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Exploring San Francisco Green Business Conference 2008

Keith Rockmael — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 17:49:02 +0000

As we walked into the San Francisco Green Business Conference 2008, our expectations rose just a tad when we spied not only the recycling, landfill and compost bins (with Biobags) but also fair trade coffee and organic tea which may seem insignificant but first impressions mean a lot. As is the case with many Green festivals, summits, etc in the Bay Area that a significant percentage of attendees hailed from the local region however it we enjoyed seeing representation and discussion from people in “red” states.

With the economy on just about everyone’s mind, the green business conference made for timely discussion. A panel of Jay Harris, publisher of the still independent Mother Jones, Adrienne Brown (Executive Director, The Ruckus Society) and Paul Ray of Integral Partnerships, discussed the how the recent election will effect the green marketplace which included intriguing topics about “affordable green.” A lot of people (us included) think that with people watching their dollars even more closely that the green economy suffer a downturn. That’s exactly why we need to spend more to dig us out of the hole. However, the green economy isn’t a silver bullet. If it was then businesses such as Whole Foods wouldn’t be experiencing a downturn in profits.

We enjoy numbers and video clips as much as most human beings (maybe even more) so one of the later discussion led by Mitch Baranowski (BBMG) and David Lubensky of Bagatto raised our awareness. These markets awareness gurus discussed, among other things, how “green” is the new “new and improved” and that with all of the green product and service claims, the public wants to see specifics rather than the general generic green claims that appear to have become more prevalent. One particular video clip struck a chord with us clip of a woman in a Midwest supermarket reading an ingredient label. This “box-turner” picked up a product, scanned the label and uttered, “An inch of ingredients, how bad could that be?” For us and many of the green business attendees, that inch spoke volumes.

Ecocity World Summit 2008

Keith Rockmael — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 15:47:17 +0000

The 7th International Ecocity World Conference continues this week in San Francisco, California and if a positive aspect exists about globalization, it can be seen at this conference. A buzz exists in what feels like a combination of the World Cup (the passion), the U.N. (the international flavor) and something like Greenpeace (the Green aspect). We ran into a potpourri of organic architects, city planners, NGO leaders, and other interested in sustaining the earth as we know it.

The speakers ranged from keynote speaker Jaimie Lerner, former mayor of Curitiba Brazil co-founder of the IPPUC, Parris Glendending (Former Governor of Maryland and President of Smart Growth Leadership Institute and Janet Larsen, Director of Research for the Earth Policy Institute and advocate for Lestor Brown’s Plan B. Larsen mentioned how Plan A refers to as “business as usual” and most of us can see that that plan isn’t working. Plan B doesn’t just refer to the U.S. Countries like Algeria who depend on their oil revenue can see the oil-less future and continue to create solar and thermal alternatives to power their future. Imagine an oil country funding alt energy sources.

Great Green North?

Keith Rockmael — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 15:51:21 +0000

Taking a break from the daily San Francisco routine, we headed down to Los Angeles for a conference known as Canada Marketplace where we search for the anything significantly Green in the Great White North. We did discover some hotels, restaurants and other things making that movement in the green direction but that will have to wait for another post.

In this one, we focus on the marketplace itself. This year, they ventured into that Green netherworld to make the conference greener. They even hired a Green conference consultant but we could track down this consultant so we had do go it alone.

We thing we see when we check in is a giant sign from Travel Alberta about how they have purchased carbon credits. It’s no secret of what we think of carbon credits (low on the green totem pole). We’re more about actually doing something to make a change instead of just buying something.