What is the Blue Economy?
Last Tuesday night I headed to Cleveland’s Ohio City neighborhood to the Great Lakes Brewery tasting room for an event called Eco Meet CLE. Eco Meet CLE organizes events for those interested in environmental and sustainability issues. The topic of the evening was “Cleveland’s Blue Economy”.
I was really excited when I caught a post on LinkedIn about this event. While I had a sense of what a “blue economy” is, I was interested in seeing it applied in my local context. The keynote speaker, Emily Bacha, is the Program Director of the Cuyahoga County Freshwater Institute, a new county program designed to connect, educate and engage Clevelanders in leveraging, and protecting, our Lake Erie shore location.
Emily shared a couple of definitions of a blue economy, also sometimes called a water economy. According to the Cleveland Water Alliance: Often referred to as the blue economy, the water economy is based on the foundational concept that water, a precious and limited resource, has significant economic value. Any business that utilizes water, utility that treats water, or organization that conserves water is part of the global and interconnected water economy.
After Emily’s keynote, there were shorter presentations from the Port of Cleveland, a non-profit organization called Argonaut, Interlake Steamship Company, and the Cleveland Water Alliance. A few tidbits that have stuck with me:
Samantha Martin from the Cleveland Water Alliance spoke about Cleveland as a global destination for water innovation. I will be honest that I was not, and am still not sure, whether this is currently the case or an aspiration for the organization and city. However, she did share numerous international partnerships and collaborators who are bringing their projects here (for example, next generation water filtration technology). Apparently to some degree, Cleveland is know more abroad than nationally in this space.
The Port of Cleveland touted the year by year increase in the number of Great Lakes cruise ships stopping in Cleveland. Keira Cotton, their speaker, had their numbers down flat for the average dollars spent by a cruise ship passenger visitor in the city. I think it was around $160 dollars.
The leader of Argonaut spoke with deep dedication to service and opening up workforce opportunities for young people in the maritime economy. Argonaut is the partner supporting the Cleveland Metropolitan School District’s Davis Maritime and Aerospace High School, a school designed to offer classroom and field-based opportunities for students.
As always, I found myself somewhat moved when hearing about the Interlake Steamship Company, which has been transporting raw materials across the Great Lakes for more than 130 years. They own many of the huge “lakers” that sometimes wind their way up the Cuyahoga River. There are people working on these ships, or for this company, that are moving the materials needed for your car’s frame, your computer parts, the beams in your walls, or that airplane you flew on.
The event made me think further about the question, how do you calculate the value of water? There are economists who can offer different ways to calculate a numerical value. But given that without water there is no life, perhaps the value isn’t a calculation but a concept. There are ways to consider water’s value that are biological, cultural, spiritual and existential as well. Maybe we get a little caught up in the numbers sometimes, no?
As a final note, in contrast to the evening conversation of “blue”, the Great Lakes Brewery tap room has an amazing, very green, wall. I’m also a fan because the owners of Great Lakes Brewery are big water advocates who do things like sponsoring the Eco Meet CLE event. Gotta keep that beer water clean!
