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Longtime Aspen ski executive thinks corporate sustainability is a scam

In “Terrible Beauty,” former sustainability director for Aspen’s ski resorts Auden Schendler pens an ode to all that climate change threatens.

Before announcing his plan to resign come spring, Auden Schendler spent 26 years working as the vice president of corporate sustainability for Aspen One, which operates the world-famous ski resorts around the posh community on Colorado’s Western Slope. It’s easy enough to drive a hybrid or use paper straws, but if someone wants a better future for their children, they should fight for a carbon tax — even though Schendler fears that the ship has sailed (on rising sea levels). And part of what I posit in the book is that corporate America said “That was great, but we never again want to see that level of regulation.” That was paired with a trend toward neoliberal free market thinking, which was really boosted by Reagan, who famously said, “Government isn't the solution, it's the problem.”

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