The Lovins-Hawken perspective is a good fit with what's beginning to happen at the community level in some places, where either private groups or local governments are promoting dialogues on "redefining progress" aimed at reforming industrial and consumption patterns. At a minimum, the book provides local activists with a robust checklist of possibilities for waste reduction and the evidence that major firms are actually making dramatic savings by doing the right thing. These points seem especially relevant if public subsidies are being used for a new factory or project. If the company gets a tax break, shouldn't it be required to apply the best practices in design?

Other technological examples are numerous and fascinating (though a slog for readers who don't have an appetite for this kind of stuff). As Natural Capitalism moved from one domain to the next, piling up the success stories, I was eager to be convinced. The more I read, however, the more unwanted doubt crept in. I don't quarrel with their facts or have the expertise to judge the technological claims. But the stories inspire this nagging question: If these innovations so obviously benefit the companies as well as nature and society, why aren't they being adopted everywhere? If the payoff is so darn good, why are major sectors of industry still fighting the old wars, gutting environmental laws when they can, stalling on compliance, propagandizing with scare stories about how environmental values kill growth, jobs, profits?

The book, alas, doesn't confront the question squarely (a concluding chapter does critique the blindness of markets but doesn't satisfy my doubts). Because I was otherwise so impressed, this bothered me, so I called Paul Hawken to ask about the gap between potential progress and the disappointing reality. This gaudy financial boom, he observed, does not offer a propitious moment to talk about the larger crisis and long-term solutions.

"Inertia momentum," he said with a sigh. "Business has so much inertia now that speed is at such a premium. This boom is masking worldwide deflation, so people do not see conserving energy or any other resources as cost issues."

The innovations that some companies have pioneered are still "unknown choices" to corporate managers in general, he said, and especially to the Wall Street analysts who judge their performance. Even if companies were aware of the potential, I would add, investing capital in systemic reforms must compete with every other opportunity for profitable investment, which may make long-term solutions look like a loser.

"The people who control the flow of funds in this country have a very narrow understanding of where you obtain financial returns," Hawken observed. "They have no familiarity with any of the subjects we describe in this book. They have no training in these matters; they receive no pressure from institutional investors or even the government to consider these choices. They have no accountability for the results of not considering them."

OK, that takes the edge off the optimism expressed in the book. But it should not discount the ideas and the abundant evidence that a larger, more aggressive approach to the ecological crisis is plausible. If Wall Street and corporate leaders won't take up the possibilities, others of us can talk about how their indifference might be changed.

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