economics

A recent UN study by the British consulting firm Trucost, as reported in the Guardian, assessed the environmental impact that the three thousand top global corporations inflict. The study clocked this impact at a cost of $2.2 trillion dollars–a sum greater than the national budgets of all but seven countries in the world and approximately [...]

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A few weeks ago I drove up into the mountains near Los Angeles to go skiing with a friend. We were luckily headed against traffic, but across the median, pointed towards Los Angeles, was one endless stream of cars. I expected it, but it was still astonishing to see: we had been driving away from [...]

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The British government unveiled Wednesday a Green Investment Bank that will have £2 billion ($3 billion) to invest in “high risk” green projects. A similar proposal was floated in the United States Congress last year before that institution became completely obsessed with..what was it?..oh yeah. The British version was unveiled by Finance minister Alistair Darling [...]

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Given the collision of two crises, one economic and the other environmental, our leaders need to understand their priority both in terms of relative importance as well as urgency. Politicians wanting to claim the high ground of concern on the global climate issue, without actually supporting it, were given perfect cover by the financial crisis [...]

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A majority of non-profit organizations in three parts of the country – New York City, New Jersey and Washington D.C. – expect to hire staff in the year ahead. Most will also raise salaries, or at least keep them steady, according to a trio of surveys by Professionals for Nonprofits, a staffing firm. According to [...]

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Air pollution in Central and Southern California cost area hospitals $193 million from 2005 to 2007, according to a study by Rand Corp. The study documented 29,808 emergency room visits and hospital admissions in the South Coast Air Basin and the San Joaquin Valley for problems related to pollution. Both air basins are the worst [...]

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During the Economist’s Corporate Citizenship Conference earlier this week, I heard nearly three dozen global leaders discuss the challenges, successes and failures of corporate citizenship.  From their comments, I gleaned a collection of best practices for developing corporate citizenship programs that generate tangible results.  Here’s what these leaders recommend. Collaborate with competitors. It’s not easy [...]

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Toshiba, one of Japan’s largest makers of lighting products, announced that it had permanently ended production Wednesday of incandescent light bulbs, a year ahead of schedule. Manufacturers worldwide have begun phasing out production of incandescents in favor of compact fluorescent lamp (CFL) and light-emitting diode (LED) bulbs, which are more energy efficient and last longer. [...]

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The Great “but” in any discussion of short term profitability versus corporate responsibility, whether to the public or to the company’s own future, is “but CEOs owe it to the shareholders to increase stock price.” This seemingly iron-clad obligation is arguably the source of much of the financial turmoil of the last couple years, with [...]

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The Economist’s Corporate Citizenship Conference “Doing Well by Doing Good” wrapped up earlier last week and provided a variety of perspectives on what exactly needs to be done, how and by whom to restore our economy, corporate ethics and public trust. It was no surprise that the bleak economic situation was a recurring theme echoed [...]

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A prominent British economist said “arrogance” on the part of the planet’s wealthier nations contributed to the disappointing outcome of the Copenhagen climate conference in December. In an interview with the BBC, Lord Nicholas Stern said the conference should not be considered a failure, however, despite producing only the non-binding Copenhagen Accord, which has been [...]

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Investment in renewable energy grew in 2009 in wind and biofuels – despite most of the world’s economy being mired in recession, according to a new Clean Energy Trends report from market research firm Clean Edge, Inc. The third pillar of clean energy, solar power, saw revenues shrink, but only because of a crash in [...]

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Eco-friendly LA is about to put its money where its mouth is. A proposal by LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa would raise electricity bills 8.8% to 28.4% to pay for an ambitious clean energy initiative. The rate hikes would be implemented by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (DWP), and must be approved by [...]

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Here’s a news flash of sorts: ExxonMobil (XOM), the world’s largest publicly traded oil and gas company, has barrels of money and plans $28 billion in capital spending this year and about $25-$30 billion each year thereafter through 2014. The company made more than $19 billion last year and generated cash flow of $28.4 billion. [...]

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You might want to start taking notes on the effort in California to shelve the state’s landmark emissions control legislation, the Global Warming Solutions Act (aka AB32). It’s getting interesting. First off, the Sacramento Bee reports that papers filed today in Sacramento identify  Scott Folwarkow, Valero’s director of government affairs in California, and Jon Coupal, [...]

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World of Good Inc., a company that has made a business of connecting artisans in developing countries with mainstream consumer markets, announced last week that eBay has fully acquired its brand and related assets. The company also announced that GreaterGood, a division of Charity USA has acquired its wholesale division and line of designer Fair [...]

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By Eric Weaver, CEO, Opportunity Fund Last month, Opportunity Fund helped truckers beat a February deadline to retrofit their truck engines as new EPA emissions standards in California went into effect. Truckers told Opportunity Fund that without loans to cover the retrofitting costs, they would have had to give up trucking or move their business [...]

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I’ve a fear of oceans. Lakes—even the biggest ones—I don’t mind. I love them, in fact, having grown up in Chicago and attending college on the shores of Lake Superior. But oceans, and their rip tides and undertows, have always struck me as sinister. Ironically, just after returning from a week on a beach in [...]

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The idea of “Green Jobs” is a favorite subject around here, especially in tough economic times. The idea is that, however you define the term, “Green Jobs” are going to be a cornerstone of economic recovery and indeed a larger re-tooling of the economy to be based on efficiency, clean energy, better, healthier products, services, [...]

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Microfinance, something now fairly common and even mainstream in 2010, was a novel concept when we first wrote about Kiva in 2005. At that time, you could only lend to people in Uganda. Now you can lend to people around the world, and in a clear sign microfinance has moved beyond being only about helping [...]

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Five years ago, 3p reported that GDP does not correlate with happiness, and that another, more holisitic metric—GPI, or Gross Progress Indicator—would be more apt. Now, in 2010, some say this is still true. This finding has been repeated and reported almost constantly in the last five years, which begs two points. First, that happiness is [...]

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Since TriplePundit.com launched in 2005, Walmart and other big box stores have gone through quite a metamorphosis in the eyes of many pundits of triple-bottom-line business. In fact, 2005 was the same year that Walmart launched the first of a growing list of initiatives aimed at simultaneously reducing its environmental impact and its operating expenses. [...]

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Back in 2005, 3p’s inaugural year, we looked at the role private toll roads can play in reducing traffic congestion—one of our nation’s largest contributors of greenhouse gas emissions—as well as fix struggling state budgets. Fast forward five years, and it seems like we’re still asking ourselves that same question: are private toll roads the [...]

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The Environmental Protection Agency announced on Sunday a five-year, $2.2 billion initiative to start healing the Great Lakes. The effort has three main goals: improve the lakes’ wildlife habitat, improve water quality and fight the invasion of non-native species such as Asian carp, which threaten not only the lakes’ ecosystem but also their fishery industry. [...]

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I have to be honest. I don’t know much about the Tea Party movement. But as someone who sees our two party system as offering little more than the illusion of a real and effective democracy, I applaud any group that stands up and forces the status quo to take notice. In fact, after doing [...]

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By Dennis Salazar Copenhagen – A Microcosm of the Green Movement Last year’s disappointing climate summit in Copenhagen demonstrated if not proved two important things about “saving the earth”: 1. Sustainability is a very emotional topic for some 2. Sustainability is a financial topic for most Unfortunately, what transpired in Copenhagen is probably the rule, [...]

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Editor’s Note: The following is a guest op-ed by Eric Weaver, Opportunity Fund, and Matt Lonner, Chevron. Periodically we are approached by companies wishing to publish op-ed material and other content, sometimes we accept it, sometimes not. We were recently approached by Chevron to do this. While the oil industry is a controversial one on [...]

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Though historically high gas prices provide a strong market demand for electric vehicles (EVs) in California, it is the state with an electric grid that is the least able to support these cars. With automakers set to launch at least a dozen EV models by 2012, California’s electricity regulators are scrambling to respond to the [...]

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Maximize Regional Strengths Not unique from any economic development strategy, it is important to examine community assets to boost green job development. Toledo, Ohio, is nicknamed the Glass City because it is known as a major glass manufacturer. Unfortunately, Toledo lost one-third of its manufacturing jobs since 2000, leaving excess manufacturing capacity and a highly [...]

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Shipping containers play an integral role in moving goods from one location to another.  A Dutch company, Cargoshell, has designed an innovative collapsible shipping container that may soon revolutionize the way products are transported.   While traditional containers can transport an enormous amount of cargo, when the containers are empty, they take up a massive amount of space [...]

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