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In a research paper published by Resources for the Future, the authors examine why PROPER (Program for Pollution Control, Evaluation and Rating), the successful environmental corporate disclosure program in Indonesia, works. In 1995, Indonesia’s Environmental Impact and Management Agency (BAPEDAL) created PROPER to “honor and shame” companies into environmental compliance. The country’s command-and-control regulatory system wasn’t working due to lack of enforcement. The program publicizes company compliance with emission standards (good and bad) by assigning individual plants ratings – black, red, blue, green or gold. Ratings are assigned based on very simple, straightforward criteria. They are simple enough for the public to easily understand and to provide incentives for firms to move from one category to the next. It has been a great success and is being widely imitated.What is behind the strong correlation between company environmental performance and public disclosure? The prevailing assumption is that companies respond to external pressure from the public and media. Based on a survey of from firms participating in the PROPER program, the authors found another important contributor: by participating in the program factory managers learned about their plant’s emissions and how to curtail them. The authors suggest that both internal feedback on performance […]
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These Tomes Sum It UpEverything you ever wanted to know about sustainable development – two mammoth efforts sum it up. Our Fragile World: Challenges and Opportunities for Sustainable Development is 2240 pages long. It comes with an accompanying CD-Rom and two-year access to the web-based Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems which debuts in December 2001. It presents the vision and thinking of over 200 authors in support of efforts to solve the complex problems connected with sustainable development. There are interviews with Maurice Strong, Mikhail Gorbachev, Steven Rockefeller, Maritta Koch-Weser and many others. A large section is devoted to economics, business and public policy, and sustainable business and development. Among the many articles are: “International Commodity Policy”, “Growth, Sustainability, and the Power of Scale,” “The Role of Business and Industry,” “The Information Economy and the Internet,” and “Sustainable Economic Systems.” The Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems organizes the work of many of the world’ s foremost scholars, experts, and policy-makers in all major fields. It represents the ‘ state-of-the-art’ on virtually every aspect of the life support systems on which we depend with 200 subject themes and 6000 contributors. And there are messages from Richard R. Ernst, Nobel Laureate-Chemistry, Leon […]
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Here’s an example of an e-commerce model put to good use. The United Nations has launched HalonTrader, the “world’s virtual marketplace for recycled halons.” Halon seekers or sellers can search the online database to buy or sell halons by country, type of halon, and halon quantity. Halons are chemicals that contribute to ozone depletion and climate change and are being phased out under the Montreal protocol. This service helps people trade remaining halons as a key strategy to phase them out. It facilitates transactions between people who need halons for essential uses and those that have recycled or banked halons. By promoting recycling, recovery and exchange of existing halons, this matchmaking service helps avoid demand for new halons.[sorry this link is no longer available]
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David Pimentel, a professor of ecology and agricultural science at Cornell University believes agriculture will become more sustainable when foods that cost society the most cost the most, and when foods that contribute to society the most cost the least. He advocates taxing foods with the worst environmental impact. “If one chooses to eat high-impact food, one should pay the full costs of such a choice,” he says in the book he co-edited and co-authored, Ecological Integrity: Integrating Environment, Conservation, and Health, (Island Press, 2000). High impact foods require the most resources to produce, or result in the most environmental degradation. Foods like beef and pork would cost the most and legumes, grains, vegetables, starch crops, fruits, and nuts would cost the least. The 104 million cattle in the U.S., are the largest users of grain. It takes 535,000 gallons of water to grow one acre of corn to feed cattle. And it takes seven pounds of feed to produce one pound of beef. While people in Europe and the U.S. are eating lower on the food chain, developing countries are increasing consumption of beef and pork. U.S. beef consumption, for example, has dropped from its peak of 95 pounds […]
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The “Early Warning Signs Map” is a poster-sized map of the world that illustrates global climate change as it’s happening. It shows global warming Fingerprints (where you can see it happening now) and Harbingers (what it may well look like). Click on a continent to explore local indicators of global warming. The map was produced by seven major conservation organizations including the Union of Concerned Scientists and Natural Resources Defense Council. There is also a Curriculum Guide to use with the map. http://www.climatehotmap.orgIt might be interesting to see how this map matches the World Energy Council’s on-line database of worldwide voluntary greenhouse gas emissions reductions. Companies and organizations can publicly demonstrate what they are doing to reduce emissions by contributing to the database. It also enables financial institutions and groups seeking emissions offsets to identify promising projects that may merit financial support. The system allows emission reduction projects to be recorded and tracked as they proceed; reductions are totalled by country and by type of greenhouse gas emission. http://www.worldenergy.orgHow do you calculate greenhouse gases? The GHG Protocol Initiative shows you how. A multi-stakeholder collaboration convened by World Resource Institute and the World Business Council on Sustainable Development is testing a […]
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A May 15th New York Times article says that multinationals plan to continue reducing emissions regardless of Bush policy. In fact, many companies advocate action. For example, Peter Pestillo, chairman of the Visteon Corporation, one of the world’s largest auto parts makers, says that efforts to address environmental issues are not very expensive if identified early in the design process. Companies also continue to face strong pressure in Europe and Japan. Another NY Times article reports on government studies that conclude that depending on how aggressively the government supports efficiency gains in appliances and buildings, the growth of U.S. energy demand could drop by 20-47 percent. This would eliminate between 265 – 610 of the 1300 new large power plants the Bush Administration insists the country needs. The range also depends on the price of energy – the higher the price, the more efficient technologies become economically attractive. H Power Corp., a fuel cell development company, is bringing Residential Fuel Cells to California. They will be arriving over the next few months and will be marketed with their partner, Energy Co-Opportunity, Inc. (ECO). Altair Energy LLC, will be the non-exclusive distributor for the Southern California market, to sell, install and […]
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European Commission President Romano Prodi of Italy received a generally warm reception on May 16 when he EuropeanCommission President Romano Prodi of Italypresented a long awaited sustainable development road map for the EU. It will be discussed by heads of state at next month’s Gothenburg summit. The strategy consists of broad objectives that address the six greatest threats to EU sustainability. The six areas are: climate change, public health, resource management, transport congestion and pollution, poverty and an aging population. Since recent EU summits have already adopted measures to deal with poverty and an aging population, Prodi’s announcement focused on the other four objectives: * EU greenhouse gas emissions cut by 20 percent by 2020; * An EU energy tax that includes “full internalization of external costs” adopted by 2004;* Incentives to increase the use of biofuel in transportation to 20 percent by 2020; * A system of “resource productivity measurement” developed by 2003; * Reduce transport congestion by introducing charges that “reflect transportation costs to society” by 2005. EU leaders will review progress annually using “headline indicators.” John Hontelez, a spokesperson for the European Environmental Bureau said the strategy is “a real attempt to describe a long term vision […]
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Ford Motor Company is the first company to offer employees a SRI option in their 401k plan, the Domini Social Equity Fund. Ford’s 401k plan is the ninth largest defined contribution plan in the U.S.It’s rare for a national poll to find that Americans rank the environment as a higher priority than economic development, but that is what a recent Los Angeles Times poll concluded – 50 percent versus 36 percent. Respondents to the nationwide survey indicated that withdrawing from the Kyoto treaty was a mistake for President Bush and that pollution is getting worse. By a margin of 2-1, respondents believe that government oversight on businesses is necessary when it comes to environmental protection. If the law passes, the UK will be the first country to introduce a voluntary trading system of municipal waste landfill permits. The government expects it to reduce the cost of complying with the EU 1999 landfill directive. [sorry this link is no longer available]The newest division in the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs is the NJ Green Homes office. Its mission is “to fundamentally improve the environmental performance, energy efficiency, quality, and affordability of housing in NJ.” It will use advocacy, education and […]
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Japan’s new Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi recently asked cabinet members to make sure they were moving toward his target of having a fully low-emission fleet of government cars in place in the next few years. “Japanese carmakers have excellent environmental and energy-saving technology. By getting it more broadly accepted in society, we can be a leader on environmental issues and make it a source of economic growth,” said Trade Minister Takeo Hiranuma. Yoriko Kawaguchi, environment minister, pledged to seek a global consensus on the Kyoto Protocol. He and Hiranuma asked senior officials of the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association and Toyota Motor Corp to keep the supply of low emission cars consistent with demand. The Trade ministry is setting a goal 3.22 million electric, natural gas, methanol or hybrid vehicles on the road by 2010. Tokyo’s municipal government plans to base automobile taxes on the environmental performance of their cars. The most environmentally efficient vehicle will be used as a benchmark against which all other vehicles will be assigned eco-rankings. Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara called the plan “a very effective tool in asking automakers to share responsibility for air pollution.” The Tokyo City Tax Commission hopes to draft a city ordinance […]
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On the heels of SONY and IBM’s electronic products take-back, Best Buy announced that people will, for a small fee, be able to return their unwanted electronic products to selected pilot stores. Starting this summer, the program will be available at 10 stores nationwide. Best Buy is an electronics retailer with 400 retail stores throughout the U.S. Its headquarters are in Minnesota, where SONY’s take-back program is also being piloted. Individuals will be able to drop off televisions, computer monitors and printers, central processing units, and peripherals, VCRs, telephones, cellular phones, and camcorders. Best Buy is testing the price for handling fees, but they will likely be $10-$25, depending on the item returned. That was the amount Best Buy set during last fall’s pilot program conducted at one store in Minnesota. 22 metric tons of old equipment were returned during the two-day event. Best Buy plans to hold collection days at least once a year. The company views the program as a way to help build its brand and drive traffic to its stores, in addition to providing a responsible way to deal with the problem of electronic waste.Meanwhile, state and local government agencies are opening up a “national electronics […]
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