A recent Wall Street Journal article cites a McKinsey & Co study claiming that American consumers influence 65% of the countrys greenhouse gas emissions. (Consumers in the rest of the world only influence 43% of emissions.) The findings demonstrate that it is the individual and not industry that has power over climate control.
Is there an echo in here? The good news coming from venture capitalists last year is that they're continuing to support the growth and expansion of the cleantech industry at a record-setting pace. According to Reuters, cleantech investment topped $5 billion for 2007, a 44% jump from 2006 (which was, itself, a similar increase over 2005…
Our passion for organic tea began with the opening of our cafe in New York City in 2003. We opened the doors to Grounded Organic Coffee & Tea House with an emphasis on quality of product and consistency of drink preparation. Though most New Yorkers are considered proud members of America’s vast "coffee culture," we…
In sharp contrast to just two years ago, concerns about climate change have now become a household topic. What caused this epidemic to tip (apologies to Malcolm Gladwell)? Was it the Oscar-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth? Was it G.W. Bush mentioning those two magic words in his 2007 State of the Union address just six months later?…
The NYTimes is featuring an article today on Bjorn Lomborg's take on climate change. While the content won't be unfamiliar to most people who follow the issue, let me quote the gist of it: “Wealth is a more important factor than sea-level rise in protecting you from the sea. You can draw maps showing 100…
Photo:Juhanson, Creative Commons, Flickr In a joint report issued last week by Ecosystem Marketplace and New Carbon Finance, an approximate total of 23.7 million tons, or US$91 million, of CO2 traded in the voluntary, non-Kyoto supported carbon markets in 2006. While this pales in comparison to the 1.1 billion tons of CO2, or US$24.4 billion, traded on…
Lawmakers and securities regulators have been surprisingly silent on the recent alliance between the New York Stock Exchange and Euronext (the first trans-Atlantic securities exchange), and the future possibilities for mergers due to take place in Japan, India and other regional stock exchanges that the big board has under their radar.
Media headlines concerning climate change and the declining supplies of the world’s clean water have spawned an investment euphoria into water companies, utilities and the mutual funds that invest in them. Investment analysts have been forecasting that opportunities related to water in the 21st century could rival the same opportunities oil offered in the 20th…
If anyone were to ask me what company represents the fight for a greener planet, I would have to say Waste Management Inc., (WMI-NYSE), trading just below $40 per share. Since 1894, this company has been taking out the trash and has recently built a respectable portfolio of solutions to profit from waste-to-energy implementation and…
Market players head into this 4th of July trading week, facing a heightened sense of awareness that the story for stocks is about as unsatisfying as the Sopranos' series finale.
Move over Martin Scorsese, Al Gore is Oscar . This is one more step of climate change going mainstream. One of the more interesting economic implications of this trend is with real estate values. Prices may start to take into account potential direct implications, future regulatory changes, and changing marketplace perceptions.
Investor Network on Climate Risk (INCR) , a coalition of unions, public pensions, and faith-based institutional investors in Money magazine recently identified ten companies, including Exxon and Bed Bath & Beyond , that it believes are too slow to address climate change. INCR suggest that companies that are slow to evolve their business operations to…
Insurance customers see rising rates and dropped policies. Insurance companies, according to Ceres , experience insured losses multiplying 15-fold in three decades: far faster than inflation, population or growth. Climate change affects nearly every industry in at least three ways: directly (i.e. drought, sea level rise), through increased regulations, and through market perception that climate…
Blogger Felix Salmon summarizes a Citigroup (C) report on climate change and companies poised to benefit. Principal companies noted are in Alternative Fuels, Carbon Trading and Clean Technology. Link to Felix's Summary and list of companies mentioned.
Today it's increasingly clear that, considering the environment is no longer trendy or simply the right thing to do for business, there is no alternative. Andrew Winston, founder of Winston Eco-Strategies and co-author of Green to Gold : How Smart Companies Use Environmental Strategy to Innovate, Create Value, and Build Competitive Advantage gave an engaging…
This surprise blog results from some time I spent this weekend looking into ways for us to try to ecologically offset our air travel. There is tons of info out there and I’m a novice, but I thought I’d share the quick ‘n’ easy options that I managed to find…. The first option is obviously…
"An increase of two or three degrees wouldn't be so bad for a northern country like Russia. We could spend less on fur coats, and the grain harvest would go up." – Vladimir Putin, Russian President, October 2003 Climate change has many losers: Dutch, Africans, and Floridians to name a few. But does it have…
The US government says climate change is uncertain and addressing it will hurt the US economy. In contrast, the UK government says addressing climate change will cost 1% of global GDP every year, but that not addressing it will cost up to 20% each year. A Tufts University report estimates the cost of climate change…