Our conference chair, Don Carli wrote a terrific article entitled “Ready or Not, Welcome to the Age of Low Carbon Publishing,” appearing in a recent issue of Seyboldonline. We thought to introduce you to Don’s writing and a great article. See the excerpt below and link to the entire piece.
Lisa Wellman
CEO, SustainCommWorld
According to information recently released by Apple, the lifecycle carbon footprint of an iPhone is responsible for the emission of 121 pounds of CO2-equivalent greenhouse gas emissions over the course of a three year expected lifetime of use. Over 10 million iPhones have been sold to date.
Though it is not a direct comparison, it is interesting to note that Discover magazine estimated that the lifecycle carbon footprint of each copy of its publication is responsible for 2.1 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions, the same amount produced by twelve 100-watt light bulbs glowing for an hour or a car engine burning 14 ounces of gasoline.
Over the next few years it can be expected that the reporting of lifecycle data and the carbon labeling of all products will move from the margins to the mainstream – including the footprinting of print and digital media products. Welcome to the age of low carbon everything.
To read the complete article in the Seybold Report – Click here.
Super Capers rip Georgia Rule dvdrip
Don Carli is Executive Vice President of SustainCommWorld, Conference Chair and Senior Research Fellow with the Institute for Sustainable Communication
LEARN ABOUT THE BEST SUSTAINABILITY REPORTING – READER’S CHOICE AWARDS
A study, commissioned by GRI and undertaken by KPMG, found that publishing information on sustainability performance has a strong positive impact on the reader’s perceptions of the company, adding to its brand.
GRI conducted an international contest to determine the GRI Readers’ Choice Awards for 2008 reviewing over 775 sustainability reports from around the world..
“Openness in disclosing economic, environmental and social impacts can give companies a competitive edge, but people aren’t fools,” said Ernst Ligteringen, Chief Executive of GRI. “They read these reports with a purpose and they want the truth, and particularly the whole truth-not just selective reporting where their performance is good.”
Best Report: Civil Society Readers’ Choice and All Stakeholder Groups Award-Petrobras (Brazil)
Best Report: Media Gas Natural-SDG (Spain)
Best Report: Financial Markets-ABN Amro India (India)
Best Report: Employees-ITC (India)
Best Report: Non-Business Organization-Fundacion
Emprendimientos Rurales Los Grobo (Argentina)
Best Report: Not-So-Big Business-Frigoglass (Greece)
Best Report: Non-OECD Company-TGC-5 (Russia)
Over 1,700 readers from 70 countries participated in the scoring process. They based their vote on five criteria:
· Materiality: The report covers the issues that are most relevant and important to the company/organization.
· Stakeholder inclusiveness: The report is focused on the most important stakeholders and addresses their concerns.
· Sustainability context: The degree to which the report explains the company/organization’s own performance in relation to data about broader sustainability trends.
· Completeness: The scope of the report and how well it enables readers to assess the organization’s performance.
· Quality: The comparability, accuracy, timeliness, clarity, reliability, balance and quality of the information provided in the report.
‘GREEN’ ADVERTISING CLAIMS – MARKETERS AND CONSUMERS SHOULD BE WARY
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have programs in place to educate consumers about scrutinizing products and packaging with environmental claims that might influence their purchase decisions. The agencies have cooperated to develop guidelines for advertisers to ensure that their environmental marketing claims are not misleading. And studies show that customers are growing wary.
Recycling is an example of providing both good and misleading information. 34 years ago a paperboard company had a contest to promote their recycled content and created a logo of 3 chasing arrows. In 1988 the Society of the Plastics Industry adopted this logo and dropped their identification coding system inside the arrows to indicate plastic resin types. The numbers actually do not indicate that you can recycle that product as you might expect, merely how they can be sorted together. 1 and 2 represent plastics that are readily recyclable. 3 indicates that the resin type is Polyvinyl Chloride – difficult to recycle and PVC is a major environmental and health threat.
This is not to suggest that products with higher numbers are not recyclable, just that this system is misleading consumers. Many consumers assume larger numbers mean ‘more’ or a product or package better abled to be recycled – and that is clearly not the case.
Some products claim to be “degradable.” “Biodegradable” materials, like food and leaves, break down and decompose into elements found in nature when they are exposed to air, moisture, and bacteria or other organisms. When materials are disposed of in landfills, however, laws require that modern landfills be designed to keep sunlight, air and moisture out of the landfill. This helps prevent pollutants from the garbage from entering the air and drinking water, but also slows decomposition. Even materials like paper and food may take decades to decompose in a landfill.
Consumers are wising up to environmental claims and between the blogosphere, twitter and YouTube, inaccurate and misleading claims are quickly debunked. Companies do best to qualify their positions, remembering that we live in a transparent world.
GLOBAL RECESSION AND ENTERPRISE ENERGY
The global recession is having a mixed impact on climate-change efforts within business: It encourages energy efficiency projects, but slows down greater changes, according to a major new research report distributed through the United Nations.
A global survey of 528 senior business executives and 18 in depth interviews with relevant executives and experts gives a clear signal that global recession spurs to greener thinking. Almost three-quarters (73%) of firms polled will make energy efficiency a high or moderate priority over the next two years in a bid to cut costs. However the survey shows that other climate-change initiatives will receive less attention: overall, two-thirds (67%) think climate change will fall down the corporate agenda as the global economic crisis continues.
This report shows that, although businesses will necessarily switch focus to survival mode, many firms are starting to embrace some of the short-term cost benefits of energy efficiency. A significant minority is also discovering longer term business opportunities relating to climate change.
Other key findings from the research includes:
· More than one-half of companies polled (54%) have established some kind of climate-change strategy, although most simply consider energy efficiency.
· Seventy-five percent of respondents agree that companies as a whole have been slow to prepare for the long-term impact of global warming on their business.
· Overall, 40% of respondents say their firms have developed new products or services in the last two years that help to reduce or prevent environmental problems – and 30% say such development will be a high priority in the coming years.
· (from Europe) About two-thirds (65%) of respondents (for whom it was relevant) indicate that a carbon price of up to €50 would be enough to have a significant effect on their energy usage, with a price somewhere between €30 and €50 per tonne of CO2 seen as the sweet spot for change.
· More than one-half (56%) of surveyed companies believe that more government regulation is necessary in this sector. In fact, for the relatively few companies that do lobby, more are arguing for tighter rather than looser regulation – at both the national and international levels. Above all, businesses want a level playing field in which to compete.
TYPICAL INDIVIDUAL’S CARBON FOOTPRINT
Carbon Footprint Ltd, a British company, calculated a measurement of all the greenhouse gases (GHGs) each person in the developed world individually produced. A carbon footprint is a measure of the impact our activities have on the environment. It relates to the amount of greenhouse gases produced in our day-to-day lives through burning fossil fuels for electricity, heating and transportation etc.
The company divided their calculations into two parts. The primary footprint is a measure of our direct carbon emissions. These we have control over. The secondary footprint is a measure of the indirect emissions from the whole lifecycle of the products we use. i.e., the more we buy, the more emissions will be caused on our behalf.no reservations download Pray 2: The Woods film