Top Stories
"Global Agriculture Gets the Walmart
Sustainability Treatment"—reliability high.
"In a spate of new goals announced this morning at a Global
Sustainability Milestone Meeting in Bentonville, Walmart aims to
overhaul the global food supply chain." It will increase local sourcing
of food, cut food waste by 15% in its stores in emerging markets and by
10% in the developed economies, and apply the transparency tools of its
Sustainability Index to growers. CEO Mike Duke said they will be
"asking our top growers for the first time to provide detailed
information on their agricultural practices." More details on the
announcement. At Reuters
from Greener World Media.
"South Korea kicks off $36bn low-carbon
investment drive"—reliability high.
South Korea will "spend $36bn (£22.6m [sic]) over the next five years
to develop renewable energy sources and accelerate the transition to a
low-carbon economy. The government forecasts that the country's exports
of clean energy will reach more than $30bn in 2015 if the plan is
implemented successfully, creating 110,000 jobs." President Lee
Myung-bak was quoted in Korea Times: "Given the sharp growth in the
world's market, we will be able to nurture solar energy and wind power
industries as the second semiconductor and the second shipbuilding
industries and make them the pillar of the future national economy."
The Korean government sees the global renewable energy market growing from $162bn last year to around $400bn by
2015. From BusinessGreen.
[Who wouldn't be
interested in part of a $400 billion market?]
Companies,
Industries, Markets and Supply Chains
"BP, Arco, Best Buy to install fast chargers
for electric cars"—reliability medium.
About ECOtality's plan to install 400 Blink DC Fast Chargers. 350 are
being funded by a $114.8-million federal grant. Most of these will be
along I-5 between Vancouver and Tijuana. Best Buy has also ordered 12
for its stores, and BP/Arco wants another 45 to try out at its
stations. The Blink can charge an EV in "15 to 28 minutes". See Los
Angeles Times blog.
"China 4th in world energy investment hot
spots: report"—reliability high.
A report from EC Harris on National Policies and Incentives for
Investors in the Energy Sector ranked the U.S. first, then France,
Germany and China in terms of energy policies relating to fossil fuels
and renewable energy sectors. "The rankings were based on key factors
including government policies and incentives, business environment,
forecast of economic growth and electricity consumption. China is the
world's top investor in renewable energy projects, having invested
around $120 billion to $160 billion between 2007 and 2010, the report
said." See Reuters
story.
"52 Percent of Americans Flunk Climate 101"—reliability
medium.
About the results of a survey by Yale researchers that found much
confusion among the public about climate change. Mentions some of the
misconceptions, erroneous and self-contradictory opinions people have,
along with some of the correct knowledge that's out there. "Researchers
said that the results 'reflect the unorganized and sometimes
contradictory fragments of information Americans have absorbed from the
mass media and other sources.'" "45 percent said they were not very
worried or not at all worried about" climate change. See New
York Times green blog. Access the study here.
["Overall, we found
that 63 percent of Americans believe that global warming is happening,
but many do not understand why." Who's surprised that most Americans
don't know the details about a complicated topic that most of them
don't care much about anyway?]
"German power bills to rise on surge in
renewables"—reliability high.
The levy that German electricity users pay to subsidize feed-in
tariffs for renewables like solar will rise from 2.05 cents per kW-h
today to 3.53 cents in 2011. From Reuters.
["The average power
price in Germany is about 20 cents per kw/h." So the cost of
electricity will rise 1.48 cents per kW-h or 7%. Installation of PV
panels has surged this year since Germany announced that the subsidies
would soon be reduced to try to cool the overheated solar market. This
3.53 cents per kW-h fee represents a transfer of billions of euros from
electricity ratepayers to those who installed renewable energy systems.
Those billions have driven Germany above 15% of electricity from green
sources.]
"Staples Pushes Key Suppliers for Sustainable
Products, Packaging"—reliability high.
Office supply chain Staples will challenge key suppliers to improve
sustainability in product manufacturing, packaging and distribution.
EVP of merchandising and marketing said: "We’re letting our key
suppliers know that sustainable business practices will join price,
quality and service as a major factor in driving purchasing decisions.
Starting now and over time, we’ll work with all of our suppliers in a
Race to The Top to improve product sustainability and quality and
reduce cost." The focus over the next six months will be on packaging
reduction and sustainability. See Environmental
Leader.
"5 Reasons Why Small Businesses Should Care
about Sustainability"—reliability medium.
Kathy Miller Perkins posts five drivers for small-business
sustainability action. "even though the larger companies are in the
sustainability limelight currently, small businesses have much to gain
by developing their own sustainability strategies. And let's face it:
No company will be able to hide from the issues for long." See GreenBiz
blog. [Not
news, but a useful reminder for SMEs.]
Government and
Regulation
"Agencies Urged to Plan for 'Inevitable
Effects' of Warming in U.S. Report"—reliability high.
The Obama administration's interagency task force on adapting to
climate change, which includes NOAA, the Office of Science and
Technology Policy and the White House Council on Environmental Quality,
says government agencies should prepare for the "inevitable effects" of
global warming and consider it in all planning. It also recommends that
the U.S. develop a strategy to support adaptation in poorer nations.
See Bloomberg
story. PDF of the report here.
[Thus the U.S.
joins Britain in advising government and companies that warming impacts
are inevitable and they better be planning for them (See this earlier
post at sister blog).]
Geek Corner
"Video: ABC News gets taken for a spin in
Google's self-driving Toyota Prius"—reliability medium.
See it in action. "Becky Worley, the news correspondent in the video
clip, even gets up the guts to give the Google car a real-life brake
test. She steps in front of it as it's motoring down the road. What
happens? The car "sees" her and slams on the binders." From Autoblog
Green. [Latest
of Google's geek green dreams. See full list here.
You know commuting geeks begrudge those hours when they could be
surfing, playing or coding.]
