Charles Holliday, Jr.
Chair Emeritus, Council on Competitiveness
Chair, Global Federation of Competitiveness Councils
Members of the Council on Competitiveness Board and Executive Committee, and Commissioners and Advisors from the National Commission on Innovation and Competitiveness Frontiers came together this summer at Gallup World Headquarters to take stock of the Council’s work and explore the challenges and opportunities driving Phase 2 of the National Commission’s work.
During the meeting, Mr. Charles Holliday, Chair Emeritus of the Council on Competences and Chair of the Global Federation of Competitiveness Councils, asked whether we are prioritizing the right things, particularly as it relates to sustainability. He asked, “Are we working on the right things?”
Global warming and climate change is a top sustainability problem we are all facing right now. Every organization represented in the National Commission is likely dealing with it in some form or another. In all of our lifetimes, it is still going to be the number one thing we're dealing with. But are you working on the most important things that will make the biggest difference? Are you working on the things that are in front of you and easier to see?
For example, passenger vehicles account for 7-8 percent of greenhouse gases in the world. They are about double percentage in the United States. But at 7-8 percent, how many times have passenger vehicles been mentioned in the last 24 hours, either because you have a battery plant in Tennessee, or we have all thought about buying an electric car?
The cement industry is responsible for the same amount of greenhouse gases as passenger vehicles, and who has ever thought about cement before? Steel is right behind that. And we are not putting the technology to work to solve those problems. There are commercial technologies to decarbonize. Cement is just very expensive. Now, who is really working on a program to have a breakthrough there? Same for steel.
“If we do not start balancing how we spend our resources toward the really big problems, we are leaving a problem for the next generation.” – Mr. Charles Holliday, Chair Emeritus of the Council on Competences and Chair of the Global Federation of Competitiveness Councils
