Citizen Brand

Global warming is good for business

From Reuters, a brief review of a new book from Harvard Business Press which tells today's business leaders they had better remove their heads from the sand when it comes to global warming:

BOSTON (Reuters) - Chief executives can no longer brush off concerns about climate change but need to start figuring out how global warming -- and regulations intended to curtail it -- will affect their businesses.

So asserts "Climate Change: What's Your Business Strategy?" (Harvard Business Press, $18), a new book due out May 1.

"You can remain completely agnostic about the science of climate change but still recognize its importance as a business issue," write authors Andrew Hoffman and John Woody.

Their slim 97-page volume doesn't delve into the science of climate change, which suggests that, by burning fossil fuels and releasing greenhouse gases including carbon dioxide, humans are warming the earth, potentially setting the stage for enormous changes in weather patterns.

Rather, they presume that human responses to climate change -- primarily in the form of regulations that raise the cost of emissions -- will affect how businesses operate.

Smart CEOs will respond by developing a way to measure their company's "carbon footprint" -- the emissions caused by heating buildings and transporting goods, for instance -- finding ways to reduce it and then taking a role in lobbying to influence what new environmental regulations look like.

"I'm talking to those who think, well, the science isn't there and I'm going to continue to stall -- big mistake," said Hoffman, a professor of sustainable enterprise at the University of Michigan, in a telephone interview.

'THIS IS A BUSINESS ISSUE'

"Let's take all the environmental language out of it, let's take all the moral language out of it, the 'Do the right thing' language out of it, and simply say, brass tacks, if you're a business, this is a business issue," Hoffman said.

Climate change will also create opportunities, in the form of new demand for green products, which is attracting new investment, the authors note.

"In green building and alternative energy, there is money to be made," Hoffman said. "That's where (investors) are going and if you're not thinking about this, you're missing out on these capital flows."

The authors cite U.S. industrial heavyweights General Electric Co and DuPont Co as companies that took on climate change directly and found opportunities to both cut their costs and develop projects that appeal to businesses and people concerned about sustainability.

Those companies stand out in part because U.S. CEOs generally trail their European Union counterparts in engagement on this issue, Hoffman said.

"The EU has been under a carbon regime and so they're much more used to addressing this," Hoffman said. "But there's a cultural issue too ... There is, I think, within the general public within Europe a greater sense of the scientific evidence around climate change and the need to respond than there is in the United States."

Taking climate change seriously -- and taking steps to reduce a company's emissions and other environmental impacts -- also gives it a better chance of having influence on future national and international regulations on emissions.

"Regulation is coming. If you want a seat at the table to influence what that regulation should be, you've got to get on this now," Hoffman said. "It may even be too late."

Brown and Green do go together

From Triple Pundit:

"What can Brown do for you?

It’s not just what United Parcel Service can do for you, but it’s also what they can do to trim operating costs and help the environment – all at the same time.

UPS announced this week that the Petaluma branch in Northern California will lease 42 Xebra electric vehicles to deliver smaller packages in congested areas where driving the Big Brown trucks aren’t so conducive to swift navigation through heavy traffic and, the bane of all urban drivers, finding a place to park (or double park, as the case may be).

The Xebra electric vehicle is manufactured by Santa Rosa-based Zap. In business since 1994, with customers in 75 countries, Zap has made over 100,000 electric and alternative vehicles, from scooters to their planned electric SUV.

And now UPS is one of those customers.

With a ground fleet of 94,542 vehicles moving 16 million packages around the world every day, and a barrel of oil hovering in the 90’s, actively pursuing alternatives to large fossil-fueled trucks is a matter of good business sense as well as environmental concern. 

UPS walks the talk with the largest private alternative fuel fleet in the industry.

After all, it doesn’t take a big brown truck to deliver your next order from Amazon to your front door."

Honda answers IBM

We didn't have to wait long to see which other global corporation would step up to help our planet.  Thanks to Jack Yan for telling us about Honda and the hydrogen car.

It's the Earth, stupid

With apologies to James Carville who helped Bill Clinton win an election in 1992 by making sure his candidate and the campaign stayed focused on the economy with a similar admonition.  Wouldn't it be refreshing if a candidate or candidates running for President in 2008 put the same emphasis on the environment.  Voters will always care about the economy - that is a given.  But it would seem that there is a growing consensus among the vox populi that we had better start paying attention to Mother Earth.  If this is true, the candidates will not be far behind.

Today is Blog Action Day.  More than 15,000 blogs are focusing attention on a single issue - the environment.  My two cents worth is that unless we do begin to take all actions large and small to impact the future of our planet in a positive way, nothing else will matter someday.  Most especially the economy.

 

Andrea is already in the mix today with a simple message from a young man who understands that each one of us can make a difference with our actions.  Another action bloggers can take is to join up with others of us over at Razoo.com and make a difference every day in ways both large and small.  Check it out.  And Alicia and Brady always know of good links when it comes to the environment (and of course fair trade.)  Alicia recommends The Accidental Environmentalist as a place to get good ideas and fresh thinking about taking care of our planet.

So tonight, make sure you turn the lights off when you leave a room; try to use a little less water in the house but make sure your flowers and trees have enough to drink; and, take one less trip in the car each week.  These seem like little things, but they are all doable.  It takes 21 days to form new habits.  Today is a good day to start some for all of us.

Green is good

Read "The Power of Green" by Thomas Friedman in Sunday's New York Times Magazine.  Friedman says the green movement not only has gone mainstream, but it represents the future platform for a "new, unifying political movement" in the United States.  He says this movement is necessary to address the three major issues all Americans now face: "jobs, temperature and terrorism."

"How do our kids compete in a flatter world? How do they thrive in a warmer world? How do they survive in a more dangerous world? Those are, in a nutshell, the big questions facing America at the dawn of the 21st century. But these problems are so large in scale that they can only be effectively addressed by an America with 50 green states — not an America divided between red and blue states."

Change is in the air.

Mounting Evidence

The rest of the world is waking up to the facts.  We are doing harm to this planet that we live on.  The question is have we gone beyond a tipping point of no return.

Audeamus points us to a report released today by the British government written by a respected economist.  It states the cost of beginning the process to turn the tide of global warming now underway will be one percent of global wealth - if we begin today.

The cost of waiting, according to Sir Nicholas Stern - formerly the chief economist at the World Bank - will be anywhere from 5 to 20 percent of all global wealth.  Read this article at Forbes.com.

Global warming is a sad example of an issue that has been clouded by political rhetoric instead of being made clear through reasoned research and science.  This is not a partisan political issue.  But it is clearly a vital economic issue that is already having an impact.  And as this report points out, the worst is on the horizon unless we put our best minds to work to solve it.

The technology exists.  The ideas are abundant.  The question now is do we have the will to put politics on the shelf and apply ourselves to identifying the extent of this problem and developing a plan to fix it.

We all can make small contributions toward a solution.  Let's all make an effort.  It is going to require the world working together to solve this one.  Can we do it?

Heads in the Sand

Here is the fear I have about the whole issue of global warming:  that we are already past a tipping point of no return and there are dynamics set in motion that are now beyond our ability to reverse.  I know what some people say to that notion - doom and gloom; wring your hands etc.

So please someone show me that we aren't too far along.  In the meantime, our friends over at Audeamus point us to a study that says there is still time, but time is of the essence.  And while we are on the topic, here is a site that shows us exactly what is going on in the world right now in terms of weird weather and its impact on Mother Nature.

We have an election coming up in the States in November.  I wonder how many candidates are even talking about this issue.  Let me hold up one hand and count.......