Green Options

In my work in Corporate Social Responsibility and sustainable business, Whole Foods has always been a company to benchmark against.  They were one of the first major retailers to offset 100% of their energy use with wind energy credits; voluntarily stop using plastic bags company-wide; join the Non-GMO Project’s Product Verification Program; and develop a certification program, the Whole Trade Guarantee, in partnership with non-profits.  Plus, the company has received a plethora of sustainability and environmental awards and recognition.  So I was just wondering…with a track record like that, can a renegade CEO damage the company’s brand reputation as a socially responsible company?  Well, John Mackey, co-founder and chief executive of Whole Foods, is sure giving it the old college try.

Sean Daily, Green Living Ideas‘ Editor-In-Chief, talks Neighborhood Electric Vehicles (NEVs) and EEStor’s promising new battery technologies with Ian Clifford, CEO of ZENN Motor Company.

Click Play [...]

Bankruptcy? What bankruptcy? New GM emerged from a gov’ment cradled bankrupcty filing just a month ago, but it seems like business as usual at the former American manufacturing giant. At a press conference this mornig, New GM CEO Fritz Henderson wasted no time explaining a recent marketing campaign involving the numbers 23 and a smiling electrical outlet.

230 “composite” miles per gallon for the Chevy Volt, city rating of course. 230 miles per gallon? What kind of voodoo magic are they putting in those batteries?

Last June, I asked if it was “crunch time” for Wal-Mart’s sustainability initiatives?  After all, the economy was faltering, and consumers were focused on saving money more than saving the planet. After subsequent economic events (think Lehman Brothers, the car makers, and 2.6 million jobs lost), that question seems even more pertinent.

So, when I pulled up the recorded webcast of Monday’s Sustainability Milestone Meeting in Bentonville, Arkansas, I was very interested to see what Mike Duke, who will take over the reigns of the company on February 2nd, had to say about the topic in relationship to the current economic climate.

Of course, this meeting was “star-studded” in a fashion: no Queen Latifah or American Idol winners, but famed architect and cradle-to-cradle proponent William McDonough was the keynote speaker for the event. While I’m always interested to hear what McDonough had to say, Duke was the one to watch at this meeting. The move towards sustainability has been a keystone of the second half of outgoing CEO Lee Scott’s tenure at the helm; would Duke give any indication that he didn’t share his predecessor’s passion for greening the company?

Uber heavy hitter John Macdonald, Chairman and CEO of the Vancouver-based solar energy company Day4 Energy, recipient of eight honourary degrees and former MIT professor, knows a thing or two about renewable energy.

He also readily admits, with a signature askew smile and hearty laugh, that “being an academic is possibly the worst possible preparation for the business world,” and endorses a strong marketing presence in any renewable energy start up because the engineers “can’t seem to understand why somebody wouldn’t want this marvelous invention!”

It’s 7:52pm Wednesday night at the venture capital-esque forum put on by the VEF on CEO War Stories.

Canadian business leaders are stepping up efforts to reduce CO2 emissions.

The Canadian Council of Chief Executives (CCCE), a non-profit, non-partisan organization made up of CEOs from Canada's leading companies has begun an Environmental Leadership Initiative to get the nation on track for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and promoting clean technologies for a sustainable future.

As part of this initiative the CCCE has appointed a Task Force of their CEO members

[...]