work of groups like the Carbon Cycle Institute and Point Blue have demonstrated the potential of natural, science-based solutions that reduce atmospheric carbon while offering reliable and verifiable carbon offsets.
Rather than simply purchasing the offsets from the voluntary carbon market and outsourcing most of their emissions reductions to faraway places, the Company’s carbon strategy would assemble a network of participating farms and provide direct payments to farmers to shift towards a growing set of practices that are well documented to build soil organic carbon. Carbon sequestration would be verified by an independent third party organization that ensures the credibility of the emission reduction projects.
While the local region does not have a compliance-based carbon market like Cap-and-Trade, given the company’s influence as a major employer and energy consumer, this approach could significantly boost the voluntary offset market in the region and act as a catalyst for other companies in the region to adopt a similar approach. While there are still many obstacles to overcome, the design team has taken crucial steps to define a community-centered carbon strategy that would maximize co-benefits to the local and regional economies and cultures. If the plan succeeds, the company may be the first to offer carbon-negative electric vehicles while acting as a catalyst for local ecological and economic regeneration.
(This piece was originally published on the Gehl blog and was written by John Bela with editing and support from Stephen Apfelbaum and the Gehl team)