The Green Skeptic: sustainability

Showing posts with label sustainability. Show all posts

25 October 2011

From The Green Skeptic Archives: Philanthropy & Environmental Change: Should Social Capital Markets Take Over?

Deep SEA. Photo by Mickey Rosenau

[Note: While on hiatus this week, I'm posting selections from The Green Skeptic Archives. This one was originally posted on 23 October 2007.--SEA]

I'm taking up a friendly challenge here.

Lucy Bernholz, who writes the excellent blog Philanthropy 2173, and I started a blogalog (Did I just coin that term?) between our blogs about the state of philanthropy and environmental change.

It began in response to Lucy's listing of green blogs in the wake of Blog Action Day last Monday, and her noting the lack of discussion of philanthropy on the sites listed (including mine).

My defense stemmed from a concern about philanthropy and its effectiveness as an agent of change in the environmental sphere, which actually was the origin of this blog. I have grown increasingly concerned about the ability of traditional philanthropy to effect lasting change at a pace commensurate with the global challenges we face.

I expressed this concern in my essay for GreenBiz, "Confessions of a Green Skeptic," several years ago about the Earth Charter.

Back then (March 2003), I wrote, "we need to demonstrate how profitable being green can be, and how essential it is to a truly global sustainability. If we can turn the greed motivation to green motivation, effectively turning it on itself, does the means justify the end? Hard to say. But if greed isn't going away anytime soon, we are left with trying to redirect the motivation any way we can. Guilt has worked, but only gets us so far. 'Envy trumps guilt' every time."

This sentiment was influenced by Thomas Friedman's thoughts on the subject expressed in The Lexus and the Olive Tree, that "if conservationists are going to get ahead of the greedy we need to move faster. 'For now, the only way to run as fast as the herd is by riding the herd itself and trying to redirect it,' Friedman writes. 'We need to demonstrate to the herd that being green, being global, and being greedy can go hand in hand.'"

And it was echoed by Gretchen Daily and Katherine Ellison in their book, The New Economy of Nature, from which I quoted, "the record clearly shows that conservation can't succeed by charity alone. It has a fighting chance, however, with well-designed appeals to self-interest."

Things have changed quite a bit since I wrote that essay -- the world has gotten flatter, green has become the new black, Al Gore won an Academy Award and a Nobel Prize for his work on climate change, and the herd has started to move to greener pastures.

But a lot hasn't changed. In Philanthropy, as Susan Raymond points out in a two-part piece called "Does Philanthropy Scale?," the "vast majority of American nonprofits are small; 60 percent or more...have less than $100,000 in annual revenue." And, Raymond notes, "the average foundation grant to nonprofits is on the order of $25,000."

Raymond also points out that "the number of nonprofits with $10 million or more in revenue has increased by 73 percent in the last decade," and asks, "when $25,000 is the average grant, is philanthropy the answer to organizational growth? Indeed, is it even relevant as a source of capital?"

I'm going to quote one more thing from Raymond's essay: "The evolution of microfinance teaches that, when what had been a philanthropic initiative matures and proves its worth, alternative capital sources step in and redefine the opportunity. Is achieving scale, then, the clue for philanthropy to either evolve or exit? And, if so, do we need to rethink what we mean by 'philanthropy' for large organizations or proven initiatives in social markets?"

I quote Raymond's piece at length because it corroborates some of my own thinking on this subject. She rightly points out that the biggest advantage of philanthropic capital is its "ability to take significant risk, to seed a promising idea and recognize that all promising ideas can be failures."

So risk tolerance or tolerance for failure, playing on the field of ideas and at the edge of problems "where the probabilities of success are unknown, is the key playing field for philanthropy."

For many ideas, perhaps chief among them those addressing environmental issues, it may be time for other types of capital to be brought to bear. I'm particularly interested in what Raymond describes as "a multiplicity of approaches to organizational finance in the nonprofit sector...for self-reliance, sustainability, and (yes) profit" to come to the stage.

This is not far from what Lucy refers to as "tri-sector solutions," such as the B Corporation she has described or the bond purchase strategy Raymond describes in her piece. (In the latter, Raymond explains, "'Donors' took on the role of guarantor rather than funder, and the resources flowed at levels that donations would never have been able to sustain.")

Elsewhere in the web pages of onPhilanthropy, John Bloom of RSF Social Finance, posits that "social finance holds that the purpose of money and finance is to support human initiative and to foster the evolution of new community."

And, Bloom suggests, social finance recognizes "the human and environmental consequences of economic activities...[and] presents a picture of a healthier sustainable future -- and one that leaves behind the industrialist model of philanthropy..."

I will continue this dialogue here on The Green Skeptic, because I think it is an important one, and part of an ongoing, evolving thought process for me that started over four years ago and which led to this blog. Thanks to Lucy for calling me out about it and fostering this dialogue.

11 October 2011

ECO-nomics: Re-envisioning Financial Services; My Talk at SXSW ECO

Last week I gave a talk at the first SXSW ECO in Austin, Texas.

Here is the slide show from my talk, available on SlideShare:

and here is a transcript of my talk on Scribd:

ECO-nomics: Re-envisioning Financial Services for the 21st Century

A video of the talk will be available at a later date.

09 August 2011

Ray Anderson, Self-styled "Radical Industrialist," 1934-2011

You have to marvel at someone who styled himself a "radical industrialist."

That's what Ray Anderson called himself in title of his book, Confessions of a Radical Industrialist, which I reviewed here. An entreprenuer, company builder, and visionary, Anderson founded Interface in 1973 to produce the first free-laying carpet tiles in America.

Ray Anderson lost his battle with cancer yesterday at the age of 77.

His company revolutionized the commercial floor-covering industry and became the world's largest manufacturer of modular carpet, which such brands as InterfaceFLOR, FLOR, Heuga, and Bentley Prince Street.

In 1994, Anderson had an epiphany that set his company on a new course, trying to prove -- some say successfully -- that an industrial manufacturing company can embrace sustainability and profitability. Their goal was to make Interface and its individual carpet brands use no new raw materials.

It all started with what he called, as he titled his 1998 book, a "Mid-Course Correction":

"In 1994, at age sixty and in my company’s twenty-second year, I steered Interface on a new course—one designed to reduce our environmental footprint while increasing our profits. I wanted Interface, a company so oil-intensive you could think of it as an extension of the petrochemical industry, to be the first enterprise in history to become truly sustainable—to shut down the smokestacks, close off its effluent pipes, to do no harm to the environment and take nothing not easily renewed by the earth. Believe me when I say the goal is one enormous challenge."

Through his books, many talks, and his daily life, Anderson made the business case for sustainability. His was a brand of environmentalism, as he put it, "with good old capitalist self-interest firmly in mind."

The one word that describes Ray Anderson best is authentic.

He was an inspiration -- a hero, really -- to those of us who believe that profit and purpose are not mutually exclusive and, in fact, are necessary to the success of any business.

Here is Ray Anderson speaking at the TED conference in 2009:

01 March 2011

The New Sustainable Economy and You

Maybe people really are hungry for a change. Not the hopey-changey stuff of political change, but the real, tangible change represented by rebooting our economy.

My post yesterday reviewing Hugh MacLeod's Evil Plans: Having Fun on the Road to World Domination and Umair Haque's The New Capitalist Manifesto: Building a Disruptively Better Business got more hits than Mark Wahlberg in The Fighter.

And that got me thinking about a talk I gave last year at Temple's Fox School of Business and Wharton's Social Impact club.

The talk was about three things:

1.) The state of our current economy and the opportunity to build a better economic system.
2.) What such change can mean for you (the audience was b-school students).
3.) What social entrepreneurship and social enterprise mean and why it can make a difference.

Ultimately, my talk was about value creation, the kind of value creation Hugh and Umair are talking about.

Here is the slide show from that talk:

20 September 2010

Saving Green While Saving Lives

Christiana Care Health Systems Wilmington Facility

Hospitals are in the business of healing. So it should be no surprise that one leading medical institution has been leading the way on healing the planet.

Christiana Care Health Systems serves all of Delaware and seven counties bordering the state in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland. Christiana has more than 1,100 licensed hospital beds in two hospitals and over 10,000 employees.

As one of the region's largest employers, they are committed to making their facilities clean and safe for staff and patients. A few years ago, a small group of staff formed a team to help green their operations.

Most probably thought of it as the right thing to do, but they soon realized it was not just about going green. There was green to be made through savings.

The team started with small goals: reduce waste and organize what they were already doing that was sustainable. They hired an industry savvy consultant who helped them target various waste streams and look for cost savings throughout their operations.

Hospitals throw out a lot of stuff. From bed pans to Styrofoam cups; from paper and cans to xylene and alcohol. There is also an enormous amount of "regulated medical waste," most of which must be disposed of in special red "Biohazard" bags.

The team conducted an audit of the waste stream, even tracking it from the facilities to the dump. They found savings and waste reduction opportunities at every turn.

Reductions in "red bag" waste were cut by 50 percent at a savings of over $210,000 a year; implementing an extensive recycling program -- even for chemicals -- led to additional savings after a modest one-time cost.

Next the facilities entered into power purchase agreements for 15 percent of the total output of the Locust Ridge II wind power facility in central Pennsylvania.

They even hosted two "medicine cabinet clean-out" events for the community in cooperation with the Delaware Nurses Association. This last effort safely retrieved old and expired medications that otherwise may have entered the groundwater system if disposed of improperly.

The biggest challenge?

"Commitment," said Robert Mulrooney, Christiana Care's Vice President of Facilities and Services, speaking at the Academy of Natural Sciences last week as part of its Profitable Pathways to Sustainability Program. "Commitment of time and people. We don't yet have one person solely devoted to this 100 percent. That would really drive it."

Rather, Christiana's effort relies on 50 environmental champions from throughout the staff.

They must be doing something right. Last year, Christiana Care received the EPA's Trailblazer Award for its environmental leadership.

Christiana's green team is not resting on its laurels. They have come up with even more ambitious goals moving forward, such as achieving a recycling rate greater than 25 percent, purchasing safer and more sustainable products, reducing water use by more than 20 million gallons per year.

"It is part of Christiana Care's mission to care for our planet as we do for our community," President and CEO Dr. Bob Laskowski has said.

Perhaps it is time to recognize that a healthier planet can lead to healthier patients.

20 August 2010

Green Skeptic Friday LinkFest - 08/20/10

Jonny's Not Rotten (Photo by Amado Garcia)

Dog Days edition of the Green Skeptic LinkFest.
So, I'll start with Sunday's cover story in PARADE magazine on the "Vick dogs" - the dogs that football player Michael Vick abused and Vick-timized in his Virginia compound. Some were forced to fight and some were traumatized for life. But most of them survived to be rehabilitated and have been given a second chance: Can You Teach a Bad Dog New Tricks?

Efficiency is finally getting it's due as investors are picking energy efficiency 'low-hanging fruit.'

Single malt or blended, sir? Yale360 reports on a New Whisky Waste Biofuel Developed by Scottish Scientists: Scotch Drink & Drive.

Sharon Begley in Newsweek writes about how we're "Green and Clueless."?

Energy China Forum (ECF) reports on how the U.S. and China Are Vying for Clean Energy Leadership.

Fisker's Karma plug-in hybrid is still a mystery, but it promises much: Fisker Do?

Eric Wesoff of GreentechMedia published a Greentech IPO Report: Past, Present and Top Ten IPO Candidates.

Fabian Pattberg listed his Top Five Sustainability/CSR Communication Examples.

And finally, A123 spin-off company 24M gets charged up by $10M from North Bridge + CRV for grid-scale batteries: 24M.

(Disclosure: I hold a long position in $AONE This post is for informational purposes only and is neither intended to be investment advice nor an offer, or the solicitation of any offer, to buy or sell any securities. I also hold a long position in an adopted pitbull named Calvin and I do advocate that you do the same.)

18 August 2010

U.S. Consumers, Executives Skeptical about Corporate Sustainability Commitment

U.S. Consumers, Executives Skeptical about Corporate Sustainability Commitment from Environmental Leader:

A new sustainability survey reveals that only 16 percent of U.S. consumers and 29 percent of Fortune 1000 executives believe that a majority of businesses are committed to sustainability. The Gibbs & Soell survey also finds that 54 percent of executives and 48 percent of consumers believe only "some" businesses are committed to “going green.”

The study, "2010 Gibbs & Soell Sense & Sustainability" (PDF) surveyed both U.S. consumers and Fortune 1000 executives on their views of corporate efforts to improve the health of the environment through sustainable practices, products, or services.

Read the article here and download the full report.

15 March 2010

VerdeStrategy: Announcing My New Venture

Over the past year and a half since leaving Ashoka, I've learned a lot about what entrepreneurs need to succeed.

I've also learned a lot about the needs of companies struggling with how to be green and sustainable in a time of increased scrutiny and transparency.

Somewhere at the intersection of these two learnings is where my new venture, VerdeStrategy, took root.

And I'm pleased to announce its launch today.

VerdeStrategy is a consulting and advisory firm focused on the cleantech, energy, and environment sectors. Working with start-ups, corporations and social enterprises, we will help create robust, sustainable businesses that attract investment, improve profitability, and extend market share.

If you're a start-up needing to raise capital to build your prototype, but not sure where to turn or struggling to explain your concept in a simple, compelling way, we can help with that.

If you're a company wrestling with what sustainability means to your company or trying to take the next step in a sustainability journey already begun, we can help with that.

If you're a CEO who needs coaching, a sounding board for management issues, or to polish your presentation skills, we can help with that.

If you're the leader of sustainability or green efforts at your company and need help navigating the confusing sustainable path, we can help with that.

I'm very excited about this new venture and about starting it in Philadelphia, where my involvement with GoodCompany Ventures, Philly Startup Leaders, and the launch of the Cleantech Alliance Mid-Atlantic (formerly REBN, Mid-Atlantic) conspired to inspire this new venture.

Here's a link to our web site: VerdeStrategy. Let me know how we can help.

12 February 2010

LEED, BIM and Smart in the Land of Green Opportunity

I have a guest post today on constructionlawva.com It starts out like this:

“LEED buildings are great, until the tenant moves in,” the head of a large, international construction company once said to me. “Once the tenant moves in, the environmental sustainability of the building goes out the window.”The Green Skeptic on constructionlawva.com, Thoughts on the construction landscape from Christopher G. Hill, lawyer, LEED AP and member of the Virginia Legal Elite in Construction Law, Feb 2010

To read the whole article, go here: http://bit.ly/bADZ7R

22 January 2010

Review: Ray Anderson's "Confessions of a Radical Industrialist"

"Will we bankrupt the future, or assure it?" Ray Anderson asks in his new book, Confessions of a Radical Industrialist. "Or should we find ways to create wealth sustainably through the efficient use of resources, renewable energy, and closed-loop manufacturing processes that use recycled waste as raw materials?"

Anderson has been at the forefront of the sustainability movement for some time. But for 20 years he was your typical plunderer, to paraphrase the author.

He "founded Interface in 1973 to equip the emerging, technology-driven 'office of the future' with a new kind of carpet, a floor covering that could change along with its owners needs," as he writes. He built the business into a global leader in the commercial carpet industry.

In 1994, however, a colleague from the company's research division passed on a memo from a sales associate that said some customers wanted to know, "What is Interface doing for the environment?" Another associate gave him a copy of Paul Hawken's groundbreaking book, The Ecology of Commerce.

That started Ray Anderson on his journey of discovery -- both personal and corporate -- that led to the company deciding to be a global leader in sustainability and never make a carpet from virgin raw materials again.

It's a story he has told before, on stage and in his 1995 book, Mid-Course Correction, and a third of this new book covers ground from that earlier memoir. But in retelling his personal journey Anderson connects his readers to his true purpose: to demonstrate that sustainability is a worthy and profitable journey and that the journey is the destination.

Along the way, Anderson makes clear the business case for sustainability -- and for accomplishing it "with good old capitalist self-interest firmly in mind."

Anderson never loses sight of the fact that "financial success is the key to achieving sustainability," as he writes in this new book. "A bankrupt company is clearly not sustainable. But sustainability is also a big key to achieving financial success. We have proved that earning a bigger and better, more legitimate profit is possible."

It's an important lesson and one supported by his book's subtitle, "Profits, People, Purpose--Doing Business by Respecting the Earth." I like that he leads with Profits and People; too often, environmentalists try to lead with the planet first and lose sight of the people and their self-interest.

That's why Ray Anderson's story is a good one and Confessions of a Radical Industrialist is an important book. (It's not a perfect book, I must say, and suffers a bit from overstating some points and pontification in spots. Yet the overall message is important enough to forgive these flaws.)

"Efficiency equals profits, profits equal jobs, and good jobs mean a strong economy," Anderson writes. To Ray Anderson, sustainability offers a new business model and a new future characterized by new thinking, new products, and new profits.

(Note: As of this writing, I have just learned that Ray Anderson has been diagnosed with cancer and is heading for further tests at the MD Anderson Center in Houston. My prayers go out to Ray and his family.)

09 October 2009

Chris Nelder and Charlie Rich Talk Sustainable Farming and Renewable Energy with Matt Davio

Give a listen to this interview with Chris Nelder, author of Profit from the Peak: The End of Oil and the Greatest Investment Event of the Century, and Charlie Rich (not the singer). The interview was conducted by Matt Davio, aka MissTrade, an posted on his blog: Trading for the Masses. (You can follow Chris on Twitter @nelderini and Matt at @misstrade)

Warning, Chris agrees with me that a Carbon Tax is better and more efficient than Cap-and-Trade, but that the political will isn't there to get it done.

Chris Nelder @nelderini and Charlie Rich Talk Sustainable Living and Farming and Renewable Energy from miss trade on Vimeo.

14 July 2009

The Wal*Mart Game-Changer: How Green is Your Sustainability?

Image via Wikipedia

I've said it before and I'll say it again, if anyone can make the transition to the new green economy work, it is Wal-Mart.

Oh, some argue that they are the evil empire, with their huge building footprint and their aisles upon aisles of cheap, sometimes useless stuff.

Others will ask, why don't they treat their workers better or their small business competition?

But no one can argue that the latest move by the bargain-dealing superstore isn't a game-changer: Wal-Mart is launching a Sustainability Index.

A Sustainability Index? That's right. Wal-Mart plans to track and rate the life-cycle of every product it sells in its stores and list the results on the shelf.

According to an article by Marc Gunther on Slate's The Big Money, Wal-Mart has been working with a consortium of consumer-goods manufacturers and universities to develop this index.

Wal-Mart's new CEO Mike Duke will unveil the Index this Thursday, July 16, at the company’s corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas.

Measuring sustainability all up and down a product's chain is tough, especially if you factor in "people and communities" to the index, as Gunther reports is Wal-Mart's intention. But if anyone can do it the Bentonville Behemoth is probably up to the task.

Kudos to Wal-Mart for taking this next step. Let's hope it works and really changes the game.

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26 June 2009

Review: Design for a Living World at the Cooper-Hewitt

Imagine sending 10 top designers out into the world to make something. Now imagine you give them just three criteria: it has to be wonderful, desirable, and...sustainable.

That's exactly what the Nature Conservancy did to create what is now an exhibit at the Cooper-Hewitt museum in New York.

The designers, ranging from Yves Behar and Isaac Mizrahi to Maya Lin and Paulina Reyes from Kate Spade in New York were sent out to Nature Conservancy project sites from Maine to Alaska and from China to Bolivia. Each designer used materials found in the place and even employed local people to help fashion such useful objects as handbags, furniture, rugs, and jewelry.

Among my favorites from the exhibit: Maya Lin's red maple Terra Bench, Abbott Miller's FSC-certified wood chair, Mizrahi's salmon leather dress and matching shoes, Reyes'/Spade's wooden tiled handbag, and Ezri Tarazi's bamboo-totem wine racks and speaker tubes.

I also rather liked Hella Jongerius's failed experiment to find a design application for chicle latex from the Maya Forest of Mexico. You've got to admire her valiant efforts to transform this material, once the basis for most chewing gums, into a surface design element or even bonding material.

The exhibit is on view at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York through January 4, 2010.

For more information, visit nature.org/design or Cooper-Hewitt.

16 March 2009

On Cramer vs. Stewart, Corporate Leadership, CNBC, and a Pivotal Moment

I'll admit that I find Jim Cramer, host of CNBC's Mad Money, entertaining. Cramer is entertaining in the same way as those old "Crazy Eddie" ads: "He's IN-sane!"

Cramer's enthusiasm and showmanship is fun to watch and his crazy antics are amusing -- throwing pies at CEOs on his Wall of Shame, punching buttons like a carnival barker to generate hoots, hollers, and recorded noises and phrases.

But as Jon Stewart said in his skewerview of the frenetic host, Cramer is a snake oil salesman.

To the extent that he taught folks how to think about investing, that was a good thing. And in his defense, Cramer often warned retail investors to do their homework, to only buy stock in companies they understand and whose products they use, and to be diversified.

That a majority of his viewers didn't take his advice and just bought when he punched the "Buy, buy buy" button or sold at "Sell, sell, sell," it's probably their own damned fault.

But it's the larger picture that really bothers me. CNBC's business model seemed to be based on the cult of the CEO, wealth-worship, and a hubris of growth. They forsook journalism for entertainment.

And this was clear from Cramer's response to Stewart's taunts on the subject: "CEOs lied to me." To which Stewart quipped something like "What happened to Journalism 101?" You don't take their word for it; you investigate further.

I stopped watching CNBC late last summer. I couldn't take it anymore. The smarmy hosts of Squawk Box every morning were two-headed beasts, simultaneously crying "The sky is falling," while licking the loafers of the parade of CEOs and other executives who were the proverbial wolves in sheep's clothing.

As it turns out, most of the CEOs were lying or at least not being entirely truthful -- or worse, they were really clueless themselves.

Our collective rage was unleashed by Jon Stewart on the nonplussed Jim Cramer. Cramer was our scapegoat and his mea culpa and pleas of I'll try to do better seemed genuine. I didn't see his show the day after the Stewart interview, but that would have been an opportunity for him to apologize to his viewers and begin to make amends. I understand that it was just more of the same.

It's too bad, because I really think we're at a pivotal moment. We have an opportunity to shift the way companies are run, journalism is practiced, and business is pursued. We should seize this opportunity to fire the bums and create a new standard of trust and transparency for CEOs, the journalists who cover them, and the consumers who buy their stock, products, or watch their programs.

Otherwise, this will be a missed opportunity and all that rage expressed by Jon Stewart will have been just another play for ratings. (Which I'm sure it was in part.)

A sustainable economy will require a new kind of CEO and a new relationship between companies and the media that writes about them. It will also require that we as consumers and viewers take more responsibility for doing our homework and maintaining a healthy skepticism.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Jim Cramer Unedited Interview Pt. 1

Daily Show Full Episodes
Important Things w/ Demetri Martin

Political Humor
Jim Cramer

20 February 2009

Don't Get Depressed, Get Creative

The market sucks. And all the government intervention in the world isn't going to help. People are moving into cash and holding onto it more than ever. We could see 10 percent unemployment by the end of the year, if not sooner or worse.

More and more billionaires are turning out to be crooks and once stalwart companies and even our own government is stealing our money.

Time to slit your wrist, jump under a train, or off a rooftop, right? F***-it. That's never done anybody any good. Suicide is for losers or, as the recent string of financial suicides has shown, for people who don't know how to create anything but false value and a lavish lifestyle for themselves. (My apologies to their families, who have certainly suffered as a result. I'm sorry for your loss.)

At times like these the only thing to do is to get creative. Start making things, something, anything. Make something out of yourself. Create your own path, your own existence.

What hidden talents do you have? What interests do you have that you never had time to explore? What value can you create for the world? What can you build that will be best positioned for a sustainable future?

Only the creative will survive this economic mess. What are you waiting for? Start creating.

02 February 2009

Review: Strategies for the Green Economy by Joel Makower

Joe Makower is truly a green guru.

Two decades ago he wrote The Green Consumer (which we published when I worked at Viking Penguin), and over the past 20 years he's become one of the leading advisers and sustainability strategists to Fortune 500 companies.

He knows how to navigate green waters and has ridden enough green waves to show you how to do it too.

Best of all, he doesn't take himself too seriously -- and he doesn't think consumers will ever completely make the change. In other words, you can believe what he says.

Countless pretenders would have you believe that people will change their way of living and buy their way to a better future or greener pastures. Makower, in his new book, Strategies for the Green Economy: Opportunities and Challenges in the New World of Business, says it's probably not possible, given how much consumer habits -- and people in general -- would have to change.

And after more than two decades, Makower seems to think that the more things change the more things stay the same. All the green marketing efforts -- and even the greening of many products and services -- has failed to move the needle when it comes to taking action.

And it turns out, we're all to blame.

"The result of all this--motivated but distrustful consumers, proactive but humble companies, aggressive but often misguided activists, the media's mixed messages, and the lack of norms and standards of what is 'good enough' -- is that it is almost impossible to create a workable green strategy that meets the expectations of a confused and cynical marketplace," Makower writes. "Did I mention that this is a dysfunctional conversation?"

Makower has the research to back up his claims, although the lack of any notes in the book makes it difficult to verify some of the source materials. He has reviewed and studied most of the major consumer-related research on green awareness and attitudes, and he shares with his readers how to interpret such data for their own use.

Part of the problem, according to Makower, stems from the relative complexity of the issues, whether it's climate change, environmental degradation or what it means to be a "good enough" green company. It turns out; it really isn't easy being green, after all.

"What many people don't seem to know (or have forgotten) is that the 'three R's' [reduce, reuse, recycle] represent more than just a clever alliteration; they are a hierarchy of priorities," Makower writes.

He identifies a corresponding hierarchy when it comes to climate change: Reduce your overall consumption of energy; purchase as much as possible from Renewable sources; and Remedy the climate impacts of nonrenewable energy consumed by purchasing carbon offsets.

The staccato style of the book's chapters, which read a bit like a series of loosely connected blog posts (maybe they were?), can be a little disconcerting. Makower covers a lot of ground in such a relatively short book.

Makower concludes that the "virus called the green economy has not hit critical mass." More companies are paying attention and developing programmatic strategies (look at Wal-Mart, GE, and others). "But a high level of interest does not a tipping point make."

Still, in the end, Makower believes there are enormous opportunities for success -- for consumers, companies, and for ordinary citizens. And green will be an enduring issue for businesses and shareholders for years to come.

Strategies for the Green Economy begins to provide a roadmap for companies to create lasting value by going green.

(Disclosure: I formerly wrote for GreenBiz.com, one of Joel Makower's publications.)

23 January 2009

Shari Shapiro On Why Change Has Already Come to Washington

My friend Shari Shapiro, one of the smartest green people I know in the legal community, has an excellent new post up on GreenerBuildings.com (the post originally appeared on her own blog Green Building Law).

Here is the opening paragraph:

Long the city of high crime, poverty and neglect by the federal government which calls it home, Washington D.C. has passed some of the most progressive sustainability regulations in the country since 2006. For example in December 2006, Washington mandated, among other things, that private buildings 50,000 square feet or larger have to submit a checklist of green features by 2009, and meet LEED NC 2.2 standards by 2012. In addition to green building regulations, Washington has enacted comprehensive sustainability legislation, including a Clean and Affordable Energy Act, a Green Summer Jobs bill, a Climate Initiative and stormwater and water quality regulations.

And a link to the full article: Change Has Already Come

Shari also had a great critique of the Obama Stimulus Package earlier this week: Shortchanging the Environment.

13 January 2009

On Al Gore, Crises, and Sustainability

Al Gore - World Economic Forum Annual Meeting ...

Image by World Economic Forum via Flickr"Short-term thinking has led to the climate crisis, just as it has led to the financial crisis," Al Gore told the group of us gathered at PNC Bank in Center City Philadelphia this afternoon. "Our financial system has been functionally insane -- we need a sustainable capitalism."

It's a message Mr. Gore as been giving over the past year, and one that seems to resonate with folks, and certainly with many in the room who were brought together by outgoing Pennsylvania Treasurer Robin Wiessmann.

"The solution to the financial, environmental and energy crises we face is the same," Mr. Gore opined. "Reduce our dependency on polluting sources and troubled assets."

He also suggested that we need to return to a long-term view, whether it's investing or protecting the environment.

Speaking of his own firm, Generation Investment Management, Mr. Gore suggested, "We set out to prove that you can outperform by adapting sustainability principles. We asked, 'When you use the word profit, what do you mean? Ninety days? Twelve months? Or seven years? We wanted a sustained profitability."

As I've written elsewhere on this blog, Mr. Gore has settled into his role as climate statesman very well. He has a kind of homespun-meets businessman demeanor that is appealing when he stays away from hyperbole.

I'm concerned about his overuse of the word "crisis," for instance, and his insistence on the "facts" about global warming, dismissing questions about variations in arctic ice calculations as relying on mere "factoids."

And I do wish he would stop using the allusion to the Chinese character for Crisis being "a combination of the characters for 'danger' and 'opportunity,'" which has been disputed by the University of Pennsylvania's Victor H. Mair

, professor of Chinese language and literature, and which I've written about elsewhere on this blog.

But he has a point when it comes to the long view. How can we expect economies, companies, or people in general to embrace sustainability when they are expected to think only of the next week, the next quarter, even the next year rather than in the lifetime of a business-cycle or a generation?

15 October 2008

Blog Action Day '08: Poverty and Energy

Energy is a basic human need and underlies all economic and social activity. It is an "indispensable element of sustainable human development," according to the International Energy Agency (IEA). "Without access to modern, commercial energy, poor countries can be trapped in a vicious circle of poverty, social instability and underdevelopment."

And yet, today, according to a 2005 UNDP study, Energizing the Millennium Development Goals, "millions of households in the developing world still lack access to safe and reliable energy and pay high prices for poor-quality substitutes. Moreover, poor people spend much of their income on energy, more than a third of household expenditures in some countries."

That would be bad enough were it the only impact, but poor households, especially women, also "devote a large portion of another important asset, their time, on energy related activities--women and young girls spend upwards of 6 hours a day gathering fuelwood and water, cooking, and agro-processing."

Worldwide, around 2.4 billion people still use solid fuels, including wood, dung, agricultural waste, and coal to meet their household energy needs. Cooking and heating using open fires or traditional, inefficient stoves results in health-compromising indoor air pollution, and causes up to 1.6 million deaths every year, according to the Baker Institute Energy Forum at Rice University in Houston. Most of those deaths involve women (60 percent) and children under five with acute respiratory infections.

In some countries, Baker Institute researchers claim, "this neglected health risk is to blame for 3.7 percent of all deaths, making it the most lethal killer after malnutrition, unsafe sex and lack of safe water and adequate sanitation."

Worldwide, according to sources familiar with the situation, two billion people live without any access to modern energy supplies and about 1.6 billion people live without access to electricity.

It's a vicious cycle: poor households do not have the resources to obtain cleaner, more efficient fuels and appliances; so they rely on solid household fuels and limited, often inefficient appliances, which in turn reduces the potential for economic development and affects their health and productivity, keeping them from making their way up the poverty ladder.

One can argue that achieving many of the UN Millennium Development Goals by 2015 is extremely difficult, if not impossible, without addressing the need for increased access to cleaner, affordable, and safer energy.

Researchers at the Baker Institute conclude that, "In order to halve the number of people living on less than $1 per day, there is a concomitant need to reduce the number of people who lack electricity services by some 560-600 million." Their price-tag for providing electricity services to these people? Around US$200 billion.

It's kind of a no-brainer: Better energy services can reduce workloads and indoor air pollution, potentially generate income for poor households, and lead to greater environmental sustainability, encouraging better natural resource management and improved water quality.

Microenergy or small, distributed energy generation may be the key to providing energy services to the global poor. Small-scale solar installations are now affordable for application in most rural, developing countries. Wind turbines, geothermal, and more efficient biomass or biogas stoves can reduce the impact of indoor air pollution and forest degradation.

As microfinance has revolutionized the access of financial services to the poor -- by no means is that revolution complete -- so, too, can microenergy help leverage the rural poor out of their vicious cycle of poverty.

And just as there is a ladder out of poverty, there is a corresponding ladder of energy (see diagram above). Increasing energy access to the world's rural poor can contribute to reducing global poverty. Indeed, you can't reduce rural poverty without it.

(Diagram Source: IEA Analysis, World Energy Outlook 2002)

20 August 2008

Review: Lester Brown's Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization

You may want to read this book by starting with Part II. Either that or make sure all the knives are locked away so you won't slit your wrists during Part I.

Lester Brown has his facts straight and uses them liberally, but reading about how dire is the current situation on the Earth leaves you feeling hopeless.

Increasing shortages of water, rising CO2 levels, food security, health, education, and natural systems under stress. What can we possibly do to change this for the better?

Luckily, Brown pivots after the first 127 pages and devotes the rest of the book to solutions.

"There are many things we do not know about the future," Brown writes. "But one thing we do know is that business as usual will not continue for much longer...Will the change come because we move quickly to restructure the economy or because we fail to act and civilization begins to unravel?"

That is the critical question of this book. Can we move fast enough and for the right reasons?

Brown, the founder of Worldwatch and the Earth Policy Institute, has been promoting a sustainable future for over 30 years.

He includes recommendations for eradicating poverty, stabilizing population (through education and contraception), restoring natural systems, feeding the projected 8 billion we are likely to see in this century, and shifting to greater energy efficiency and alternatives.

And he budgets out the necessary costs, estimating Plan B will take an additional annual expenditure of $190M, "roughly one third of the current U.S. Military budget or one sixth of the global military budget."

Brown concludes: "The choice is ours -- yours and mine. We can stay with business as usual and preside over an economy that continues to destroy its natural support systems until it destroys itself, or we can adopt Plan B and be the generation that changes direction, moving the world onto a path of sustained progress."

What choice do we have?

(Blogging by BlackBerry; links to come later.)

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