sustainable business
Green Jobs
image: flickr user OregonDOT
In today’s current economic situation, there has been a lot of hope (and hype) inspired by what’s being called “green-collar jobs”. This self described new industry would appear to be the much needed solution to not only the depressingly high unemployment rates, but also the need for alternate energy sources and even a more general, cultural environmental paradigm shift. But what is the real situation when it comes to the green job market today? What even qualifies as a “green collar job”? It’s sometimes all too easy to fall for perhaps over emphasized, environmentally significant buzzwords. Recognizing this, let’s start with a couple definitions.
In a Time article, What Is A Green-Collar Job, Exactly, Phil Angelides (chair of the green employment focused coalition, Apollo Alliance) defined it as a job that pays decent wages and benefits that can support a family, a job that is part of a real career path with potential for advancement, and a job that reduces waste and pollution and benefits the environment. Personally, I prefer Green Collar Blog’s wider definition of “full-time, part-time, or internship opportunities that provide a social or environmental benefit. These jobs can be in the public, private, or non-profit sector and include jobs in areas such as energy efficiency, green building, natural resource management, recycling, and renewable energy.”
The Green Collar Blog definition includes a broader view of green, including sustainability and corporate social responsibility type jobs. It really all comes down to an argument over what the real definition of “green” is, but let’s save that for another blog. › Continue reading
Tools for Sustainable Investing
One way I like to try and make a difference is supporting sustainable companies that I can feel good about. There are two ways to do this, one is by buying their products, the other is by investing in their future and showing your support and investing in their future. The second way also leaves you an opportunity to benefit from the success of that company.
I try and keep an eye out for new and sustainable companies, environmentally responsible stocks and mutual funds that promote eco-friendly and socially conscious values. Honestly this has paid off for me much better (especially in the long term) than most of my other stock or mutual fund picks. I recently found and interesting investing tool called the Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI), which are a collection of global indexes tracking the financial performance of the leading sustainability-driven companies worldwide.
A partnership between the Dow Jones Dow Jones Indexes, STOXX Limited and SAM they provide asset managers benchmarks to manage sustainability portfolios. The nice thing is that you are able to access them as well for your investment decisions. You are able to look up companies and filter them by key factors outlined by the index.
For each company, the input sources of information for the Corporate Sustainability Assessment consist of the responses to the online questionnaire, submitted documentation, policies and reports, publicly available information and SAM Research analyst’s direct contact with companies. Each sustainability assessment is verified by PricewaterhouseCoopers.
New on the Green Scene
I get quite a few emails a day from green companies and individuals recommending their favorite products and sites, however, I just don’t have the time write feature articles on all of them. With so much great stuff to share, I figured I would just type up a quick summary of each so everybody can still benefit.
Positively Cleveland
Cleveland, Ohio has taken great strides to help turn this lakefront town into one of the nation’s greenest cities, from the environmentally friendly hotels to a number of restaurants who exclusively cook with locally-grown food. To commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Cuyohoga River fire, Positively Cleveland has compiled a list of the 75 “green” things to love about Cleveland.
Forty years ago the Cuyahoga River caught on fire due to heavy pollution, but Cleveland has since turned this unfortunate incident into an opportunity by striving to make itself one of the nation’s greenest cities. After decades of hard work, Cleveland has grown to become a “green city on a blue lake.”
Gobble Green Vegan Food
Gobble Green is an online marketplace where you will find a diverse and frequently updated selection of healthy, pre-packaged vegan meals. Our food kits are packaged in environmentally friendly containers and shipped directly to your home.
Gobble Green is all about the protection of our environment, animal rights, and healthy eating. Gobble Green is right for anyone who is interested in leading a humane and environmentally responsible lifestyle. We are very proud of our menu and our message.
Buy Green
A great new green shopping resource, Buy Green even has its own green standards for the products it carries.
You will find eco friendly clothing, including bamboo clothing, green home environmental products including natural organic products and solar powered lights, just to name a few. Commercial buyers also have a wide selection of products from environmentally friendly bags for retailers to recycled paper products.
Recycled Fire Hose Gear
It’s amazing how many things we use out there that just get thrown away. Good thing there are creative and resourceful individuals who are willing to try to make products out of recycling just about anything.
Recycled sails and recycled inner tube bags are the hot ones right now, but I just found another unique niche, fire hoses.
Carrotmob Mobs Seattle for Sustainable Businesses
I am pretty excited about the first (of hopefully many) Carrotmob event at the Pike Place Place Brewery in Seattle, Washington. If you haven’t heard about Carrotmob, you should check out their website and get hooked into their sustainable consumer network.
Carrotmob organizes environmentally conscious individuals to reward businesses for being eco-friendly. One way they do this is to funnel large amounts of consumers to patronize a single business which has promised to become more sustainable. The means is negotiated beforehand by the Carrotmob team, which can range from upgrades to make a business more energy efficient, to converting over to renewable energy.
The first ever Carrotmob event in Seattle happens TODAY (sorry about the late notice) April 22, 2009 in tandem with a Seattle Greendrinks event at Pike Place Pub and Brewery.
Buy, Sell, Trade and Get Rid of Stuff – Recycle and Trade Spring Cleaning Treasures
I was going through my place doing a little spring cleaning (in spring, can you imagine?) and I ended up with 3 different categories of items:
- Items I want to sell (and I think i can)
- Items I want to sell (and I think they are pretty much worthless)
- Items I just want to get rid of
If you can believe it, there are actually very specialized places to do business with all three of these types of items. For items that actually have some value and could fetch a fair amount of cash, I usually head straight to craigslist, ebay or amazon
Green Business Finder – 3rdWhales’ iPhone app
A company called 3rdWhale just made it much easier to find those green businesses in and around your city, or wherever you happen to be. What’s really cool is their new app for the iPhone. It gives you directions, reviews and more about the eco-friendly, fair-trade and green stores and service providers near your location.
The app provides you with four green categories: food, retail, fitness centers and spas, and ecotourism. The main features of this app will allow you to:
- Check out “What’s Around” and “Search” for green places
- Rate the greenness of a business
- Add your favorite green place
- Flag offensive/inappropriate listings
- Submit your suggestions to improve 3rdWhale mobile
Fair Trade Sustainable Sporting Goods
How often do you think about your sporting goods and how they impact the environment? Well, you may not have really had a choice – but now you do! Fair Trade Sports brings North America the first line of sports balls (soccer, football, basketball, volleyball, rugby and more) certified fair trade and green.
Also available in Australia through Etiko Sports and UK and Europe through Fair Deal Trading, these products are made from Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified all natural vegan rubber and hand stitched by Union workers who are paid a living wage. Fair wages and healthy sweatshop-free working conditions for adult workers are used for their apparel as well (hint hint Nike). › Continue reading
Zulugrass Sustainable Eco Jewelry – The Leakey Collection
I just received some beautiful sustainably zulugrass bracelets from the Leakey Collection. These bracelets and almost all their jewelry are made by people of the Maasai tribe in the Rift Valley area of Kenya, East Africa from zulugrass. What excites me the most about this collection is not only how beautiful the jewelry is, but how one simple piece can have so much impact on our world.
The production of this jewelry employs over 1200 Kenyans, and allows them to live a more traditional lifestyle in this ever changing modern world. It also helps to preserve native wetland habitat by allowing the sustainable harvest of the zulugrass instead of burning it for cattle grazing.
The process begins by harvesting grass, one blade at a time. The long grass is then dried and cut into bead-size pieces and dyed in an environmentally sustainable manner giving each bead a unique hue. › Continue reading
Invest Green – Environmentally Responsible Stocks and Mutual Funds
Now may not be the best time for this post, or is it? Market wisdom dictates to buy low, sell high. Well guess what, the market is pretty low right now and some technologies seem to have a rosy future. The Obama administration has made it clear that they will be investing heavily in alternative green energy sources, breaking our dependency on oil and dirty power generation. This opens up a great opportunity to possibly make some money, and support green initiatives that are important to you as well. › Continue reading
A Great Green Workout – Create Your Own Energy at the Gym
I remember thinking that this would be a great idea back when i used to workout at the gym in college, and now someone actually did it! A gym where you create your own power during the workout. The Green MicroGym in Portland, Oregon is not your traditional gym, it is stocked with generators that are linked in to workout equipment so you actually power the studio (they estimate the equipment and solar panels will cover about 40% of the gyms’ operational energy). They are attempting to increase that number even further and have calculated a need of 240 hours per day on the equipment is needed to net a 100% self sustainable studio. They are not above offering incentives and will actually even pay you for every hour you work out with their burn and earn program.
The Team Dynamo and spin bikes are hooked in and collectively generate up to 350 watts continuous power, all of which is fed into the gyms power system or the local power grid. They are working on hooking the elliptical machines into the loop Even the ‘traditional’ workout equipment is eco-conscious with the SportsArt EcoPowr Treadmills using 30% less electricity than other models. The gym has a real energy conscious atmosphere, with solar panels, energy efficient fans to cool the gym, lighting, all of which is individual member controlled, so its off when not in use. All materials have been thought out with recycled rubber, marmoleum, and sustainable cork flooring, non-toxic cleaners and dual-flush toilets.
With 2800 square feet of space, with 4 rooms of cardio equipment, free weights, training equipment, and floor space for stretching, yoga and bosu, you should definitely check them out if you are in the Portland, Oregon area. Hopefully in 10 years all gyms will be this energy savvy.
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