January 2009

Walking along a crystal clear coastline and splashing in water that’s warm as a bath has definite appeal, but the implications for sustaining life as we know it are dire. Warm water has less capacity to absorb oxygen, which also is a necessary fuel for many kinds of bacteria that play a critical role in breaking down organic material. It makes the green movement and alternative energy sources that much more important.

The concern is centered on a computer simulation that points toward our proximity to a tipping point where our actions in the next 50 years could have long-term effects that would last 2,000 years or more. Our climate is going to get warmer, at this point it’s a matter of how much.

We have seen it before. It is the writer who takes a comment or sentence out of context, dramatizes it, and regurgitates it to the public with a completely changed, unethical perspective. It is the sub that has 6 grams of fat or less, just as long as you use wheat bread and don’t put mayonnaise, oil, or cheese on it. It is the small print at the bottom of the one million dollar sweepstakes that turns your dream into a scam.

What is it? It’s the marketing ploy that tells half that story.

Recently, the New York Times released an article that highlighted PepsiCo’s efforts to manage its footprint by working with Carbon Trust to calculate the total amount of carbon emissions in one half gallon jug of orange juice. The findings got enthusiasts excited about the potential of tracking companies’ total emissions. So what is the problem?

Toyota just unveiled its latest iteration of the Prius, and while there are some neat enhancements the new model is far from revolutionary. But then, that could be another sign of Toyota’s approach to business which has often meant incremental improvements to existing designs. In this case that means a Prius with 50 mpg, a bigger engine, a solar powered fan, and LED headlights.

In contrast, General Motors is risking it all with the Chevy Volt to blaze a new path in the industry. All it took was a company on the verge of collapse to get there. If GM fails to turn its financial tailspin around, Toyota’s incremental approach could become the industry standard again. The 2010 Toyota Prius certainly promises to be reliable if not terribly exciting and here’s why.

Coca-Cola possesses both power and resources as the number one “best brand,” according to a recent Harris Poll. The beverage company, which has been around since 1886, has been competing for “sustainability dominance” over its strongest competitor—Pepsi, since the green movement began. Now, it is stepping up its recycling efforts in an attempt to continue its supremacy in the soda industry.

There is no question that the United States, as a whole, lacks a fundamental drive to recycle. In fact, the United States leads the world in the amount of municipal waste it produces and throws away. Waste disposal has become a multi-billion dollar a year industry in the US. So how is Coke going to reverse these trends?

Despite the dreary financial markets there are some bright spots and green energy is one of them. Ze-gen is a great example because it just convinced investors to cough up an additional $20 million in Series B funding which will allow it to deploy its trash-to-energy solution commercially.

This is a case where a company is approaching sustainability and a demand for renewable energy from the back end of the process chain. Instead of working to change our existing infrastructure Ze-gen is trying to make it more compatible with the Earth.

Ze-gen is specifically focused on converting construction and demolition waste, as well as solid waste into usable energy.

Is it another energy solution or is it a cover-up for an even bigger problem? The idea of using grease and oil to generate energy is certainly enticing. Restaurants that use large amounts of oil for deep frying and cooking create storehouses of used oil that is barreled and deemed hazardous. Once a chemical is labeled hazardous restaurants must follow laws and guidelines to get rid of the waste, and that creates additional costs. Crafting a solution that generates electricity while taking care of the old oil is a win-win situation, right? Maybe not.

Somewhere in the history, or creation of the human race we became consumers. That meant searching for things like food for our bodies, materials for shelter and more recently electricity, which powers an ever-burgeoning demand for whizbang appliances and gadgets. But energy is where algae wins out against humans. It’s a simple plant with a genius biofuel solution that takes care of the energy needs of its entire population without visible limits.

Algae relies on the source of energy that powers most of Earth in one way or another, the sun. But short of a mutation in humans that allows intrinsic photosynthesis, we can’t measure up. That’s why researchers have sought for decades to understand how plants like algae convert sunlight into usable energy so efficiently, and now the focus is shifting from soil-based vegetation to the ocean.