This month I am compelled to stay on the topic of water's cost and value for several reasons. First, while discussions of the "full cost" or "true cost" of water are helpful, they do not capture the complexity of all of the issues related to the value of water. I also believe the huma...
The social entrepreneurship field is growing, exciting, full of potential, but limiting itself, affecting what it could achieve. This is particularly unfortunate as this field seems to be onto something. For some reasons, it resonates. Author Giles Hutchins states , “It … seems that m...
“Climate resiliency” is a new buzzword in environmental communications. Buzzwords are exciting because when they're successful, they convey important concepts in a compact and compelling way. At the same time, it's easy to assume audience understanding and for terms to be co-opted ove...
I first met Waste Management president and CEO David P. Steiner in 2008, when I interviewed him onstage at a corporate sustainability event. He talked about “reinventing everything” at his then 40-year-old company by changing behavior and leveraging technology in order to turn waste i...
Nature of Business radio, created and hosted by Chrissy Coughlin, is a weekly show on business and environment. At IBM, they call Dave Bartlett the "Building Whisperer." I have been looking forward to speaking with Bartlett for some time. He told me about some of his incredibly impact...
Dear readers: It's been a research-heavy week here at ICYMI HQ, with new studies hitting the wires that detail everything from profiles of ESG professionals to solutions for sustainable cities. But before we dig into that, let's start with a topic that's near and dear to my heart: foo...
Depending on what you read in the green building press right now, you could be left with the impression that life cycle assessment (LCA) is either the next big thing or fatally flawed and missing key criteria for evaluating green building products. On one hand, the major overhaul of t...
In Part 2 of a two-part series, we uncover the ideal umbrella term for the work currently known as sustainability. Or CSR. Or Triple-Bottom-Line. Read part one here . Turning the alphabet barrel Rather than coming to consensus on one of the seven terms identified in part one of this s...
Editor's note: This is part one of a two-part series exploring the evolution -- and subsequent anarchy -- of the terminology used to describe the work that sustainability professionals do. In the beginning When I went to work for Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) in 1998, there...
Some light in clean tech investing, despite the gloom By Dan Seif Published May 16, 2013 Email | Print | Single Page View Tags: Clean Tech , Funding & Finance For more than a year, media outlets have posted stories on various major venture capital firms throwing their arms up in frust...
The issue of plastic waste has grown too large to ignore. As of 2013, 40 percent of the world's oceans surfaces were covered with floating plastic garbage of some sort, according to the Center for Biological Diversity . Instead of burying their heads in the sand, companies, nonprofits...
Many building owners and facility managers lack good documentation for their automation control systems. Documentation has value; lack of system documentation can cost an organization and will increase risk. Lack of documentation means troubleshooting and work orders take longer, are ...
At VERGE Boston yesterday, panelists explored machine-to-machine communications, the burgeoning but poorly understood technology that experts predict will constitute a $1 trillion dollar industry by the end of the decade . Machine-to-machine, or M2M, technology enables all kinds of de...
Each year, GlobeScan's Sustainability Leaders survey asks experts to name a company they regard as a leader in sustainability. As Joel Makower noted recently, one company above all others -- Unilever -- has emerged as the sustainability champion par excellence in recent years, thanks ...
Its well-publicized court battles with rival Samsung involve allegations of patent infringement and copying of Apple’s design patents, trademarks and trade dress. Not only has Apple brought its complaints to U.S. district courts, but it also has charged Samsung with unfair trade pract...
It is really important not to put all of one's eggs in one basket. Our world can change dramatically in a short period of time. Most adaptive systems have built-in diversity so that if one strategy doesn't work they can shift. In business, you may be lucky if you make single bets on o...
If you are familiar with facility management, you may know that facilities have finite annual budgets, and demand for capital predictably exceeds supply. Some projects such as lighting controls may deliver carbon and financial savings, but quantifying these savings requires time and s...
Would you be willing to let a robot act as your stand-in? Before he even started his keynote at VERGE Boston, IT leadership strategist Andrew McAfee -- principal researcher at MIT Sloan's Center for Digital Research -- made a huge statement about the transformative role of technology ...
On the exterior, the Ford Endeavour -- one of the best-known midsize SUVs in India -- may look like just any other rugged all-terrain transportation option. But the company hopes the advanced technologies accessible through the vehicle, including wireless communications and an open-so...
With public funding for transportation infrastructure expansion or upgrades stuck in neutral across many regions -- often barely able to keep up with maintenance needs -- innovative alternative transportation schemes are critical for easing urban congestion and reducing emissions. But...
Many companies face a common problem: What to do with by-product or waste left over from the manufacturing process. Smart firms increasingly are finding profitable ways of turning waste into assets, often with the help of governments agencies, such as the U.S. Environmental Protection...
In a keynote interview at the VERGE conference in Boston today, Cheryl Martin of the Advanced Research Project Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) discussed how her agency is boosting the bleeding edge of energy technology. "We're learning things that we didn't think were possible," Martin said in...
I first met Mark Tercek several years ago when he headed Goldman Sachs' environmental strategy, a capstone to more than two decades as an investment banker heading various business units for the company. This was pre-economic meltdown — Tercek fortuitously left the firm in 2008 just a...
One defining characteristic of a city is that it is full of hard surfaces. Streets, sidewalks, buildings and bridges shed water when it rains. All that water has to go somewhere, and it usually gets there fast. So for a city to function more like a forest or a field, step one is to sl...
But just because electricity doesn’t leak out of windows or fall out of tune doesn’t mean networks can’t be made more efficient. In fact, many of the same factors that reduce the efficiency of other energy-based systems (such as the inability to modulate power output based on real-tim...
Last week, the Boston City Council approved an ordinance requiring larger commercial and residential buildings to report annual energy and water usage to the city, which in turn will make this information available to the public. As the VERGE conference begins today in Boston, it join...
Pink slime. Pan-European traces of horsemeat. Escolar masquerading as white tuna. Some 30 states considering GMO-labeling legislation. The challenges and opportunities surrounding transparency affect consumers in ways that are deeply personal (if not downright intestinal) and raise th...
ICYMI -- "In Case You Missed It" -- is a regular Friday feature recapping the news of the week. Dear readers: There are weeks when this is the greatest gig in the sustainability business. I get to survey, from a 10,000-foot view, all the amazing ideas and efforts that are helping to g...
Sustainability is becoming a standard practice at companies across various industries here in the United States and around the world, and the health care sector is no different. As we saw at last month’s CleanMed Conference and Exposition in Boston, Mass., there is continued and growi...
suggests that the architectural community may have a greater influence on human health than physicians. Physicians can recommend behavioral changes that will lead to better health and wellness, but the results will depend on an individual’s willingness to change their habits. Architec...
