Top Stories
Indian Automaker Buying Into Electric Car
Company.—reliability high.
"Mahindra & Mahindra, one of India’s largest automakers, said
Wednesday that it would acquire a controlling stake in Reva, an
electric car pioneer based in Bangalore that has been looking for
deep-pocket partners to invest in its technology. Mahindra, a
conglomerate based in Mumbai that makes tractors, sport utility
vehicles and trucks, said it would buy 55.2 percent of Reva by
purchasing shares from the founders for an undisclosed price and by
investing 450 mln rupees, or $10 mln, in cash in the company. ... The
head of Mahindra’s auto business, Pawan Goenka, will become chairman of
the renamed Mahindra Reva Electric Vehicle. Chetan Maini, a founder of
Reva, will stay on the board and become chief of technology and
strategy." Story in The
New York Times.
China wants to reach energy goals before
Cancun talks.—reliability high.
"China will aim to meet its five-year energy saving and emission
reduction goals through 2010 ahead global climate talks at the end of
the year, the country's top climate negotiator said. ... Beijing was
alarmed by the recent energy efficiency losses, and on May 5 Premier
Wen Jiabao directed the government to step up efforts to ensure the
2010 goals would be met. As part of the measures, China will shut down
another 10 gigawatts of small and less efficient coal-fired power
generators by the third quarter of this year after closing 60.06 GW in
the past four years, ahead of an earlier plan of shuttering 50 GW's
worth in the five years through 2010. Beijing will raise power tariff
surcharges for some energy intensive firms by 50 to 100 percent from
June 1, reducing power price discounts to certain industries including
aluminum, calcium carbide and ferroalloy and imposing punitive high
power rates on inefficient firms, in renewed and hastened efforts to
curb expansion in energy-guzzling and polluting industries." See Reuters.
[China can
deliver.]
Companies,
Industries, Markets and Supply Chains
How Companies Weather the Flood of
Eco-Labels.—reliability high.
"The GreenBiz.com editorial staff talked with some of these leaders to
find out how businesses large and small address the glut of
eco-labels." Comments from Citigroup, Marks & Spencer, Willamette
Valley Vineyards, Kraft. See GreenBiz.
Organic cotton sales up – but what’s the
cost?—reliability high.
"The latest headline figures on organic cotton retail sales supplied
by Organic Exchange (OE) show a healthy 35% growth to a value of US$4.3
billion in 2009, but they also suggest that like the conventional
cotton sector, there is considerable ‘mark-up’ taking place along the
supply chain with very little profit trickling back down to
impoverished farmers. ... If the baseline price of a kilogram of cotton
is around US$1.76, effectively what traders reckon to be the average
‘break even’ point for organic cotton, this suggests that the value of
the 175,113 MT of fibre comes to roughly US$308.2 million, a mere 7% of
the total retail value of the organic cotton garments." From EcoTextile
News. [No
surprise. This is true of most agricultural commodities. The value of
the wheat in a loaf of bread or package of pasta is only 5-10% of the
retail price. And those are "commodity" products. A "designer" product
will have a much higher retail price for the same cost of materials.]
How to develop a sustainable marketing
campaign.—reliability medium.
Analysis piece on challenges of "green" marketing. "Unfortunately,
sustainability is a uniquely tricky concept to take to market. As
incredible as it sounds, some corporate marketing departments have
actually been guilty of making unwarranted and even false green claims.
... Ensuring marketing and communication campaigns get the sustainable
message across without falling foul of increasingly exasperated
regulators means that the whole notion of green messaging has become a
veritable minefield for agencies and internal marketeers. It takes a
lot of coordination and creativity to make sure that messages remains
coherent and punchy, but still within the increasingly stringent
guidelines laid down by the ASA, Defra and even the European
Commission. ... what are some of the dos and don'ts when it comes to
combining the disparate parts of a green marketing campaign?" See BusinessGreen.
Sustainability Faceoff: Microsoft vs. Apple.—reliability
high.
Compares Apple and Microsoft sustainability programs and actions. With
table. Finds some positive steps and some deficiencies for each
company. Microsoft gets better score in this analysis. From Fast
Company.
Science and
Economics
More Wind Farms Mean Cheaper Energy.—reliability
medium.
"If the Western US generated 30% of its electricity with wind
power, costs would drop 40%, the NREL reveals in The Western Wind
and Solar Integration Study. ... The NREL and the US Department of
Energy sponsored the study, with input from 13 technical experts at
turbine-maker GE and 17 at NREL; intended to help the utility sector in
integrating more renewable power. ... Utility operating costs would
drop from approximately $50 billion down to about $20 billion a year
with 30% wind, yielding benefits to the economy and to the environment,
saving American consumers money." Story at CleanTechnica.
Access the report here.
[Crossposted from HaraBara.com courtesy of HaraBara, Inc. Copyright © 2010 HaraBara, Inc.]
