Harry Potter mania is once again sweeping the globe in preparation for the final movie, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, being released July 15. Legions of fans have dusted off their Potter books and breathlessly await the fate of He Who Must Not be Named, even though they know the books by heart. (more…)

For decades, it has been clear that sustainability is necessary to ensure the Earth’s survival. Now the green imperative has expanded from environmental activists to boardroom executives. The business community is confronting both a call to action and stark ultimatum: embrace sustainability or risk becoming obsolete. (more…)

Greenwash (verb, \ˈgrēn-wȯsh\) - to market a product or service by promoting a deceptive or misleading perception of environmental responsibility.

Companies are launching major ad campaigns to tout their green credentials, but many of their claims are misleading. (more…)

Although tax season just ended, addressing climate risk and sustainability should remain at the forefront of every CxO’s mind. Why? It’s about potentially missing significant opportunities to increase efficiencies and reduce costs through improved internal processes and controls, reduce risks across all areas of operations, drive innovation, and build resiliency into your firm.

The Securities and Exchange Commission guidance published in February 2010 about disclosure of climate risk is intended to highlight the concern management has about the risk they see. Any quantification of that risk is expected to be stated in the financial statements as compliance costs or unforeseen capital expenditure required for compliance of new regulations or due to physical impacts, such as flooding. (more…)

Wal-Mart officials have vowed to cut the company’s greenhouse gas emissions by 20 million metric tons by 2015, a sweeping strategy by the retail giant to reduce the carbon footprint of its network of suppliers and stores.

Company leaders say the cuts will more than offset the expected growth of its carbon emissions globally, and represent the equivalent of taking 3.8 million cars off the road.

Initially the company will target the suppliers and producers that emit the highest levels of carbon dioxide. Matt Kistler, senior vice president of sustainability, said initiatives will include cutting the CO2 emissions within the company’s massive transportation operation and reducing waste for fresh foods.

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The green economy is thriving despite the economic downturn, according to the State of Green Business 2010 report released Wednesday by Greener World Media.

“Green professionals weren’t among the first to be thrown overboard,” said Joel Makower, report author and Executive Editor of GreenBiz.com, in a statement. “Their budgets were slashed, their headcounts frozen, all while their mandates sometimes increased. But they managed to survive, even thrive, during tough times.”
What top trends are now driving green business? To start, the report says more companies and consumers are embracing “radical transparency.”
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This is the last of three posts on the Executive Council’s “Value-Based Sustainability” event last week (read previous posts here and here). As official sponsor of the event, CleanTechies raffled off five free tickets to our Facebook fans, Twitter followers (@CleanTechies) and Newsletter subscribers. The author of this article was one of the lucky winners. Fan us and follow us to learn about upcoming raffles like this!

Many companies easily jumped on the ‘green’ bandwagon in 2007 and 2008 when the economy was growing.  Now that the U.S. is in a recession, unless sustainability was already a guiding pillar for your company, making the business case for green, clean, and lean initiatives can be challenging.  At last week’s Executive Council summit on Value-Based Sustainability: the Business Case for Clean, Green, and Lean, several best-of-breed companies shared their thoughts on sustainability and the role of consumers.

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A couple of years after former Sierra Club President Adam Werbach founded  ActNow, a sustainable business consultancy, he signed up Walmart as a client. This brought Werbach considerable notoriety in eco-activist circles. Walmart’s record of environmental responsibility had previously been spotty, to put it mildly. Werbach retorted to his critics that Walmart, with almost two million employees and 127 million customer visits per week, had the potential to do far more to save the world than the Sierra Club ever had.

I had the opportunity to visit Werbach’s company (now named Saatchi S) in San Francisco and attend a staff meeting. The participants sat on the floor and passed around a plate of organic banana bread. Yet despite the trappings of informality, the conversation had a focus, drive and ingenuity about it that I had rarely experienced in the non-profit world.  The Saatchi staff certainly looked like the young, idealistic types whom I knew from environmental NGOs. But dropping a profit incentive into the motivational mix seemed to release a different level of creative zing.

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Green businesses in the San Francisco Bay Area abound, and green professionals are fortunate enough to be offered an array of green events they can choose from at any time. As editor of green media outlet CleanTechies, I particularly like one event that is taking place tomorrow. The Green Chamber of Commerce and law firm Wendel Rosen are co-sponsoring a panel on “Practical & Legal Considerations for Communicating Your Message” – an event that no green communicator would want to miss (at least in my opinion). Personally, I think it’s a fabulous idea to get green media leaders together, and I trust William Acevedo from Wendel Rosen will do a great job moderating the panel, which includes the following leading local green media experts:

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