Owned by the Taylor family of St. Louis – which also owns and operates Enterprise Rent-A-Car - Enterprise Fleet Management offers businesses with medium-sized fleets services to efficiently manage their vehicle fleet.

The award comes as no real surprise for this blogger, as Enterprise Rent-A-Car has come to our attention on several occasions for their work expanding their low emissions rental fleet, providing van pool services throughout various cities across the U.S., funding alternative fuel research, and acting generally as a good corporate citizen.

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Our focus on natural ingredients was, in retrospect rather laughable as we included all sorts of what we now call, toxic ingredients, but promoted the “natural” additives. We looked for opportunities to tie into events and with charities that focused on green initiatives with an eye toward increasing sales.

In many ways that hasn’t changed.

Brands across categories, but particularly in the natural products industry are choosing charities with which to align themselves. In most cases this is an exercise in determining what the brand will stand for. The bigger the brand, the larger the charity and the more thought is given to this exercise as seen in the almost perfect launch last year of Clorox Greenworks brand.

But many brands have turned this reasoning on it’s head now and are looking at their social responsibility as the primary raisn d’etre for being. Is this a viable strategy?

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It will now take steps to reduce pesticide use in potato production for its supply.

Our U.S. potato suppliers are already working with their growers to advance sustainable pesticide practices, such as reductions and alternative methods.

And because it accounts for a huge chunk of U.S. spud use, I suppose it’s good that they’re leaning toward organic. But this isn’t some charitable thing, though they’re gonna spin it that way (of course).

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In a recently released corporate responsibility report, the Disney company has set its sites on going green and reducing its carbon footprint.  The report looks at everything from the nutritional content of the meals it serves, to “green standards,” to the working environment of the manufacturer’s that make Disney licensed products.

Disney, which owns theme parks, resorts, a cruise line, and travel tours, has the ability to make a tremendous difference with its sustainability measures.  The recent report laid out immediate goals for the coming year, goals for the next three to five years, and long-term goals for the company and its holdings.

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Disney has just issued the company’s first ever comprehensive corporate responsibility (CR) report.  For a company that was founded in the 1920s and is the largest media and entertainment corporation in the world, this report is a long time overdue!

The long term environmental goals outlined in the report are:

Zero waste

Zero net direct greenhouse gas emissions from fuels

Reduce indirect greenhouse gas emissions from electricity consumption

Net positive impact on ecosystems

Minimize water use

Minimize product footprint

Inform, empower and activate positive action for the environment

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Reports have surfaced that the Obama administration will likely terminate the National Environmental Performance Track program as early as this week.

The EPA’s Performance Track program was designed to encourage businesses and governmental offices to move beyond mere compliance of environmental regulation by registering participants to agree to voluntary improvements across 20 environmental category areas. By joining, signers-on hoped to improve their “environmental cred.”

The program was one of several public-private partnerships that became the hallmark of the Bush administration’s environmental policy. This approach to regulation was touted as a move beyond the traditional “command and control” nature of administrative rulemaking to more collaborative and voluntary programs. Such programs have had mixed results.

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Microsoft has announced plans to make both their headquarters and  their products more environmentally sound.

With energy-conservation, use of renewable energy, improved data center design, and reduction in air travel, the company plans to reduce their carbon emissions by 30 percent compared to 2007 levels by 2012.

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First of all 60% of Americans use social media, and the figure is higher for your market, if you sell to younger Americans.

Cone surveyed almost 1100 adults and found that (of that 60%) 85% feel that companies should interact with their customers via social media.

I found it interesting that the men surveyed were twice as likely as women to use social media to interact frequently with companies (33% versus 17%).

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When Greg Steltenpohl, Chairman and Co-founder of Adina, the San Francisco-based healthy beverage company, does something, one might say he takes it to the extreme.

His company’s tagline, “Drink No Evil”, even applies to their vehicles — including a delivery fleet of electric cars and full-size school bus converted to run on waste vegetable oil (WVO), which Adina uses at their tasting events.

I recently had a chance to interview him about his company’s transportation options. Several interesting topics popped up in our chat, including corporate responsibility, greenwashing, and the importance of outreach. Read on to hear more.

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The University of Phoenix, in partnership with local Phoenix, Arizona energy provider Salt River Project (SRP), announced yesterday that they will make the largest purchase of renewable energy tax certificates in Arizona history.

The University will buy 46.5 million kilowatt-hours of renewable energy credits, equivalent to all of its Phoenix campus’ annual consumption and 27% of its more than 200 campuses across the county. It is also enough power to keep the lights, computers, and TVs going in 3,800 American homes for a year or removing the carbon emissions of 5,280 cars.

University of Phoenix is purchasing the credits from the Hopkins Ridge Wind Facility in Washington state through SRP’s EarthWise program.

As a result of the purchase, the University of Phoenix is ranked 7th on the Environmental Protection Agency’s “Top 20 College & University Partner List“.

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Editor’s Note: This post was provided by one of our sponsors, the juice manufacturer Odwalla.

These days, consumers are increasingly interested in the environmental and social responsibility of the companies that manufacture their favorite products.  Public companies must answer to shareholders and have largely adopted transparent reporting initiatives that detail their corporate responsibility.  Food and drink manufacturers that depend on raw materials – like fruits and vegetables – are committed to environmental stewardship programs that ensure consistent supplies of produce.

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Most toilet bowl cleaners are made with caustic acids that can burn your skin, and I certainly don’t want my little one’s bums to experience that!  Seventh Generation’s Emerald Cypress & Fir Natural Toilet Bowl Cleaner is biodegradable, safe for septic systems, chlorine-free, phosphate-free, dye-free, etc.  It comes in a cool shaped bottle allowing you to squirt under the toilet bowl rim. Unlike many other natural cleaners who guard their ingredients in a shroud of secrecy, Seventh Generation fully discloses its ingredients.  This toilet bowl cleaner is made from:

Aqua (water), lactic acid (plant-derived demineralizer), polyglucose, coceth-7, coceth-4 and deceth-5 (plant-derived cleaning agents), xanthan gum (natural thickener), essential oils and botanical extracts* (citrus aurantifolia (lime), abies balsamea (balsam fir), calilistris columellaris (emerald cypress). *d-limonene is a naturally occurring component of these ingredients.

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