For some, like Hartman and Stapp, Arizona seems to be current with the increased awareness and focus on sustainability around the country and the world.
Hartman said Phoenix is doing well as a sustainable area. He said the goal is to think realistically about resources like water. For example, he said that many people think of water the same way they think of energy in that the goal is to eventually not use any water. This is a fallacy he said. Instead, the goal should be to find renewable amounts of water and live within that amount.
Hartman mentioned that Phoenix announced eight Environmental Sustainability Goals to reach by 2050, which cover issues like transportation, parks, water, and waste. Some of these goals include encouraging alternative forms of transportation, creating zero waste by increasing waste diversion and providing a clean and reliable 100-year supply of water.
According to the Phoenix City website, the main objective for these goals is to “improve the quality of life for all, while enhancing nature.”
Sustainable Arizona Founder John Neville has his doubts. He compared Arizona’s growth to cancer growth in humans. Though people can continue to develop, growth inevitably stops, he said.
“The only thing that might grow would be a tumor. And we set up an economy in states like Arizona and all around the Western world that are like tumors, and everything seems really fine until everything goes to hell in a handbasket,” he said.
"Sustainability of a place has to do with the quality of its habitat. This is more than creating sustainable communities, it's creating resilient communities."
Regardless of how well the various Arizona experts believe the Valley is doing with respect to sustainable development, they tend to agree that sustainability is defined as more than conservation techniques or waste management. “Cities are living organisms. They grow, flourish, wither, and sometimes die.” That is the first line of Gammage’s book, The Future of the Suburban City: Lessons from Sustaining Phoenix. And it also represents an underlying idea that sustainability is more than conserving water or reducing waste. “Sustainability of a place has to do with the quality of its habitat. This is more than creating sustainable communities, it’s creating resilient communities,” according to Stapp. Looking at the Metropolitan Phoenix area as a living organism within the context of the overall quality of its habitat, the question becomes whether or not preparations are still being made to sustain the growth and development of the organism for the future. “We think of sustainability as a sustainable state, are you able to continue existing the way you have been into the future?” said Gammage.