3p Contributor: Jen Boynton
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Top Gear Takes Innovation in a Whole New Direction
Host James May with some "commie" cars
I’m one of those freakzoid environmentalists with neither a car nor a television. Which is why it is all the more remarkable that I’m chuffed to bits by this British show Top Gear. The 13th season premieres on BBC America on Monday. I’m behind the times, what with the lack of television and all, but the folks at Top Gear were kind enough to send me a screener which I watched on my trusty laptop.
This show features cars that drive fast, which is drool-worthy for technically minded folks (me, I read my RSS feed during those parts), but of course it’s got 3 British hosts who pretty much make the thing with their banter, G&T mixing on camera, and celebrity guests who get to drive the cars too. The most entertaining part for me are the challenges the producers create for the hosts.
In Season 10, episode 2 the boys have to create amphibious vehicles with which to drive on land and across the English channel. It’s hilarious to see what they come up with, and (spoiler alert) how badly it all goes awry.
From a sustainability standpoint, at first I was a bit resistant to the program because it seemed as if it were all about gadget lust–on a really expensive scale. But what I’ve realized is that there is glory in the gadget sometimes, and we shouldn’t try to deny that, lest we become teetotalers that no one wants to talk to. The challenges where the hosts have to use their knowledge of all the moving parts to complete an asinine task remind me of the potential for problem solving that exists when one combines knowledge and passion with a healthy dose of humor and gin. Watch as the gang tests the limits of American muscle cars on the Bonneville salt flats:
How Google’s China Pullout Shows Their Triple Bottom Line
Cartoon police officers JingJing and ChaCha appear periodically when surfing the Web in China to help Internet users remember to maintain harmonious Internet order together and to be conscious of safe and healthy use of the Internet.
What happens when, in its mission to make information as universally acceptable as possible, Google has to be kind of evil? Google’s mission and motto, “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful” and, of course, “don’t be evil,” will not be new to most readers. What’s interesting is when these two missions come at odds, like in the case of China.
Google wrestled hard with whether or not it could afford to refuse China’s demands. If it refused to comply, it would lose key market share and cut off access to more than 103 million internet users. If it complied, it would deviate from the company’s core values. The search giant’s decision to stand up for itself and make the right move is one of the greatest examples of company activism for triple bottom line thinking of our time.
Top Five Start-Up Posts of the Year
Dear Readers,
TriplePundit has had a heck of a year. With your help, we’ve grown to be one of the most widely-read online publications about sustainable business, we’ve brought in many new contributors, and we’ve helped stoke the fires of a new, green economy in many new places. We hope you’ve had a great time reading and engaging with us and we’re ready to kick of January with a lot of new features, partnerships, and content.
To celebrate the end of the year, or crack team of editors has put together a few top-five lists for the year, including this one: the best start-up stories of the year. These are the stories that inspired us the most and gave us hope about the possibility for a better way to do business.
First up: the unbelievable. Making drinking water from thin air. It’s not science fiction. This story hit big for the technology’s potential to bring water to waterless regions.
Then there was Virgance, the company that figured out how to turn activism into a business model. Got a mob, need action? These guys will tell you how to monetize it, too.
Zumbox plans to revolutionize the mail with the power of digital transmission. How novel!
Molten Salt just sounds cool, doesn’t it? Molten Salt! SolarReserve thinks it’s the key to solving the solar energy storage problem. And adding flavor to your popcorn. (Ok, that last one maybe not so much.)
Finally, there’s Better Place. The company aims to make the world just that, through innovations to electric vehicle charging and the car ownership model. Turn a traditional sales model on its head by renting the risky part (batteries) and suddenly you have a new market opportunity. These guys are one to watch, for sure.
Check back tomorrow for the best of the worst: greenwashing edition. On Wednesday we’ll look at our top five posts of the year!
Suntrica Brings Mobile Connectivity to 3rd World and Gadget Lust to You
Imagine biking 25 miles to reach the nearest electricity source capable of powering your cell phone. According to UN research published in 2005, only 20% of Africans (excluding South Africa and Egypt) have access to reliable grid electricity, and this number falls to 2% in rural areas. Consider that one more time. Only 2% of rural Africans have access to electric lights to scare the night away.
Couple that with the fact that the developing world is the fastest growing market for cell phones by a long shot. Worldwide, there are more than 2.4 billion cellphone users (2006 data) and 59 percent of these 2.4 billion people live in developing countries. This makes cellphones the first telecommunications technology in history to have more users there than in the developed world.
In countries where mobile technology has leapfrogged infrastructure power for mobile devices can be quite difficult to come by.
So while mobile connectivity represents a major opportunity for quality of life for the base of the pyramid the realities of the electric grid present a substantial stumbling block.
That’s where Suntrica comes in.
If You’re Feeling the COP15 Burnout, This Is the Satire for You
COP15 Activists at Work
Don’t get me wrong, I am watching as eagerly as the rest of you. I’m thrilled that COP15 has garnered as much media attention as it has. It’s amazing. I don’t think that the consciousness of the world has ever been so fixated on a single environmental issue in my lifetime. It’s everything that I could hope for. But, I’ve been known to skim and article or two.
Who can blame me? There’s a ton of coverage, and not really much happening. David Roberts over at Grist put it best when discussing the non issue of the leaked Danish text:
Consider: Copenhagen maxed out on journalist registrations, at 5,000. (Supposedly there were more than 10,000 waiting in line after that.) The place is choked with journalists, not to mention folks from think tanks and NGOs who are supposed to be blogging. There are thousands of people crammed in a small area, all under instructions to update frequently with fresh news, all exhausted and stressed out, all hungry for something to write about.
On the flip side, virtually nothing of significance to an international agreement will be decided before the final days, perhaps the final hours, of the talks.
What are all those journalists going to write about?…. Most of all, they’ll report the hell out of it every time any representative of any government says anything about anything. Every bit of pre-positioning gossip and bluster will be blown up to billboard size. There is, in short, immense incentive to exaggerate the significance of every piece of “news.”
If you’re feeling the burn, this 2 minute bit of satire from NPR will be music to your ears.
California Small Businesses A-OK Under AB32
The Union of Concerned Scientists released a report today (full disclosure- they pay my rent, which is why I got a jump on writing about this great report) outlining the impact of California’s groundbreaking global warming legislation on small businesses. The long and the short of it? No big changes! The impact to small businesses is expected to come primarily from changes in the cost of energy, because the cost of producing cleaner energy, as required under AB32, will potentially be passed on to consumers. At least that’s the worry.
The report finds that it’s not a big concern. The percentage of revenue spent on energy for a typical small business will change from minuscule- 1.4% to mildly less minuscule- 1.7%. Even better, this is a conservative estimate, assuming that businesses do not invest in any energy efficiency upgrades. Companies that choose to invest in upgrades to reduce their energy consumption might even see decreases in their costs, but UCS wanted to focus on the worst case scenario for companies that do not pursue energy efficiency.
In addition to examining the impact to small businesses by sector, UCS conducted a case study on the Border Grill, an upscale Mexican restaurant in Los Angeles owned by the Two Hot Tamales of Food Network fame. The Border Grill was chosen because restaurants and bars account for the largest share of employment in any small business category, and restaurants also have relatively high energy costs– think of the gas used for cooking and the energy used to refrigerate, light and cool a typical restaurant. Energy costs are a pretty big concern for many independent restaurateurs. Plus the Border Grill was willing to open its books and share detailed information on its physical premises, equipment, lighting, energy use, and financial performance with the analysts. All of this was necessary to conduct a rigorous analysis, but don’t worry, the hot tamales are getting some nice PR out of it. Anyway, the analysts did their analyzing and it turns out that if the Hot Tamales were to do *nothing* but carry on as usual, all they would have to do is raise their typical check from $20 to $20.03 and their increased energy costs would be totally taken care of. Yes, that 3 cents will be passed on to the customer, but he can probably swing it.
Four Game-Changing Technologies You’ve Never Heard Of
Finland is a country that is very generous with its entrepreneurs. According to the representatives from Tekes, a publicly funded organization for financing research, development and innovation in Finland, it’s pretty easy for most entrepreneurs to get low-interest grants and loans for 1 million euros or less. That’s obviously pretty appealing to many would-be entrepreneurs (one of the entrepreneurs we spoke to called Tekes the “Finnish rainmaker”), and in turn this easy access to funding makes it pretty easy for game changing technologies to have a shot at reaching the mainstream.
Here are four interesting startups we learned about during my visit to Finland last week:
Forests as Feedstocks: The Finnish Approach
Nuuksio National Forest on the Outskirts of Helsinki
I’m on the eve of my return home to San Francisco from a lovely time in Finland.
Our wonderful hosts at Finnfacts planned a special last day for us in Nuuksio National Park where we hiked in the woods, smoked our own venison sausages over the fire, and dipped ourselves in a frozen lake and then raced into the sauna.
It was amazing. I gained a new understanding for the deep connection Finns have to the natural world. Don’t get me wrong, Metso the biomass company still has some work to do on its environmental initiatives, but on my tour today I felt like the woods would never end and I saw them as a source for fuel and life-sustaining energy in a way I haven’t ever quite before.
The Importance of Being Earnest About Biomass
Finnish Bioenergy Power Plant
Metso Corporation is pretty confident in its green cred. The Finnish company calls itself “a global supplier of sustainable technology and services” and in a press visit today the company’s VP of strategic development, Michael Hoven, and communications manager, Sanna Rahikainen, when asked if they considered Metso a green company, said it was. They said they don’t greenwash and are proud of what they were doing for the environment.
Unfortunately the devil is in the details, and Metso has a way to go before this blogger would feel comfortable calling it a truly sustainable business.
The key to Metso’s self-proclaimed environmental credentials is its production of biomass boilers to replace those powered by coal and other fossil fuels. It’s true that biomass has the potential to be an energy source that is superior to fossil fuels from an environmental standpoint. There are at least three keys in my mind to ensuring that biomass is a real sustainable solution:
3p Bound for Helsinki: Five Fast Facts About Finland
Quick quiz: name five things about Finland.
I’ll go first: reindeer, vodka, snow, Nokia, and … saunas.
Pretty sad, right? For a bunch of world travelers we should know better. Luckily there is a group who is setting out to change all that. Finnfacts, the country’s PR agency, has invited Triple Pundit and friends from:
Sustainablog, Clean Techies, Clean Tech Blog, Green Dig, Leo DiCaprio’s blog, Mother Nature Network and German blog Cleanthinking.de on a tour of some of the country’s hottest clean tech companies and coldest national parks. Finnfacts is kind enough to foot the bill because they know bloggers are not known for their deep pockets. Sold!
We head off on Monday. In preparation for the trip, I’ve been doing my research. Yes, some of this time was spent doing experiential research in the sauna with a Finlandia on ice, but I also did some good old fashioned reading. Did you know:
- Helsinki was recently named the world design capital for 2012 Which is not a surprise to me because I have a thing for Marimekko designs
- Finnish is closer to Hungarian than it is to Swedish, linguistically
- During World War II, Finland fought the Soviets, unsuccessfully allied with the Germans to regain lost territory, then eventually joined the allied forces against Germany as a condition of peace, meaning they fought in 3 separate wars all told.
- Finlandization is the art of bowing to the east without mooning the west. (Hee! what an image.)
- It’s really cold there
If you have any fun facts to add, or questions for us to ask, leave them in the comments!
A Quick Interview With Nick Corcodilos of Ask The Headhunter
I had a chance to do a quick email interview with Nick Corcodilos, author of the Ask a Headhunter Blog and a frequent contributor to Fast Company. My questions for Nick concern the rise of so-called “green” recruiting firms and other folks capitalizing on the rise of green jobs – are they for real? or just jumping on a trend?
Jen Boynton: I’m concerned by the idea that “green search firms are a racket playing on a theme,” I’d assumed that they were just new firms targeting my demographic but I see from reading your book that a headhunter doesn’t need to know how to do a job to find a good candidate- he just needs to be a great networker. However, given that sustainability is a completely new field with a new set of parameters is their any use at all for search firms that specialize in environmental jobs?
Nick Corcodilos: I’m sorry to say that I keep finding more opportunistic use of “green” than legitimate use in marketing. I think this will change, but I fear the term “green” is lost already. It’s an empty slogan that sells product for many companies — but too often seems to have little to do with environmentalism. I’m sure there are some search firms that are trying to really be green… but what’s the point? A good search firm that handles all sorts of positions can create a “green” area within its practice. The challenge that “green” search firms face is… doing search properly to begin with. If I were looking for a green job, I’d try to hook up with the best search firms, period, and emphasize what I’m looking for.
Public Produce: Filling the Sidewalks with Fruit Trees
This review is part of the Green Books campaign. Today 100 bloggers are reviewing 100 great books printed in an environmentally friendly way. This campaign is organized by Eco-Libris, a green company working to green up the book industry by promoting the adoption of green practices, balancing out books by planting trees, and supporting green books. A full list of participating blogs and links to their reviews is available on Eco Libris.
Triple Pundit was thrilled to take part in the green books campaign because we love reading and we especially love reading books that have been produced in an environmentally responsible way.
We reviewed Public Produce: The New Urban Agriculture
At first glance, this doesn’t seem to have much to do with sustainable business, because the book argues for a shift in municipal policy. But Triple Pundit is a place where we love to talk about food and we’ve covered many businesses that deal with food innovation. The policy laid out in Public Produce has all the tenets of an innovative model: cost reduction, life improvement and a healthy a dose of “why haven’t I thought of that.” Author Darrin Norahl lays out all the problems with our current food production and distribution system: the dearth of affordable healthy food in the inner city and its connection to obesity; hunger; the 1500 miles the average piece of produce travels; outbreaks of food borne illness that sicken and kill people country wide and the environmental degradation associated with big ag. Then he provides an elegant solution:
Hopenhagen: the Ultimate Cause Marketing Campaign
If you follow environmental issues, chances are you’ve come across the beautiful, inspiring Hopenhagen campaign. The purpose of the campaign is to draw attention to the upcoming United Nations climate change conference COP15, which you can read more about here. Many folks who care deeply about climate change are watching closely with their fingers crossed, hoping that strong commitments will come out of the conference.
For those of us on the ground who care about the outcome of the talks but aren’t involved in politics, there isn’t much to do but watch and worry. And that’s where Hopenhagen comes in. The brain-child of Ogilvy Earth, an international sustainability marketing company, Hopenhagen is the branding of a movement. The purpose of the campaign is to give activists something to do besides watch and worry: we can hope. The power of “hope,” as we learned with the viral “Yes We Can” video during the Obama campaign, is that hope has a way to inspire and motivate people to action in a way that fear never can.
Hopenhagen is not only a play on the city where the talks will take place, but a subtle jibe at the choices we have in the climate crisis. We can cope with climate change by changing our behavior, moving inland and finding alternate habitats for the polar bears, or we can hope that the crisis will move us toward a more sustainable way of living sustainably, with the resources we have available on this planet. There’s a lot of opportunity for innovation there.
3P Founder Opens Closet for Ecouterre
Nick takes his sustainability seriously- from his head down to his toes. He let Ecouterre take a tour of his closet and he let it all hang out. Click the link to see his labels and his adorable message tees.
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