Diageo Reducing Material Use to Achieve Zero Waste by 2015

August 13, 2013, 11:22 pm

≫ Next: Democratic Approach to Business Governance Key to Long Term Innovation

≪ Previous: Weyerhaeuser Certifies Nearly 20 Million Acres to Sustainable Forestry Initiative Standard

Global drinks company Diageo says it is working towards zero waste to landfill targets at all of its sites by 2015, but is looking to make its waste management activities a higher priority via a five-pronged approach.

The company's latest sustainability and responsibility report says it has reduced waste to landfill by 53.4 percent this year, contributing to an overall reduction of 77.9 percent against a 2007 baseline. This means that 81,099 tons of manufacturing waste is now being reused or recycled.

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Democratic Approach to Business Governance Key to Long Term Innovation

August 14, 2013, 12:18 am

≫ Next: Researchers Discover Process to Absorb Toxic Metals from Water, Using E-Waste

≪ Previous: Diageo Reducing Material Use to Achieve Zero Waste by 2015

The Foundation for Enterprise Development (FED) has published a paper that explores the roots of representative structures and argues that a democratic approach to business governance is crucial to long term innovation.

Sustained Innovation through Shared Capitalism and Democratic Governance evaluates the role of research, innovation, organizational structures and associated issues in addressing the long-term focus required for development—both material and human.

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Researchers Discover Process to Absorb Toxic Metals from Water, Using E-Waste

August 9, 2013, 10:51 am

≫ Next: Obsession Over 'Natural' Aside, Burt's Bees a Rightful Leader in the Personal Care Industry

≪ Previous: Democratic Approach to Business Governance Key to Long Term Innovation

A team of Hong Kong researchers has found a way to use ground-up circuit boards from discarded cell phones, computers and other gadgets to absorb toxic heavy metals found in water, according to Chemical & Engineering News

Each year, around 20 to 50 million tons of electronic waste is produced worldwide, most of which is incinerated or dumped into landfills. Burning the plastic/metal combo in printed circuit boards releases toxic compounds such as dioxins and furans. In landfills, the metals on the circuit boards can contaminate groundwater.

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Obsession Over 'Natural' Aside, Burt's Bees a Rightful Leader in the Personal Care Industry

August 14, 2013, 11:49 am

≫ Next: The Rise of the Scratch Card Brand

≪ Previous: Researchers Discover Process to Absorb Toxic Metals from Water, Using E-Waste

Burt’s Bees is an incredible American success story. Roxanne Quimby’s venture into beeswax candles took her from New England craft fairs to lip balm and personal care products sold in thousands of drugstores across the United States, before she eventually sold her company to Clorox for $913 million in 2007. That acquisition has been one within a recent trend of large food and consumer packaged goods companies buying smaller ones for more “natural” or healthful products: Colgate-Palmolive owns Tom’s of Maine; Coca-Cola snapped up Honest Tea; Kraft has long owned Boca Burgers.

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The Rise of the Scratch Card Brand

August 14, 2013, 12:43 pm

≫ Next: Back to the Start with Back to the Roots

≪ Previous: Obsession Over 'Natural' Aside, Burt's Bees a Rightful Leader in the Personal Care Industry

We're living in The Age of Scratch Card Brands — social networks have closed the gap between brands and the businesses that deliver them to the extent that businesses now sit immediately beneath their brands. Social networks have rendered the factory and boardroom walls in glass — a rude employee or a river foaming with effluent can be captured on a phone camera instantly, be on YouTube in seconds and viewed by millions shortly after. Potential health and safety violations tolerated by out of sight factory workers are no longer out of mind to the consumer activist buying the brand promise four thousand miles away.

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Back to the Start with Back to the Roots

August 14, 2013, 2:08 pm

≫ Next: From Invisible to Impact: Value in the Personal Data Economy

≪ Previous: The Rise of the Scratch Card Brand

In their last semester at UC Berkeley, Alejandro Velez and Nikhil Arora were inspired by a class lecture about the possibilities of growing mushrooms using entirely recycled coffee grounds. The perfect representation of turning waste into wages, after various experimentations the pair founded Back to the Roots in 2009. We caught up with Nikhil to learn more about the company’s business model and its newest offering, a tabletop aquaponic farm.

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From Invisible to Impact: Value in the Personal Data Economy

August 14, 2013, 2:44 pm

≫ Next: Unilever Taps Crowdsourcing to Develop Eco-Friendly Shower

≪ Previous: Back to the Start with Back to the Roots

There’s been a lot of talk about the power of Big Data in our modern digital economy. But tech experts will be the first to tell you “Big Data” is a marketing term, not a magic bullet. While it’s important to know how to best aggregate and make sense of the massive amounts of information available about your customers, there’s a more critical point you need to address right away about the nature of people’s data:

It’s going to disappear.

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Unilever Taps Crowdsourcing to Develop Eco-Friendly Shower

August 14, 2013, 5:35 pm

≫ Next: New IBM Modeling Technology Increases Wind and Solar Power Reliability

≪ Previous: From Invisible to Impact: Value in the Personal Data Economy

Unilever has announced that it will harness the potential of ‘crowdsourcing’ to develop the world’s first sustainable shower.

The company is asking creative individuals all over the world to submit at eYeka.com their ideas and solutions for an environmentally-friendly shower. The winner will receive a cash prize and a trip to London to develop the idea, Unilever says.

Believe it or not, in-home use is responsible for a significant proportion of the carbon footprint of shower products. With water becoming increasingly scarce, there is an urgent need to develop a commercially viable sustainable shower.

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New IBM Modeling Technology Increases Wind and Solar Power Reliability

August 14, 2013, 6:08 pm

≫ Next: Sustainability Ideas Must Be 'Made to Stick'

≪ Previous: Unilever Taps Crowdsourcing to Develop Eco-Friendly Shower

IBM recently announced that it has developed an advanced power and weather modeling technology that will help utilities increase the reliability of renewable energy resources.

The solution combines weather prediction and analytics to accurately forecast the availability of wind power and solar energy, which will enable utilities to integrate more renewable energy into the power grid and help to reduce carbon emissions. The company says it also will significantly improve clean energy output for consumers and businesses.

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Sustainability Ideas Must Be 'Made to Stick'

August 15, 2013, 3:33 pm

≫ Next: SEM Founder Lucy Findlay on How to Legitimize Your Social Enterprise

≪ Previous: New IBM Modeling Technology Increases Wind and Solar Power Reliability

Calls to shake up the sustainability community seem to be becoming increasingly frequent — the latest that I’ve read coming from the State of the World 2013 Report. With a warning that sustainability is in need of a “dramatic reboot,” it suggests a failure to deliver on the wealth of opportunities being promised.

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SEM Founder Lucy Findlay on How to Legitimize Your Social Enterprise

August 15, 2013, 8:24 pm

≫ Next: Google Reduces Carbon Footprint By 9%

≪ Previous: Sustainability Ideas Must Be 'Made to Stick'

Founded in 2010 in the UK, the Social Enterprise Mark Company (SEM) awards its “Social Enterprise Mark” to organisations that demonstrate their social, environmental and ethical values and behaviours, in particular with regards to profit distribution.

As the only international certification scheme for “genuine” social enterprises, the Mark helps social enterprises gain competitive advantage by highlighting their social and environmental credentials and purpose to stakeholders (much like a B Corp certification).

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Google Reduces Carbon Footprint By 9%

August 16, 2013, 12:39 am

≫ Next: The Ultimate Interview Question: Social Responsibility in the Hiring Process

≪ Previous: SEM Founder Lucy Findlay on How to Legitimize Your Social Enterprise

Google has announced it emitted 1.5 million metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2012, a 9 percent decrease from the year before, according to the company’s latest carbon footprint data.

The search giant says it used new reporting guidance from the Carbon Disclosure Project to buy carbon offsets to reduce its 2012 footprint to zero. Google also claims it has been carbon neutral for six years running.

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The Ultimate Interview Question: Social Responsibility in the Hiring Process

August 16, 2013, 8:03 am

≫ Next: Lux analyzes winners in growing field of energy-use monitoring

≪ Previous: Google Reduces Carbon Footprint By 9%

The hiring process can be a grueling one — weeding through all those prospects can be a bit like looking for a needle in a haystack. It can be frustrating, and it also presents a lot of opportunity for self-doubt.

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Lux analyzes winners in growing field of energy-use monitoring

August 16, 2013, 9:32 am

≫ Next: Total Energy Resource Productivity: Math Not Myth

≪ Previous: The Ultimate Interview Question: Social Responsibility in the Hiring Process

As new companies find their niche helping building designers, owners and managers lower energy consumption, the measurement and verification (M&V) industry is rapidly moving toward real-time performance-tracking, according to a new study by Lux Research. The report also analyzes these new players, both the ones focusing on sub-metering hardware and other specializing in data analytics, as they improve building energy management systems (BEMS) and making M&V tools that give a continuous picture of performance.

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Total Energy Resource Productivity: Math Not Myth

August 16, 2013, 9:45 am

≫ Next: RecycleForce Keeps Electronic Waste Out of Landfills and Ex-Felons Out of Prison

≪ Previous: Lux analyzes winners in growing field of energy-use monitoring

Open the news in the US and you hear two conflicting messages: “We are on our way to becoming energy independent using fossil fuel” and “The biggest challenge we face is getting off fossil fuel.” The inconvenient truth is that we don’t know how to quantify our dependence on fossil fuel nor do we have a metric for Energy Productivity and Environmental Performance.

Bill Rebozo

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RecycleForce Keeps Electronic Waste Out of Landfills and Ex-Felons Out of Prison

August 16, 2013, 6:53 pm

≫ Next: CH2M Hill Ranked Best Environmental Firm for 8th Year

≪ Previous: Total Energy Resource Productivity: Math Not Myth

Since 2006, Indianapolis-based RecycleForce has paid over $10 million in wages and employed 650 ex-felons to recycle over 20 million pounds of electronic waste. The non-profit social enterprise has a dual mission: to help people coming out of prison successfully transition back into civil society, and to keep as much electronic waste as possible out of Indiana’s landfills. RecycleForce deconstructs electronic waste and other recyclables provided by residents and corporate partners, separates the reusable materials, and disposes of the waste safely and cleanly.

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CH2M Hill Ranked Best Environmental Firm for 8th Year

August 18, 2013, 11:35 pm

≫ Next: Investment Group Ranks Sweden ‘Most Sustainable Country in the World’

≪ Previous: RecycleForce Keeps Electronic Waste Out of Landfills and Ex-Felons Out of Prison

CH2M Hill, a global consulting, design, construction and operations firm, was ranked the No. 1 U.S. environmental firm by the Engineering News-Record’s Top 200 Environmental Firms list.

URS and Veolia Environment North America retained their 2012 spots after being ranked the No. 2 and No. 3 companies, respectively. The remaining top 10 included Tetra Tech, Bechtel, Energy Solutions, AECOM Technology, MWH Global, Golder Associates and Clean Harbors.

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Investment Group Ranks Sweden ‘Most Sustainable Country in the World’

August 19, 2013, 12:20 am

≫ Next: How Sustainable Is Your Supply Chain?

≪ Previous: CH2M Hill Ranked Best Environmental Firm for 8th Year

Swiss investment group RobecoSAM has ranked Sweden the most sustainable country in the world in its recent ranking of 59 countries, which gauges a wide range of environmental and social governance issues like carbon emissions, social cohesion and civil liberties.

RobecoSAM says it designed the report to offer investors a deeper insight of issues that may affect a country's credit rating but are not typically considered by traditional sovereign ratings, like climate change.

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How Sustainable Is Your Supply Chain?

August 19, 2013, 11:30 am

≫ Next: New Era: Can Profit-Seeking Approaches Protect Natural Capital?

≪ Previous: Investment Group Ranks Sweden ‘Most Sustainable Country in the World’

Beginning this month, Sustainable Brands will launch a new Issues in Focus editorial channel examining sustainable supply chain management.

The SB editorial team — with the help of guest editors Dave Meyer of EORM, Tara Norton of BSR and Sam Hummel of the Sustainable Purchasing Leadership Council— are seeking articles, interviews and case studies for publication throughout the year.

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New Era: Can Profit-Seeking Approaches Protect Natural Capital?

August 19, 2013, 11:44 am

≫ Next: Consumer Collaboration Investment: The Communispace Client Index vs. the S&P 500

≪ Previous: How Sustainable Is Your Supply Chain?

Mark Tercek of The Nature Conservancy (TNC) has written a new book with Jonathan Adams, Nature's Fortune: How Business & Society Thrive by Investing in Nature. A video interview of him at an Aspen Institute forum last month at Hunter College, “The Case for a Profit Motive in Conserving the Environment,” with New York Times science writer Andrew Revkin showed that his theme and approach have a lot going for them.

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