Eco-Logical Communities: building a more sustainable world, one community at a time.

Eco-Logical Communities is an experiment in community engagement to promote sustainability. The question that launched the experiment started with a “what if”:

• What if everyone in a community understood sustainability and began to implement it in their own lives?
• What if you could measure the difference that each person made and add it all up to see the difference that individuals make collectively?
• What if you could launch a United Way-style campaign, but instead of raising money, people pledged to reduce carbon emissions or water use or waste?
• Could we harness the power of collective action? Could we shift the curve to the left?
• Could we dial down key metrics?
• Could we build a sense of community pride around environmental performance?

Eco-Logical Communities is a proposed outreach program of the Applied Sustainability Center at the University of Arkansas. The University is located in Fayetteville, so naturally, Fayetteville is the first eco-logical community, the pilot city. The goal for the pilot is to enroll as many households as possible and see if there is a measurable difference in KWH used, water consumer, or waste generated. If successful, the next step will be to explore ways to expand the pilot to additional cities.