3.30.2012

Bonus gem

The whole 'it's a journey' frame is nauseatingly overused in the vortex of corporate greening. Here's a tragic example of McDonald's awkwardly trying to get on board (at the 2012 Skoll Forum):

"McDonald's says corporates are more confident about being open and realising it is a journey and they do not have to meet targets."

Memo to McDonald's: For a business that sells 75 unhealthy hamburgers per second and serves 1% of the global population every day, underdelivering on sustainability doesn't really work that way.

Something that's actually good

Jeremy Leggett makes the case for aggressive investment in renewables and energy efficiency (via Guardian tracker on Skoll Social Forum):

"The other pillars are gas and carbon capture and storage which, respectively, are an unproven prospect and increasingly a dream. If government does nothing the lights are going to go out."

Literally.

Gem of the day

When times are up, the world's hedge fund billionaires are more than happy to tout the success of their bespoke approach [luck] to churning capital.

But when they're down...

"Mr. Paulson — the $5 billion manager in 2010 — failed to make the list this time. One of his largest funds lost more than 50 percent, after bets on the economic recovery soured. A spokesman for Paulson declined to comment." (via NY Times)

3.29.2012

Gem of the day

It's hard to pick just one gem from writer Will Self's editorial skewering The Economist's new glossy hardcover tome, The World in 2050, but here goes:

"For [The Economist], the world in 2050 is pretty much business as usual, ie: bigger, faster and more profitable. I suppose it's hardly surprising that those who write for a magazine called 'The Economist' are so sold on the notion that sheer quantity is itself a sufficient measure of the good life. In this rabid utilitarianism – which understands the price of everything but the value of nothing – they are the unlikely bedfellows of that arch-moderniser Josef Stalin, whose mantra it was that 'Quantity has a quality all of its own'. However, if you ask me, that quality is largely … bullshit."

Amen!

3.27.2012

Gem of the day

Umair Haque sums up the rotten state of our global economy and society. And what better analogy to use than the highway system, which is responsible for creating so much of this urban decay? (via HBR)

"Institutions are a little like highways, whose destination is prosperity: get on the highway, take the right exit, and voila. Or at least they were: today, those highways are crumbling, and more and more of us are slowly beginning to find out — sometimes, the hard way — that too often, they just might be roads to nowhere."

3.26.2012

Gem of the day

Key stakeholders of BP (show your faces, you must be out there somewhere!) managed to show up to a couple of closely-managed roundtables last year to make carefully worded recommendations like this one:

"Review BP's leadership positioning and options to articulate the company's vision, ambition and roadmap, particularly regarding sustainability imperatives."

...and in return they got this:

"BP’s objective is to create value for shareholders by helping to meet the world’s growing energy needs safely and responsibly."

Translation: the objective is to generate short-term profit by exploiting the waning share of oil BP have control over.

Sorry stakeholders, but there's no sustainability in that.

3.22.2012

Bonus gem

This is the kind of quote about our global energy use that will go down in history as truly stupid (via NY Times):

'"To not be concerned with where our oil is going to come from is probably the biggest home run for the country in a hundred years,' said Scott D. Sheffield, chief executive of Pioneer Natural Resources, which is operating in West Texas."

Who's going to be the first to break it to Scott that oil spills, volatile costs and less than 100 years of secure resources are hardly a 'home run'?

Gem of the day

America, the land of environmental nonsense, does it again:

Las Vegas is drinking itself to death. No, not in terms of booze - water. It's going to run out in 20 years.

 Enjoy that drink, Sheldon Adelson.

Another non-environmental wonder

Newt Gingrich, high school bully (via NY Times):

"In a Twitter message Newt Gingrich wrote, 'Etch a Sketch is a great toy, but a losing strategy.'"

3.21.2012

Something that's actually good

Loving Michele Simon's dedication to putting a tougher spotlight on PepsiCo's greenwashing. Of course, anyone who really wants to know how far the company's commitment to sustainability (especially human health-related issues) goes need only look at how PepsiCo has been talking to its shareholders. Where's the money really going?

Memo: they're upping investments into marketing the saltiest and most unhealthy snacks, to children in particular, at any cost. That's no exaggeration. In the words of Frito-Lay's division director, PepsiCo is "maniacally focused about gaining share in all of these segments [snacks] in 2012."

Simon's key proof points:
  • Last year PepsiCo spent $3.2 million on lobbying. The company also joined a group of food lobbyists with a classically normal-sounding name, the "Sensible Food Policy Coalition," whose sole purpose was to derail an effort by the U.S. government to improve the food industry's voluntary guidelines for marketing to children.
  • A complaint filed with the US Federal Trade Commission alleges PepsiCo engaged in "deceptive and unfair digital marketing practices" by invading the privacy of unsuspecting teenagers who engaged with an online Doritos ad campaign that encouraged sharing personal information.
Oh dear. Is this kind of activity what PepsiCo means when they state unequivocally in their most recent sustainability report that "a healthier future for all people and our planet means a more successful future for PepsiCo. This is our promise"?

3.19.2012

Gem of the day

What could be less progressive than naming American Express, the credit card business that drives the engine of consumerism at any cost to the actual consumer, to a list of the world's most ethical companies?

Then again, that's what rankings are for - to relentlessly promote a 'better' approach using business in usual as a benchmark. Or, as Ethisphere prefers to call it, "shape future industry standards by introducing best practices today."

Yawn.

3.16.2012

Another non-environmental wonder

Julian Assange delivers a masterful summary of why he believes radical transparency is the only way we can truly create a desirable future:

"The information that is the focus of my attention now...is the information that people are actively working to prevent from entering into the record...with regard to all this suppressed information, we’ve never had a proper understanding of it because it has never entered our intellectual record, and if we can find out about how complex human institutions actually behave, then we have a chance to build civilized behavior on top of it."

Gem of the day

Obama assigns some talking points to his supporters (via NY Times):

"There are a few places, Mr. Obama noted with a smile, where he has not authorized drilling: the National Mall; the middle of Chesapeake Bay; or underneath the houses of the people in his audience. When politicians tell you, 'Drill, Baby, Drill,' the president said to the crowd, answer, 'We’re doing that. Tell me something new.'"

3.12.2012

Bonus gem

Here's something that doesn't make sense:

Via Jeremy Leggett, as many as 12 of the UK's 19 civil nuclear sites are at risk of flooding and coastal erosion because of climate change.

And yet today the Guardian reports this new development:

"The UK government wants nuclear power to be given parity with renewables in Europe, in a move that would significantly boost atomic energy in Britain but downgrade investment in renewable generation."

Thanks for lobbying that into place, EDF.

Gem of the day

Peter Voser, chairman of Shell, is confused. Maybe if he took a step back and looked at the extraordinary direct and indirect negative impacts of fossil fuels, from gas to oil to coal, against a backdrop of climate change, he would 'get it' (via NY Times):

“I am still puzzled that with Canada in the north, with oil sands and Keystone, plus the gas revolution in the United States, plus the Gulf of Mexico successes in exploration, with Alaska coming, the United States is sitting on so many energy resources. I can’t see why there is not more drive,” he said. “It’s puzzling, frustrating. Any other country in the world would jump on this.”

3.02.2012

Another non-environmental wonder

The delusion of PR climbs to new highs (lows?) in the vortex that is the Public Relations Society of America (via NY Times)

“Like beauty, the definition of ‘public relations’ is in the eye of the beholder,” says Mr. Corbett, the 2012 chairman and chief executive of the PRSA.

And what could be more ironic than the PRSA's attempt to crowdsource a 'new definition' of PR to suit the age of social media? I'll let Mr. Corbett spin his own story:

“We tried to engage everyone who would be engaged, and it generated a tremendous amount of dialog,” he said, adding: “Maybe the best way to capture it is to say it was a very transparent and open process. It was basically an exercise in making sausage.”

Maybe, Mr. Corbett, just maybe. Which is surely why the three finalists for the definition are based on minute iterations of the exact same sentiment:
  • “Public relations is the management function of researching, communicating and collaborating with publics to build mutually beneficial relationships.”
  • “Public relations is a strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics.”
  • “Public relations is the strategic process of engagement between organizations and publics to achieve mutual understanding and realize goals.”

3.01.2012

Another non-environmental wonder

In last week's Republican presidential candidate debate, Ron Paul accused his rival Rick Santorum of being “fake”.

Mr Santorum pinched himself and said: “I’m real, Ron, I’m real,I’m real.”

Gem of the day

Make the missing link between this fact...

"...the number of secondees in DECC [the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change] from EDF and British Gas/Centrica – a fellow member of EDF's nuclear consortium – far outweigh any other company." (via The Guardian)

...and this headline:

"New Wind Down, Nuclear Up as UK Rethinks Energy Mix" (via CleanTechnica)