sustainability

Branson launches B-Team to Champion Sustainability

The BBC report today that Sir Richard Branson, Founder of the Virgin Group and Kering Director Jochen Zeitz have launched a non-profit group, to encourage global businesses to look more seriously at sustainability issues.

The B Team will champion “a new way of doing business that prioritises people and planet alongside profit”.  Sir Richard told the BBC.  “Business has previously been concerned with the bottom line and has not got involved in society or with the wider issues of the world.”

The B team consists of 14 global business leaders, including Paul Polman, CEO, Unilever and Shari Arison, Owner, Arison Group.

In a statement, they said that they will face three initial challenges: “The Future of Leadership”, “The Future Bottom Line” and “The Future of Incentives”, and in a live online broadcast today they issued a joint Declaration acknowledging key global problems such as growing inequality, unemployment and the unsustainable use of natural resources.

Within the Declaration the group state; they have come to the “overwhelming conclusion that businesses have been a major contributor to the [environmental] problems, and we as business leaders have the responsibility of creating sustainable solutions.”

“Therefore, if we leverage the many positives of business – the spirit of enterprise, innovation and entrepreneurship that has helped realize improvements in quality of life and enabled technological and scientific progress – we can create an unprecedented era of sustainable, inclusive prosperity for all.”

“Today we want to start a global conversation on a “Plan B” for business,” said co-founder Sir Richard Branson. “We are working with government agencies, the social sector, and business leaders to help get on top of some of the world’s seemingly intractable challenges. We are keen to listen, learn and share with others to build businesses that do what’s right for people and the planet.”
Allen & York are recruitment specialists within Sustainability and CSR, current opportunities include:

Think Megatrends

The world has never been a simple place, but the sheer amount of churn in recent years has been extraordinary.

On Wednesday, Credit Suisse will host the Global Megatrends Conference in Miami to explore in detail the landscape ahead for fixed income, equities, private equity, and hedge funds, as well as the larger themes that will move economies and markets long term. The conference is one of several similar events taking place around the world this year and the inaugural event in the United States.

The long run is where “Megatrends” come in. Michael O’Sullivan, Head of Portfolio Strategy and Thematic Research at Credit Suisse, defines the term as “major economic, social, and political forces relevant across decades,” and says that paying attention to these big-picture forces allows for forward-looking insight even as the frenetic markets continue to jerk up and down. In a recent Credit Suisse Private Banking report, “Compass: Navigating the Investment Landscape,” O’Sullivan identified three such themes – demographics, sustainability, and a multipolar world.

The first megatrend covers the impact of significant demographic shifts driven primarily by an aging developed world and high population growth in emerging markets. The world is urbanizing at an astonishing rate, particularly in Asia and Africa, and the emergence of megacities will require significant infrastructure investments, O’Sullivan writes. The health care sector will continue to expand, and medical advances should radically improve life expectancy in developing countries.  Both developed countries and emerging markets will increasingly have to wrestle with diseases associated with aging populations, such as Alzheimer’s and cancer.

Investors should also realize that the days of a few all-important economic superpowers are numbered, paving the way for a multipolar world. This new political order, driven by expanding middle class populations in Asia, Latin America, and other fast-growing regions, forms the basis for O’Sullivan’s second megatrend.

“The size of the global middle class is expected to grow from its current 2 billion to almost 5 billion in 2030, entirely driven by emerging markets,” O’Sullivan writes. “As a consequence, Asia’s share of global spending is expected to surge from 25 percent today to almost 60 percent in 2030.”

Globalization and an increasing clamor for global trade and supply chains will see the continued diffusion of economic firepower and wealth, but O’Sullivan cautions that rapid growth in emerging markets brings environmental risks that must be heeded if the world’s economies are to grow sustainably.

Developing renewable energy resources and adapting to potential threats from weather-related disasters, cybercrime, and pandemics can boost sustainability for companies, individuals and governments all over the globe, and may also be an investment opportunity.

“Investments that guide capital toward projects and companies that help to manage resources sustainably and responsibly are gaining traction,” O’Sullivan wrote.

But how can investors play the trends more specifically? O’Sullivan suggests looking at a firm’s innovation as a measure of how it opens new markets and makes products accessible to more customers rather than just the capacity for inventing new technologies. He also recommends investing across asset classes, guarding against buying into hype that may turn out to be short-lived and looking at megatrend-driven investment as a means of portfolio diversification, which means recognizing the potential risks.

In the near term, investors have been talking about how to play a recent rally in equities and how to invest profitably in a world characterized by low interest rates.

Barbara Reinhard, Credit Suisse’s Chief Investment Strategist, and Philipp Lisibach, a Director with Credit Suisse’s Private Banking Americas Asset Allocation and Investment Strategy team, suggest in the Compass report that “plentiful liquidity, attractive valuations, and low inflation make equities among our best options in an asset allocation context.” But the pair acknowledges that many investors who are holding large amounts of capital in cash might be more comfortable easing into investing in equities, rather than piling in all at once.

Reinhard will give an address on the global outlook for the rest of the year at the Megatrends conference, and Lisibach will moderate a panel on fixed income. Look for those events and deep dives into other asset classes at the conference website.

In the coming months, The Financialist will continue to explore the Megatrends in more depth through stories that touch on the themes of changing demographics, a multipolar world, and sustainability.

Photo courtesy of szeke via Compfight cc

Environmental Considerations: Shampoo

Story by Erin Parfet contributing author for the PeoplePlanetProfitBlog.com

It’s sad that even with a biochemistry degree and (unofficial) chemistry minor with various electives in pharmaceutical chemistry/pharmacy that the ingredients on a garden variety bottle of commercial shampoo sometimes confound even me. These ingredients are not only utilized in shampoo, but other personal care products such as conditioners, facial cleansers, and toothpastes. While one could explore the health effects of such chemical concoctions, there are also environmental implications of washing these down the drain during their respective cleansing processes. Let’s explore some ingredients I found on a random (undisclosed) bottle of shampoo:

Water, sodium laureth sulfate, sodium lauryl sulfate, cocamidopropyl betaine, sodium chloride, citric acid, sodium citrate, fragrance, various extracts, polyethylene (PEG)-60, sodium benzoate, tetrasodium ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA), methylparaben, propylparaben, yellow 5, orange 4, violet 2

Water and sodium chloride (similar to table salt basically) seem harmless enough.

Sodium laureth sulfate and sodium lauryl sulfate have detergent-like properties, and detergents can affect the composition of interactions between water-soluble and water-insoluble components of a molecule. Think of water-water as soluble, and water-oil as insoluble. Molecules have specific arrangements and interactions between water-soluble and water-insoluble components to sustain proper molecule functioning, and thus ultimately life. This is true whether human life, aquatic life, or plant life. Now after your shower, sodium laureth sulfate in your shampoo is washed down the drain. Who is to say some of this water does not end up affecting marine life, whether it be fish or aquatic plants whose cells are not designed to be disrupted by a detergent agent?

The parabens in general (methylparaben and propylparaben) are antifungal agents. While we don’t want our shampoo bottle to grow fungus, consider the implications of an antifungal agent finding its way into nature and interrupting the normal growth of fungus needed in natural ecosystems.

Yellow 5: derived from coal tar. Do we want coal tar derivatives in our waterways and ecosystems?

Fragrance: how nonspecific. This could be a lot of compounds, so this one is hard to assess without more information.

This isn’t an exhaustive analysis, but enough hopefully to get one thinking.

Just think, if these chemicals have effects on human health, what about the wildlife that is exposed to such chemicals when runoff drains into our lakes, rivers, or other waterways? What about the untold effects of these chemicals not only on aquatic life, but perhaps in terms of altering the pH of soil or water such that growth of native species is inhibited due to un-ideal conditions? What happens when runoff containing personal product A mixes with runoff with personal product B? The ingredients may be slightly different between products A and B leading to who knows what potential chemical reactions. Multiply this by the number of products available on the market and consider the number of people utilizing such an array of products. The end result is literally a chemical brew with who knows what byproducts from untold numbers of side reactions, and the effects on both health and the environment are hard to quantify, or sometimes, even qualify.

Food for thought.

About Erin Parfet

I am a graduate of Kansas State University with a degree in biochemistry,
with a special interest in agricultural and environmental issues. I believe we need to protect and respect our planet, while simultaneously promoting human and animal health and well-being.

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Top 10 Reasons to Get a Sustainability Audit

Story by Noah Botwinick, contributing author for the PeoplePlanetProfitBlog.com.
What is a Sustainability Audit?

An audit is a systematic evaluation process that is directed at verifying whatever facility, structure or organization getting the audit’s status is in regard to specific criteria. According to the professional association for EHS auditors, an audit is, “a systematic, documented process of objectively collecting and evaluating factual information in order to verify a site or organization’s… status with respect to specific, predetermined criteria (Auditing Roundtable, 1997).” The audit criteria are explicit measures or requirements, such as regulations, standards, performance indicators, metrics, principles, guidelines and corporate directions, that the auditor uses to evaluate the information gathered during the audit process. A sustainability audit is a type of audit that looks into the effectiveness of implemented sustainability programs measured against specific criteria. In other words, a sustainability audit is a way of learning about your facility’s or company’s energy practices and seeing how they compare to other companies and against official standards.

…a sustainability audit is a way of learning about your facility’s or company’s energy practices and seeing how they compare to other companies and against official standards.

 Why Should You Get a Sustainability Audit?

1)      Save Money:

 >  Save money on your electricity bills by pinpointing areas where energy is being wasted.
>  Many organizations and corporations have been undergoing sustainability audits because there has been evidence that increased financial performance has often resulted from improving performance in environmental areas.
>  Additionally, a company showing that it cares about sustainable practices attracts support from socially responsible investing groups.

2)      Preventative Measure:

In homes, buildings and facilities, an energy audit can help discover structural and safety problems such as rot and mold, before they lead to more costly damage.

3)      Internal management need:

A company looking to manage business risk and opportunity, support internal decision making, and/or build trust within various stakeholder communities can get a sustainability audit.

4)      Compliance with Government Regulations:

Getting a sustainability audit can help a corporation or business understand where it needs to fix its sustainable practices in order to comply with government regulations, and can help them deal with these issues.

5)      Prioritize:

Getting a sustainability audit can help a company, business or homeowner understand cost-effective improvement opportunities. By seeing all the issues laid out with their respective solutions,

6)      Home Improvements:

>  Make your home more comfortable and pleasant by figuring out how to properly heat or cool areas that are difficult to maintain at proper temperatures.
> Identify what cheaper options are available for heating and fuel bills.

7)      Increase Resale Value:

By auditing your home or business and fixing energy issues or installing energy upgrades and improvements, the resale value of the home or facility is increased; how much depends on the nature and extent of the improvements.

8)      Demands from shareholders, employees and financial institutions:

More and more companies are being pushed from stakeholders to look into a broader range of sustainable development issues in regards to an organization’s production. Although companies and businesses have been publishing their own reports regarding the sustainability of their own practices, stakeholders have been demanding audits because they represent an impartial, third-party investigation and report of a corporation’s sustainable practices. Thus, getting an audit improves the credibility of a company in the eyes of the stakeholders.

9)       Comparing Energy Practices:

By conducting a sustainability audit, a company can compare its practices to other companies within the same industry to understand where it stands and if further improvements are needed and in what areas. An audit enables this comparison because it measures everyone using the same impartial standards, thus making comparisons useful.

10)  Broaden Your Thinking:

A sustainability audit will likely identify dozens of initiatives in areas of a business previously never considered. By having an audit conducted, you will discover areas in your practices that can be improved upon that you didn’t even know about.

About Noah Botwinick

Currently attending Yeshiva University in New York. Majoring in political science. I’m passionate about protecting the environment and the world we live in. I believe that sustainable, clean and efficient energy practices hold the key to reversing the damaging effects we’ve had on the earth. In addition, I played on my college basketball team for 2 years and I’m the editor in chief of the YU yearbook. 

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5 Ways To Engage Employees in The Sustainability Movement

Story by Amanda Azzoli, contributing author for the PeoplePlanetProfitBlog.com.  The Sustainability Movement has become one of the most important and popular trends in today’s society. Because of this popularity and importance, Sustainability has also become a critical component for any successful business. In order to stay innovative, profitable and relevant, businesses must incorporate sustainability into their core culture and values. However, in order for any company to be successful and stay committed to this endeavor, they all need to have employees that are engaged in the movement. The reason for this is because: Employees are the life of an organization. They make up a company’s structure and they embody the company’s culture and principles. An organization is dependent on its employees because, without employees, an organization cannot survive.

Employees are the life of an organization. They make up a company’s structure and they embody the company’s culture and principles. An organization is dependent on its employees because, without employees, an organization cannot survive.

This article will discuss important fundamental rules for engaging an employee as well as examine an organization that has proven to be a leading contributor in the sustainability movement.

             Because employee engagement is such a large component in the success of any organization, I wanted to review  some basic techniques for engaging an employee. These techniques are important because effective communication is required in both our social lives and professional lives. Proper communication is often undervalued and, in some cases, can even be the solution to a failing business or relationship.

The list below is not exhaustive. It includes the techniques that, through my own research, I believe to be the most effective. The techniques for successful employee engagement are as follows:

1.  Be specific and realistic with the company’s vision

2.  Set measurable achievements with a target deadline.

Measuring employees or an organization’s, achievements motivates employees to work towards a certain goal, within a certain time frame. This eliminates uncertainly, which helps employees stay focused.

3.  Choose aspects of the overall goal that are most important.

Decide which aspects of the overall goal are most important and start achieving those.

4.  Provide a detailed explanation of why improvement is needed

Explain what the benefits are, both short-term and long-term

5.  Most important: Treat employees as important assets

Remember, the employees are the veins of the company, working together to keep the organization alive. Treat them as such.

A great example of an organization that has succeeded in employee engagement and has stayed committed to the sustainability movement is General Electric, a company ranked #1 by Forbes Magazine for Most Sustainable Company. In order to remain committed to sustainability, GE has established a division within the company, GE Citizenship, which is dedicated to solving the world’s most difficult sustainability issues. GE Citizenship focuses on issues regarding the people, planet, and economy. As stated on the GE’s website, GE Citizenship “focuses on areas where we can make a difference, either through the way we operate within the business, the marketplace, or through our broader influence in society” (gecitizenship.com).

GE Citizenship continuously collaborates with its customers, suppliers, regulators, industry bodies, and collaborators around the world. The Citizenship division has created both Advisory Boards and Advisory Panels that focus on sustainability issues, product development, and on ways to “sharpen” the company’s vision. GE acknowledges that trends and issues are ever evolving; therefore, GE needs to constantly change in order to ensure that it is meeting its goals and providing effective service wherever needed.

These panels and boards help GE stay committed and engaged because they not only provide information to the external environment about GE efforts, but they also provide GE’s internal environment, its employees, with a forum where they can raise issues, or dilemmas faced by other corporations, both domestic and global.

Another way GE keeps its employees engaged is by recognizing their value in the culture. For example, on the company website, the first sentence under GE’s Principles reads, “Our people are our biggest asset,” and goes on to say, “a legacy of good citizenship runs deep in our culture” (gecitizenship.com). GE recognizes that its employees are crucial to the fruition of the company’s goals and principles, and demonstrates this by listing its employee value as its first principle. GE understands that without its employees’ commitment and engagement, the company mission is unattainable.

One additional way GE keeps its employees engaged is by encouraging volunteer work. Employees not only volunteer as individuals, but they also volunteer during GE sponsored events. These company sponsored events are an integral part of the GE’s success because they promote teamwork and help foster bonds between employees.

GE is a great example of a company that has successfully committed to sustainability within its workforce, as well as successfully motivated its employees to be engaged in the cause. GE remains successful because, in addition to sustainability and its employees, GE values integrity and transparency. The company is very proud, and therefore, is public about its efforts to better the planet, which demonstrates confidence and honesty.  GE is proud of the work its employees produce and wants to share it with others. GE’s employees are driven by ethical and sustainable values that continue to benefit the company, as well as the planet.

About Amanda Azzoli

Currently completing my degree from the W.P. Carey School of Business at Arizona State University. I believe that educating the public on the importance of sustainability in our world today is paramount. I hope to continue my efforts in raising awareness on environmental protection. For the sake of my future children, grandchildren, and all future generations, we must continue to stay well informed. Feel free to follow me here on the PeoplePlanetProfitBlog or on my other websites.

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GMO: From Lab to Plate – A $150 billion industry! What is it and why should I care?

Story by Noah Botwinick, contributing author for the PeoplePlanetProfitBlog.com.

GMO stands for Genetically Modified Organisms, and it is generally used in regards to crops that have been genetically altered in some way. The purpose of modifying crops is to enhance certain desirable traits in the crops themselves, and the process is generally accomplished through genetic engineering. Scientists are able to locate a specific gene that is responsible for a desired trait and then insert this gene into a different plant of the same species. As the world population continues to increase and more land is utilized for housing instead of food production, there is a growing need to grow crops in locations previously considered to be unsuitable for plant cultivation.

Genetically engineered crops can survive in areas that naturally occurring crops of the same plant species cannot survive in.

It is this advantage that makes GM crops so desirable. As a result of ever increasing population growth coupled with a decreasing amount of arable land and natural resources due to climate change and human destruction, it is now possible to foresee a time when, without GMOs, there will no longer be enough land to grow the food required to sustain the human population. The basic concept behind GM crops is that they can provide a greater food yield using less land. Scientists also believe that biotechnology provides the key to protecting soil erosion, which will enable the same lands to be constantly reused for farming.

Using genetic engineering, scientists have been improving crops in a number of ways by making them:

• Insect resistant: Crops that have been modified to be insect resistant can save farmers from serious financial loss from insects that destroy crops. It’s also healthier for people to eat foods that haven’t been sprayed with pesticides, and not using pesticides is better for the environment as well.
• Herbicide tolerant: Crops that have been genetically engineered to be resistant to just one very powerful herbicide can help prevent environmental damage and reduce growing costs by reducing the amount of herbicides needed.
•  Disease resistant: Scientists are working on genetically modified crops that will be able to withstand viruses, fungi and bacteria that cause plant diseases.
• Frost tolerant: Crops have been genetically altered to resist and survive in cold temperatures, which saves crops during unexpected cold weather and allows crops to be grown in regions that were previously considered too cold to grow crops in.
• Drought tolerant: Scientists are creating crops that require less water and thus can better survive droughts and be planted in areas that previously couldn’t sustain crops.
• Salinity tolerant: Creating plants that can withstand high salt content in soil and groundwater will help farmers grow crops in formerly infertile places.
• Healthier: Researchers are working on making crops that are genetically engineered to contain additional vitamins and minerals so as to provide more sustenance for humans. They are also are working to develop edible vaccines grown into certain crops.
• Cleaners: Certain types of plants have been genetically engineered to clean up heavy metal pollution from polluted soil and underground water, making the soil and water suitable for growing crops.
• Grown on Roofs: By using biotechnology to genetically modify plants so that they can thrive in rooftop growing conditions and vertical farms, it greatly increases the amount of land available for crop growing.
• Cheaper: Some GM crops can be cheaper to grow than naturally occurring forms of the same plant.

Despite these potential improvements that genetically modified crops contain within them, there are still those that are against their usage, due to a number of concerns with the practice of altering the genetic makeup of plant species for mass production.Some possible dangers of using GM food include; unintended harm to other organisms, reduced effectiveness of pesticides and herbicides and transferring of genes to non-target species.For each of these concerns, however, there are ways scientists can genetically alter the makeup of the plant without resulting in these negative effects. There are also potential human health risks, such as the creation of a new life threatening allergen within a particular plant species as well as any other possible unknown effects that GM food might have on human health.Still, through extensive testing researchers should be able to design GM foods that don’t pose health risks.Lastly, there are economic concerns with creating GM crops as well. The main issue with creating crops that have been genetically altered to be better than the natural form of the specific crop is that these new forms of the crop are subject to intellectual property law; in other words, these new crops can be owned by one company.This can significantly raise the prices of the seeds for that crop and make small farmers unable to afford seeds.

…new forms of the crop are subject to intellectual property law; in other words, these new crops can be owned by one company.

In 2011, the global value of genetically modified seeds alone was $13.2 billion. In the same year, commercial grain from GM maize, soybean grain and cotton was worth $160 billion. Seed companies, agrochemical companies, distributors, farmers, grain elevators and companies that develop new crops all make money in the agriculture business market from genetically altered crops. Companies that create a genetically modified crop with a desire trait can sell these crops to farmers and agriculture companies all over the world; these crops are especially desirable in resource-poor areas of the world. According to statistics by the ISAAA, roughly 15 million farmers spanning 29 countries around the world use GM crops, most of which were in developing countries.

Before these GM foods enter most national markets, they have to be cleared by the national food authorities as not possessing any health or environmental risks. Therefore, GM products that can be bought at a supermarket have all been cleared as safe by the national government’s food authorities. This holds true for GM products circulating in the international market as well. The World Health Organization is constantly working to improve the safety of GMOs by evaluating their risks and working to help solve them.

About Noah Botwinick

Currently attending Yeshiva University in New York. Majoring in political science. I’m passionate about protecting the environment and the world we live in. I believe that sustainable, clean and efficient energy practices hold the key to reversing the damaging effects we’ve had on the earth. In addition, I played on my college basketball team for 2 years and I’m the editor in chief of the YU yearbook. 

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A Sustainable Fast Food Industry?

Story by Karmen Cheung, contributing author for the PeoplePlanetProfitBlog.com.  This year McDonald’s became the first fast food chain to make it onto the EPA’s Top 50 Green Power Purchasers list. Over the last ten years, McDonald’s and other leaders of the fast food industry have made efforts to improve their image through incorporating socially and environmentally responsible strategies into their business models. While fast food restaurants may never be 100% sustainable, there are many ways in which fast food companies can reduce their footprints. Small steps have already been made over the past several years but true impact is still far beyond our reach.  Some ideas that fast food industry leaders have started exploring include:

Powering restaurants with green energy

Increased investment in wind or solar energy could have immense impact on the renewable industries as well as lead to energy savings for fast food chains.

Thirty percent of McDonald’s electricity use at company-owned restaurants comes from wind power and the company is buying 306 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) of Green-e certified renewable energy certificates (RECs) annually.

Chipotle announced in 2009 that they would be installing solar panels at approximately 75 of its restaurants. When complete the installations are expected to produce 500 kilowatts of electricity collectively, and make Chipotle the largest direct producer of solar energy in the restaurant industry. Solar panels located on rooftops would not only help restaurants generate enough electricity to power the restaurant in the summer months but would also provide shade to decrease energy demand.

Recycling used cooking oil

The simple recycling of cooking oil to power diesel vehicles will reduce US spending on foreign oil by billions of dollars. Shake Shack, a rapidly growing chain of burger, hot dog and milk shake restaurant, already recycles all of their cooking oil into biofuel. Across the country, other restaurants, including McDonald’s are also slowly starting to adopt this practice.

Reduce impacts of packaging

The amount of packaging used in fast food restaurants has a large impact on the timber, paper and paper packaging industries. According to Dogwood Alliance, Starbucks and McDonald’s have been leaders in promoting sustainable packaging policies. Starbucks has been slowly working towards its goal of providing only reusable or recyclable cups by 2015 and McDonald’s has reduce the paper in its napkins by 21 percent and cut out 84 tons of paper in 2010 by reducing the size of bun tray liners. In October of this year, KFC has also issued a new sustainable packaging policy after two years of pressure from Dogwood Alliance.

LEED certify buildings

Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) is a voluntary, consensus-based, market-driven program that provides third party verification of green buildings. Participation in and international acceptance of LEED has grown rapidly over the past twenty years. Subways already has three LEED certified buildings and KFC opened up its first LEED certified restaurant in Indianapolis last year (this was also the first LEED certified retail building in the state). McDonald’s took the lead in green fast food restaurants recently with their participation in the LEED Volume program in which they pledged to build 25 LEED certified restaurants in the next three years.  Burger King has also laid an aggressive strategy to spend three billion dollars on remodeling more than half of its stores to become more energy efficient. The project, known as 20/20 stores are already being designed and rebuilt.

The initiatives mentioned in this article are not meant to be comprehensive in anyway but simply represents a small sampling of projects undertaken by fast food industry leaders.

About Karmen Cheung

I’m a New York City native currently attending Yale University focusing on Environmental Studies. I’m a big fan of large cities and good public transportation systems. Recently, I had the amazing opportunity to work with American Wind Association and while I’m not sure where life will take me next, I hope to work on issues of sustainability and corporate social responsibility in the near future. I believe in the power that businesses have and the role they need to play in efforts to create a more sustainable world.

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Five Innovations for Cities of the Future

With regrets to William Van Alen, the masterful architect of the Chrysler Building, great urban design has moved beyond the simple power of that iconic structure.

What matters now in urban design are landmark spaces defined by culture, shopping and social experiences. Bonus points go to designs that seamlessly integrate public transportation, whisking passengers away to their next destination by bus, train or bike. Urban paradises of the future are also likely to make sustainability a priority by incorporating ways to recycle energy or natural resources.

This, at least, is the gospel according to Peter David Cavaluzzi, a principal in the New York office of international architecture and design firm Perkins Eastman. Cavaluzzi designed Las Vegas’ CityCenter and worked on plans for the Vanke Beijing MiniCity and Moynihan Penn Station in New York, among other projects.

“We are seeing now more and more that development needs to be focused on high-quality public environments,” Cavaluzzi says. “That’s going to be the selling point in small and large cities across the world.”

Cavaluzzi and his peers are trying to reflect an ascendant urban culture in which a transportation hub, for example, doubles as a work and social space – a place where laptops and smartphones are as common as a ticket stub.

Demographics are the wind at these designers’ backs. Each year, 65 million people worldwide move to cities, and this year, data showed that most cities in America were growing faster than their adjacent suburbs. The great migration of young workers to urban centers has defined what it means to be a 21^st century city.

While the reinvention of the city is nothing new – see New York circa 1990 – some innovations are more agenda-setting than others.

Cavaluzzi’s guiding principle is the concept of “open transit,” which transforms a public transportation space into a nexus for city life.

That’s the idea behind The Interchange, a transit hub in Minneapolis designed by EE&K, a Perkins Eastman company.  Scheduled to open in 2014, it will feature concert and performance spaces, a great lawn, an urban plaza and shops.

Steam generated by a nearby recycling facility will be piped into The Interchange’s public spaces during the winter, and a rainwater collection system will redistribute water across the site. The bus and rail lines will be so integrated, Cavaluzzi says, that they almost disappear.

Developer David Malmuth, who has previously worked with Cavaluzzi, also subscribes to the view that sense of place is king. Indeed, Malmuth believes this sensibility is what draws innovators to urban areas, ensuring that people continue wanting to live and work in places that may otherwise have died out long ago.

He points to 22@Barcelona and London’s Tech City as examples of urban areas revitalized by investment and creative planning.

Malmuth, in partnership with developer Pete Garcia, has proposed a similar project in San Diego known as I.D.E.A. District, a 93-acre zone that relies on “creative placemaking” to attract talented workers and create a cluster of jobs at the intersection of design and technology.

“The important notion is that any way you can make your city more authentic, or feel more that it’s uniquely it’s own place” makes a project better, Malmuth says. “Those things are really appealing to a younger generation.”

Here is an example of five innovations that have the power to improve the concrete jungle.

Photos courtesy of:   Flickr — HeyItsWilliam, Flickr - KLEPER, Knutson Construction/EE&K a Perkins Eastman company, Flickr — Fred Hso

Allen & York Finalist for the NORA Awards

International Sustainability Recruiters, Allen & York are proud to be a finalist for the 12th annual National Online Recruitment Awards as Best National Recruitment Agency.

This year over 164,348  nominations were received for 583 separate websites.  The judging process is taken from the perspective of the job seeker and implemented by industry professionals.

We’ll like to thank everyone for nominating Allen & York this year and we are pleased we are offering a good candidate experience on our website.

The National Online Recruitment Awards aim to acknowledge and reward excellence in online recruitment. Find out more on the website.

Companies Failing to address Water Scarcity

A detailed report by KPMG has outlined that the majority of the world’s largest companies lack a long-term water strategy.

The findings reveal that 60% of the largest companies globally do not demonstrate a long-term strategy to deal with water scarcity in their CR reporting.
Vincent Neate, Head of Climate Change and Sustainability at KPMG in the UK, said while the issue of water scarcity is rising in the public consciousness, many leading companies are not yet taking steps to reduce their water consumption but that investors would increasingly require it.

The report also found that while three-quarters of the world’s largest 250 companies address water issues in CR reports, only a small proportion currently report on the water footprint of any part of their supply chain, and none had reported on the water footprint of its entire supply chain.

Of the companies that produce a CR report, 95% of Indian companies, 69% of Spanish companies and 66% of UK companies include specific plans to reduce water usage. This contrasts with just 24% of Chinese companies and 27% of Japanese companies.

Allen & York are international sustainability recruiters, with a number of opportunities within the water and wider environmental sector.  Job opportunities include:

C2C: A New Approach to Sustainable Design

Capitalism is known for both its efficiency and its creative destruction; despite the drive for ever more efficient methods of production, the contemporary economy still creates an enormous amount of waste. Now, devotees of the concept of sustainable design are looking to natural processes as inspiration for new ways to bring greater efficiency to modern manufacturing and usher in the next wave of creative destruction. 

A group of product design professionals are using the environment to develop entirely new, much more efficient, waste-free manufacturing processes. After all, nature is an all encompassing system that does not produce waste – at least not in the manner traditional manufacturing does. While humans tend to ignore any utility in goods that have reached the end of their “useful” existence, nature is constantly recycling waste into entirely new products. “This fundamental difference,” writes Thomas C. Kaufmann, Senior Equity Analyst at Credit Suisse, “stems from our linear thinking in terms of inputs and outputs versus nature’s way of organizing things in circular flows.”

That new, more circular approach to waste management is being championed by Michael Braungart, the German founder of Environmental Protection and Encouragement Agency (EPEA) and famed American architect William McDonough. Together, the two aim to replicate nature’s efficient waste-management process. Their system, called “cradle-to-cradle” (C2C), is a holistic approach that borrows from the idea that “waste” can ultimately be used to design an entirely new product. This differs from even the most “green” designs being employed today, which still create significant amounts of pre and post consumer waste. As Credit Suisse’s Kaufmann points out, “Being less bad is not being good”, which is a mantra of C2C design. Instead of simply minimizing the environmental impacts of a product like most of green design does, C2C could create ideally a truly sustainable cycle of creation and destruction.

Differentiation between two separate material flow cycles, biological and technical, is central to C2C design. Though the materials in both the technical and biological cycles ultimately nourish another round of production and consumption, the methods in which this is completed is wholly different. Components of the biological cycle are returned to the environment in which they become the building blocks for living systems – essentially a form of composting. The technical cycle allows smart human design to come to the fore. According to Kaufmann, the technical cycle “is a closed-loop materials flow in which non-biodegradable compounds, such as metals and certain types of polymers, are circulated in industrial cycles.”

 
A certification process is central to the advancement of the C2C concept and that process is currently based on a product’s use of desirable and undesirable substances as well as the potential for reuse of the materials. C2C certification also takes into account the type of energy sources used during production, the overall environmental effects, and the social impacts. While it might be tempting to dismiss C2C as a fringe concept, a growing number of the world’s most recognizable companies, including Alcoa, DSM and Procter & Gamble, are beginning to embrace the C2C approach. Ultimately, C2C’s promise stems from its ability to cut waste even for the most successful large cap companies – boosting both profits and environmental sustainability.

 
Thomas C. Kaufmann is a Senior Equity Analyst at Credit Suisse. 

Demand for Sustainable Packaging

The demand for sustainability packaging has meant that the global market for biodegradable plastics is expected to soar over the next six years.

A study released this August by Transparency Market Research predicts that the market for these materials will be worth nearly $7.8bn by 2018, almost quadrupling from its current value of $2.3bn.

Biodegradable plastics covers both synthetic (petroleum derived) and renewable (bio-based) materials with the growth being in the renewable bio based materials as it is considered a more sustainable option.

The bio-based sector alone is expected to reach a value of $7bn over the next six years.  This rising value is driven by major brands such as Coca-Cola, who are now looking to exploit greater use of plant-based materials for use in packaging – the drinks company announced last year it was entering into partnerships with biotech companies to develop commercial solutions for its next-generation of PlantBottle.

There are other factors that also contribute to the growth of such materials, such as  cheap feedstock supply and consumer acceptance.
Allen & York are international sustainability recruiters with sustainable  job opportunities throughout the globe, including:

Masdar City installs first rapid charger in Middle East

Masdar City where Allen & York Middle East is based is a low-carbon low-waste emerging development that aims to be one of the world’s most sustainable cities, has installed the Middle East’s first rapid charging station in collaboration with Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd (MHI), as part of its ongoing efforts to promote sustainable transportation and serve as a testbed for cutting edge development in clean and sustainable technology.
The pilot project aims to assess how efficiently the rapid charger technology will function in the region’s harsh climatic conditions. The CHAdeMO-certified Rapid Charger (EFACEC, EV QC) is a high efficiency DC charger provided by Efacec, a leading manufacturer of AC and DC chargers. The charger will serve as a charging station for the 12 Mitsubishi Motors Electric Vehicles “i-MiEV” (EVs) currently in operation at Masdar City.

Previously, the Electirca Vehicles  (EVs) had to be charged for six hours continuously using standard electrical outlets. With the arrival of the new rapid charger, the EV’s batteries can now be charged up to 80% full  in approximately 30 minutes.

Naser Al Marzouqi, Head of Facilities Management, Masdar City, said: “With a reduced charging time, a greater number of EVs will be in operation throughout the day. This project embodies Masdar City’s commitment to promoting electric vehicles. As an open technology platform, Masdar City will continue to work with various clean technology providers to provide sustainable transportation systems.”

Pedro Silva, Electric Mobility Director, Efacec, said: “We are pleased to be part of such an innovative project as Masdar City. We are committed to securing mass acceptance for electric mobility as it will be the next step towards sustainable mobility on a large scale. Our chargers were designed for best efficiency and high quality standards as part of that effort.”
Allen & York Middle East are sustainability recruiters with a number of vacancies throughout the Middle East region, including:

Fuel Free Energy

1. Why Fossil Fuel Companies Hate Solar So Much – CleanTechnica

   2 days ago … We’ve covered these points below (including the specific case study discussed) numerous times before, but this is an…

   

   Cleantechnica

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2. About Wind Energy / Why Wind Energy – CleanTechnica

   Installed Wind Power Capacity (total and new in 2010; for the world as a … http:// www.wind-works.org/index.html … http://cleantechn…

   

   Cleantechnica

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3. 7 Arguments Against Nuclear Power (Why It Should Be a NoGo …

   2 days ago … 7 Arguments Against Nuclear Power (Why It Should Be a No-Go) … It certainly summarizes my own 7 reasons for being agai…

   

   Cleantechnica

Councils Need to Lower Emissions

Source: BBC

Outlined in an article on the BBC website today is how local authorities across the UK should have a statutory duty to combat climate change, government advisors have recommend.

The Committee on Climate Change says that councils can make major cuts in greenhouse gas emissions in areas such as housing, traffic and waste.  Its report claims that some councils are taking action but many others are not, which threatens national climate goals.

But with many councils struggling with finance, the committee says more government support may be needed.

The committee is the government’s statutory adviser on climate change, and has recommended progressively tighter carbon budgets for the UK leading towards the legally binding goal of an 80% cut from 1990 levels by 2050.

What are Local Councils Doing?

“Local authorities can have a very big impact in areas such as improving energy efficiency in buildings, sustainable travel and waste management,” says the CCC

The committee calculates that having all councils invest in these measures will bring UK emissions down by about 15 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per year, or about 3%.

The Local Government Association (LGA), which represents the interests of councils across England and Wales, highlighted the policies that some councils have already implemented and the impacts they are having.

Bristol, for example, has set a target of reducing emissions by 40% between 2005 and 2020.  The council has cut its own energy use by nearly a third. It has invested in wind turbines, biomass boilers and solar panels for schools, and insulated 30,000 homes.

Islington in North London has set the same target. A district heating network and a zero-carbon school are among its flagship projects, while the council is also engaging with industries to reduce their emissions.

Woking is promoting cycling and developing ways to reduce the volume of waste produced, which also lowers emissions.

And Kirklees Council, which encapsulates Huddersfield, offers residents free home insulation.

Apart from reducing emissions, the report also notes that local authorities have the power to increase communities’ resilience to climate impacts, for example through wise siting of buildings and encouraging frugality with water.

Earlier this week, the European Environment Agency said councils had to show leadership in this area, adding that the costs of taking action would quickly be outweighed by the costs of not doing so.

Allen & York specialise in sustainability jobs.  Current related job opportunities include:

World Wealth and Solution to Financial Crisis

According to a recent report by Credit Suisse, (2011 Global Wealth Report) total wealth for the entire world reached US$ 231 trillion and is anticipated to grow even more. By 2016, the entire global wealth will reach US$ 345. The global GDP is about US$ 65 trillion. Global Wealth is nearly 4x the size of the entire global economy.

The definition use for wealth is financial assets plus real assets (mainly housing owned by individuals minus debts. (p. 8 2011 Credit Suisse-Global Wealth Report)

As there is so much wealth in the world. perhaps that could be a solution to the debt crisis and stimulating the markets. If we took 10-15% of all the wealth and used that to pay off the troublesome sovereign debt, mortgage crisis debt, college tuition debt, etc with certain conditions attached.

NHS Faces New Sustainability Reporting Mandate

NHS trusts will be required to produce annual sustainability reports as from this year under new laws announced by the Department of Health.  Trusts will be required to chart their sustainability progress as part of their annual reporting obligations.

The legislation, which came into effect last week, aims to tackle the NHS’s immense carbon impact which totals 20m tonnes of CO2.  According to the NHS Sustainable Development Unit, the health service is responsible for 25% of the UK’s public sector carbon footprint.

To coincide with the new regulations, carbon reduction charity The Nottingham Energy Partnership has published a league table of all UK trusts’ public reporting on sustainability to date.

The data shows that many trusts have already taken action to reduce emissions before the mandate came into effect, however a substantial majority still have work to do to meet the new standards.

Allen & York specialise in Sustainability Jobs.  Current job opportunities include:

Planning Reform Strengthens Sustainability Definition

The National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), which comes into effect today, aims to streamline planning policy and kick-start economic growth through house-building and other developments. It has always contained a ‘presumption in favour of sustainable development’, but the final document contains a definition of what sustainability should encompass, which was welcomed today by the green building sector, green groups and conservationists.

Announcing the new framework Planning Minister Greg Clark said: “The new framework has been strengthened by the responses to the consultation. We have confirmed the core reforms, sharpened the definition of the policies, and emphasised the essential balance that the planning system must achieve..

These reforms will help build the homes the next generation needs, it will let businesses expand and create jobs.”
The planning framework ascribes to the five ‘guiding principles’ of sustainable development as set out United Nations and the UK Government. These include living within the planet’s environmental limits; ensuring a “strong, healthy and just society; achieving a sustainable economy; promoting good governance; and using sound science.
The UK Green Building Council today welcomed the strengthening of the definition of ‘sustainable development’ and the emphasis placed on the planning guidance on ‘town centre first’.

Friends of the Earth, which has been opposed to the draft planning reform, also welcomed the strengthening of the definition of sustainable development, but said the rest of the document was confusing and contradictory.

“Ministers must make it crystal clear that the new planning system will encourage the low-carbon infrastructure and affordable homes our nation needs – and prevent poor quality developments that waste water and increases our reliance on expensive fossil fuels.”

Conservation charity, the National Trust, which has over 3.7 million members and attracted 230,000 signatures in a petition against the draft planning, also welcomed the improved document.”All these changes improve the document and give it a better tone and balance,” said Dame Fiona Reynolds, the charity’s director general.

Allen & York specialise in sustainability jobs, related job opportunities include:

University Launches Sustainability Institute

Leeds Metropolitan University is set to launch a new sustainability institute in a bid to tackle the impact infrastructure has on the environment.

As part of the Leeds Sustainability Institute (LSI), research how to reduce the impact of the UK’s buildings will be undertaken, with the aim of promoting environmental improvements. The centre will also focus on sustainable land and water management, production and consumption, climate change and the low carbon economy.

The launch event takes place on March 29th, where George Martin, former Head of Sustainable Development at Willmott Dixon and Jon Price centre director of the Centre for Low Carbon Futures will be speaking.

Speaking ahead of the launch, LSI director Professor Chris Gorse, said: “The Institute will provide a clear path to those that want to engage and a more responsive unit that can develop and connect expertise.”

Allen & York specialise in environmental job opportunities worldwide.  Current job opportunities include:

The Third Industrial Revolution – Jeremy Rifkin

Source Forbes  http://www.forbes.com/sites/terrywaghorn/2011/12/12/jeremy-rifkins-third-industrial-revolution/

Jeremy Rifkin, president of the Foundation on Economic Trends and the best selling author of nineteen books spoke about his new book “The Third Industrial Revolution” – the possibility that a distributed energy revolution is possible because at some point “we all can create our own energy, store it, and then distribute it to each other because the third Industrial Revolution “is an economic game plan. We have the science and technology to do it, but it will mean nothing unless there is a change in will.” The first Industrial Revolution, Rifkin argues, “brought together print and literacy with coal steam and rail. The second combined the telegraph and telephone with the internal combustion engine and oil.”

The Third Industrial Revolutionwith Jeremy:

How did you come up with this idea?

My read on history is that the great economic revolutions occur when two phenomena come together. When we change energy regimes, it makes possible much more complex economic relations. When energy revolutions occur, however, they require communication revolutions that are agile enough to manage them. If you look at the 19th century, print technology became very cheap when we introduced steam power into printing. That decreased the cost and increased the speed, efficiency and availability of print material. At the same time we established public schools in Europe and America. We created a print literate workforce with the communication skills to organize a First Industrial Revolution driven by coal and steam power.

Then we did it again in the 20th century with the convergence of communication and energy: Centralized electricity—especially the telephone and then later radio and television—became the communication vehicles to manage a more dispersed Second Industrial Revolution, organized around the oil-powered internal combustion engine, suburban construction and the creation of a mass consumer society.

Energy historians only deal with energy, and communication historians only deal with communications, but in history you can’t really do one without the other. That’s the framework that led me to this kind of search, and the Third Industrial Revolution really came out of that narrative on how history evolves.

So, what exactly is the Third Industrial Revolution?

First of all, it’s based on a new convergence of communication and energy. The Internet has been a very powerful communication tool in the last 20 years. What’s so interesting about it is the way it scales. I grew up in the 20th century on centralized electricity communication that scales vertically. The Internet, by contrast, is a distributed and collaborative communication medium and scales laterally.

We are in the early stages of a convergence of Internet communication technology with a new form of energy that is by nature distributed and has to be managed collaboratively and scales laterally. We’re making a great transition to distributed renewable energy sources. And we distinguish those from the elite energies—coal, oil, gas, tar sands—that are only found in a few places and require significant military and geopolitical investments and massive finance capital, and that have to scale top down because they are so expensive. Those energies are clearly sunsetting as we enter the long endgame of the Second Industrial Revolution.

Distributed energies, by contrast, are found in some frequency or proportion in every inch of the world: the sun, the wind, the geothermal heat under the ground, biomass—garbage, agricultural and forest waste—small hydro, ocean tides and waves.

About Justin Ragusa

I am an Eco-Entrepreneur, author, and webmaster of PeoplePlanetProfitBlog.com I love living green and try to incorporate all I do in this industry. Let me know if you have any questions, I’ll show you how to make a rewarding and profitable career in the Energy Industry… just contact me.

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