After Disaster, Town Sprouts Back 'Green'

"Last May, an EF 5 tornado hit western Kansas. In Greensburg, the storm leveled every building, picked up cars and tossed them into rooftops, demolished the streets, left more than two-thirds of the town’s population homeless and killed 11 people.

Out of this tragedy, an opportunity arose to reconstruct and rejuvenate not only the buildings but also the town itself. As is the story for many small farm towns, the future of Greensburg looked bleak. Even before the tornado, jobs were growing scarce and the population was shrinking by two percent every year.

So, the people of Greensburg decided not only to stay, rebuild and provide aid but also to take a revolutionary approach to doing so -- the environmentally sustainable way. City leaders saw their chance to change the city into a place where everyone would want to be, an environmentally sustainable place that would serve as an example for towns everywhere.

We’ve written about our hopes for the heartland before, and the inspiring ways the Great Plains could turn away from business as usual and start imagining what a bright green farm belt would look like. Now, Greensburg is doing just that.

Kansas is third in the nation for wind power potential, and according to the City of Greensburg, one wind turbine could typically power the whole town. City officials are also interested in looking into solar, geothermal and manure as power sources. In addition, the Greensburg City Council passed a resolution stating that all new city buildings will meet LEED platinum certification standards, making it the first city to do so."