A powerhouse duo on the green front

Aman Desouza, director of innovation and sustainability at CertainTeed Corp., of Valley Forge PA, visits a project in Broomall PA where his company is testing a yet-to-be-released photovoltaic roof able to generate solar power.

Wal-Mart and the U.S. government are driving the movement toward less-wasteful business ways.

By Diane Mastrull

President Obama is not expected to be there. Nor is the head of Wal-Mart, Mike Duke.

But when Valley Forge building-products manufacturer CertainTeed Corp. unveils its "very, very first baby step" into the world of photovoltaic roofing next week at the International Builders Show in Las Vegas, Obama and Duke presumably will be pleased.

In the fall, each took action to inspire greater commitment to protecting natural resources and working less wastefully, known in the green vernacular as sustainability.

Obama signed an executive order requiring federal agencies to practice what the administration is urging all Americans to do to aid the environment and help build a thriving clean-energy economy: Use less energy, recycle more, and build and buy in a way that doesn't waste resources and tax the planet.

Duke, Wal-Mart's president and chief executive officer, announced a sustainability-index initiative to influence suppliers to produce and deliver their products more efficiently and with an environmental sensitivity.

Though Obama and Duke acted independently, what they did has the collective potential to significantly advance what has been a slowly evolving movement - one that draws skepticism from those who wonder whether the payoff is worth the expense.

"What you have is the 500-pound gorillas in the private sector and the public sector making these [sustainability] decisions . . . and they're going to drive the rest of the market," said Joshua M. Kaplowitz, an environmental and commercial lawyer at Drinker, Biddle & Reath L.L.P. and head of an in-house task force charged with improving the firm's sustainability efforts.

The U.S. government is the nation's single largest user of energy. It owns nearly half-a-million buildings and more than 600,000 fleet vehicles, and it buys more than half a trillion dollars' worth of goods and services each year.

Wal-Mart offers equally colossal credentials: It reported $401 billion in sales and 2.1 million employees worldwide last year.

With the federal government and one of the world's largest retailers putting their substantial heft behind the cause, the results could be a real game changer, said Shari Shapiro, an environmental law associate at Obermayer, Rebmann, Maxwell & Hippel L.L.P. in Center City.

Shapiro couched her comment by saying that other steps - such as passage of a climate-change bill - are important to achieving a national embrace of sustainability. But she acknowledged that "there are no two bigger forces in our society."

The order Obama signed Oct. 5 requires federal agencies to, among other things, increase energy efficiency; measure, report, and reduce their greenhouse-gas emissions; conserve and protect water resources; and leverage acquisitions to foster markets for sustainable technologies and environmentally preferable materials.

It also calls for federal buildings to be green and for 95 percent of federal purchases to meet sustainability requirements. That it does not require 100 percent compliance is an acknowledgment that sustainability provisions might not be applicable for such purchases as military weapons systems, said Michelle Moore, Obama's federal environmental executive.

Under the order, each federal agency must appoint a sustainability officer. Every six months, the Office of Management and Budget will issue a public scorecard grading each agency on its sustainability performance.

In April, recommendations are due on which sustainability criteria to require of federal contractors, Moore said.

Wal-Mart's sustainability index also is a work in progress, expected to be rolled out in three phases.

First, the company is sending out surveys to its more than 100,000 global suppliers to evaluate their sustainability. Questions focus on four areas: energy and climate; material efficiency; natural resources; and people and community, according to Wal-Mart's Web site.

The second phase involves creation of a consortium of universities to help build a database of product life cycles. Arizona State University and the University of Arkansas will administer the consortium, which Wal-Mart is encouraging other retailers and suppliers to join.

The last step is determining how to provide customers with that information so they can make purchases in a more sustainable way.

Critics note that Wal-Mart - because of its size and influence - is known for driving down wages and putting out of business smaller competitors that cannot keep pace on pricing. Those same people are hoping its power and scope can make Wal-Mart a sustainability inspiration.

"We have already seen the type of change Wal-Mart can have on our economy," said Shapiro, who also writes the blog www.greenbuildinglaw.com. "So if it has the same impact on sustainability, it will be major."

That assessment was echoed by Aman Desouza, director of innovation and sustainability at CertainTeed.

In recent years, the company has worked to develop more environmentally sensitive, higher-performing products to meet consumers' green demands. That effort yielded the new EnerGen solar system that CertainTeed will debut next week in Las Vegas.

The system consists of lightweight, thin-film photovoltaic laminates that integrate with roofing shingles, and its installation does not require asphalt-rooftop penetration, as traditional solar panels do.

Though expanding the company's line of sustainable products is important to CertainTeed, so is improving its commitment to operating more efficiently and at minimal impact to the environment, Desouza said. It has been working with a consultant, Sustainable Solutions Corp., of Royersford, to find ways to do so.

There is a degree of vindication in that, Desouza said, since Wal-Mart is making sustainability such a priority for itself and the companies it does business with.

"The more companies like Wal-Mart start doing things like that . . . the easier it becomes for everyone."

Is Whole Foods Bad for the Planet?

By Kate Sheppard

Whole Foods CEO John Mackey has probably brought more people to organic foods than anyone else in the United States. And many of the folks shopping at his markets undoubtedly consider themselves to be environmentally aware. They might even believe that by purchasing their groceries at Whole Foods outlets they are doing their part to help the planet. But certainly many of them would probably be startled to learn of of Mackey's position on climate change: he's a global warming denier.

In a recent New Yorker profile of Mackey, the Whole Foods chief argues that there is no scientific consensus regarding the causes of climate change. He lists Heaven and Earth: Global Warming--the Missing Science, a skeptical take on warming, as one of his recent favorite reads. He frets that the "hysteria about global warming" will cause the United States "to raise taxes and increase regulation, and in turn lower our standard of living and lead to an increase in poverty." He adds: "Historically, prosperity tends to correlate to warmer temperatures."

Mackey, of course, is wrong about the absence of a scientific consensus, and his theory that warmer temperatures produce prosperity is, to say the least, wacky. But his embrace of climate change denial is not truly a surprise, for Mackey is an unabashed libertarian, opposed to the very idea of "regulation" and "taxes," no matter their purpose. He may be the vegan CEO of the country's largest natural market chain, but he voted for Libertarian Party presidential candidate Bob Barr last year--because Ron Paul wasn't on the ballot. There's long been a debate over whether Mackey is a do-gooder or a simply a profiteer in disguise. (The whole sock-puppeting incident made him seem more of a bizarre egomaniac than anything else).

Though many of his shoppers are concerned about personal and planetary health, his latest revelation so far has gotten scant attention. But when Mackey penned an anti-health care reform op-ed in the Wall Street Journal last August, it spurred a swift call for boycott from progressives. "Whole Foods has built its brand with the dollars of deceived progressives," proclaimed the the "Boycott Whole Foods" Facebook page, which had 33,829 members at last count. "Let them know your money will no longer go to support Whole Foods' anti-union, anti-health insurance reform, right-wing activities." A website promoting the boycott also sprang up. Mackey's anti-labor positions have also triggered considerable ire, after he compared having a union to "having herpes." But there's yet no virtual call to eschew Whole Foods because of Mackey's global warming position.

But that doesn't mean there's no potential problem here for Whole Foods. The company, which pulls in $4 billion a year, does try to promote itself as a firm that cares about the environment. Its official blog touts climate-related causes like rainforest preservation, waste reduction, and the awareness about carbon footprint of food. During my last visit to the store, I was urged to sign up to receive my shopping receipts via email, to save paper. But their focus is on what customers can do to reduce their impact—including in one post an admonition to "vote with your dollars" by shopping at local and at socially-conscious businesses.

The company ranked among the biggest purchasers of green power last year, but neither the company nor its CEO has advocated for environmental policies in line with the views held by their customer base. Meanwhile, companies widely scorned by progressives have stepped up efforts to deal with climate change by both implementing sustainable practices and advocating for sound policy. Chief among them is Walmart, which recently joined with a number of other retailers, universities, suppliers, and the EPA to form the Sustainability Consortium. Its goal is to create an industry-wide sustainability index for the lifecycle of products. And a number of consumer-oriented businesses, such as Nike, Gap, and Starbucks, are working through Business for Innovative Climate and Energy Policy to pass climate change legislation. Whole Foods, despite its image, is not part of that coalition. And with Mackey its most visible officer, Whole Foods essentially can be counted as part of the corporate opposition to the pending legislation.

Mackey did step down as chairman of Whole Foods' board last week, but he remains both the CEO and a board member. He says that the move was more ceremonial. There's yet no indication whether this shift will lead to any changes in the company's climate-related policies.

Last year, Mackey penned a book touting the "power of conscious capitalism." He may not want his customers who care about global warming to use that power when they are deciding where to buy their organic arugula.

Jesse Ventura Body-Slams the Climate Change "Conspiracy"

By Kate Sheppard

Jesse "The Body" Ventura, the erstwhile professional wrestler, Navy Seal, motorcycle gang member, and governor of Minnesota, has embarked upon yet another career: investigator of nefarious plots. This month, Ventura launched a show called "Conspiracy Theory" on TruTV which claims to shine light on "the most frightening and mysterious conspiracy allegations of our time." So far Ventura has explored whether 9/11 was an inside job (he doesn't buy the 9/11 Commission's official explanation) and whether the government is testing mind-control weaponry at a secret base in Alaska. (Conclusion: "I learned that radio waves really can get inside your head. They got inside mine.") And in another recent episode, he takes on "the global warming scam."

"Whether global warming is real or not, some people may be using the issue to earn billions of dollars, start a one-world government and control people's lives," warns the teaser on the website for TruTV (formerly known as Court TV). In the show, a voiceover promises that "Jesse Ventura finds the direct link between global warming and a plot to rule the world."

Enter Ventura, who spends much of the 60-minute show skulking around in a black leather jacket, meeting gravelly voiced informants in abandoned warehouses for no apparent reason. "I never thought I'd be investigating global warming. I believe it's real and that saving the planet is good," intones Ventura. "But now I'm on my way to see a guy named Noel Sheppard. He says he has proof that some people are using global warming as an excuse to make money and control the world. That's a conspiracy I want to expose."

Ventura sets up a "clandestine meeting" in a deserted San Francisco courtyard with Sheppard, who is described as an "investigative journalist." This not-exactly-elusive figure—he is a writer for Newsbusters.org—has it on good authority from Russian tabloids that "the earth is now on the brink of entering another Ice Age." He also believes that the occurrence of snowstorms disproves global warming. Ventura learns that climate change may in fact be a vast and elaborate hoax—perpetrated, as he puts it, for "Power. Money. Control."

So Ventura dispatches his team of expert investigators to uncover the truth. These super sleuths fail to locate the thousands of scientists from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change or other preeminent institutions who have spent years studying the phenomenon of planetary warming. Instead, they visit three scientists suggested by Sheppard.

One of Ventura's hard-hitting investigators—June Sarpong, formerly a reporter on a British youth entertainment show—travels by what appears to be a passenger ferry to an undisclosed location to meet Dr. X, a scientist who is "hiding for his life." June frets that someone is following her (presumably someone other than Ventura's camera crew). In order to protect Dr. X from the climate change mafia, he is never named and nor are his credentials revealed. Sitting in deep shadow, he reveals that while he believes the planet is warming, the culprit isn't carbon dioxide. It's the sun. "There's absolutely no question the sun is virtually ignored by the authorities," he says.

"If global warming isn't man-made, why are they telling us it is?" asks June. "Because they're using it as a vehicle for political control," Dr. X replies. "Control every aspect of people's lives, the number of children you can have, the number of people on the planet, where they live, what they can drive. Everything."

Other interviewees include Lord Christopher Monckton, perhaps the wackiest and best-known climate skeptic, and Richard Lindzen, an MIT atmospheric physicist and contrarian extraordinaire who claims, falsely, that the global temperature has "stopped increasing." (The show doesn't mention that in the 1990s Lindzen accepted at least $10,000 from fossil-fuel industries to dispute the existence of climate change as an expert witness before Congress and industry-sponsored events.) Ventura's team also solicits the opinion of a "conspiracy expert"— who turns out to be Alex Jones, chief 9/11 conspiracy theorist, radio host, and head of InfoWars.com, the web hub for the tinfoil hat club.

The tough questions are reserved for Benjamin Santer, a climate scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. Sarpong grills Santer about Monckton's allegations that he "cooked the books" on climate change in United Nations' reports. "Lord Monckton, to my knowledge was not part of the process," Santer points out. "I was." The investigators also grill Amit Chaterjee, CEO of carbon-monitoring software firm Hara. As Sarpong presses him for answers about his relationship with Al Gore (a partner in the venture capital group Kleiner Perkins, which backed Chaterjee's start-up) and the sinister business of carbon reduction, Ventura bursts into the room, demanding answers about Gore's motives. "If this is a war on the environment, there are going to be profiteers," he says.

Ventura ultimately decides that Al Gore is not really "trying to control the world." "I know Al Gore," he says. "I don't think he’s out to do that." Instead, Ventura reveals, "the hunt leads to one man": Sir Maurice Strong, the former executive director of the United Nations Environment Program and, according to Ventura, the "wizard behind the curtain" on climate change. Wait, make that two men: Ventura also sees a culprit in Edmond de Rothschild, the billionaire banker who died earlier this year. These powerful figures are perpetuating a massive lie in order to profit from carbon trading, Ventura and his sources allege.

Ventura's team is never able to actually talk to Strong, despite a few more secret meetings in warehouses and a trip to China, where Strong now lives. However, one of Ventura's investigators reports via webcam that he has concluded that "Strong's a double agent, pretending to be an environmentalist, but really he's been working as an adviser to the Chinese government, and helping them make money off global warming." As with most of the allegations in the show, no evidence is given to support this claim. And it's safe to say that Ventura isn't exactly skeptical when presented with outlandish theories; in the pilot episode he insinuates that the government may have caused Hurricane Katrina and the Indonesian tsunami with a weather-controlling "death ray."

In his final summation, Ventura doesn't actually say whether or not he thinks that climate change is real and caused by mankind. "I'm no scientist. The conspiracy theory here is a scare tactic to control people, make billions, even trillions in profit," he says, stone-faced. "Al Gore, you’ve been a real inspiration. But a lot of other people who preach the global warming gospel aren’t out to save the world. They’re out to run it."

Dochodo Zoo Island is an Eden at Sea

by Ariel Schwartz
It sounds like the plot of the movie Jurassic Park (minus the dinosaurs), but JDS Architects’ have created an incredible plan for a zoo located on the South Korean island of Dochodo. The island could, according to the architecture firm, be a “case study to define a tourist region based on sustainable development only, where natures and structures function in equilibrium, symbiotically feeding one another.”

According to JDS, the zoo’s landscape of natural peaks and valleys is ideal for zoo development. The flat valleys could host animals, while more mountainous areas could be protected and treated as nature reserves. All transportation, energy sources and building systems would be housed in a so-called “infrastructural green belt” located at a height of 20 meters. Everything above and below would remain untouched.

The proposed zoo would be as low-impact as possible, with zero-carbon transport systems, renewable energy sources, rainwater collection sites, and all waste would be reused as either composted fertilizer or biofuel. Dochodo sounds like an ideal location for a low-impact zoo, but we have to wonder about the potential impact of tourists constantly shuttling from other cities to the island. How green is a zoo that is only accessible by boat or plane?

Hopenhagen Ambassador Contest: HuffPost Citizen Journalist to Copenhagen

Most people don't know it, but the fate of the world is at stake this December. The UN is holding a Climate Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark where the world's leaders will decide whether there will be any framework at all on limiting carbon emissions before the Kyoto protocol expires and the before the amount of carbon in the atmosphere climbs to even higher, and harder to reverse levels.

While this might sound abstract, bureaucratic or boring, this global gathering will determine the future of our planet. The effects of global warming are already lapping at the world's shores, destroying species, threatening cities, and encroaching on our ability to produce food. This is real, and this is happening.

But it is not all doom and gloom.

Hopenhagen.org is working to connect every person, city and nation with what is happening at the conference in Copenhagen, believing that citizens can help push the fate of the planet down a positive path by showing political leaders that the citizens of world passionately want them to reach an agreement that would limit how much carbon emissions each country would produce. Leaders are shying away from making these commitments, and Hopenhagen.org wants to show there is a strong political will to set emissions targets -- which would mean more green jobs, and a more sustainable future for people everywhere.

At Hopenhagen.org, people can become a citizen of the Nation of Hopenhagen by signing a petition, learning about grassroots climate efforts and spreading the word to their own communities.

This message of action, bringing people together and spreading hope is why HuffPost Green is teaming up with Hopenhagen.org for an exciting citizen journalism contest.

WHAT: We are sending a HuffPost citizen journalist to Copenhagen for the climate conference as the Hopenhagen Ambassador, to represent the global nation of people who are hopeful that leaders will come to an agreement.

THE PRIZE: The winner will receive a trip to Copenhagen from December 12-19th! This will include airfare, accommodation, press accreditation for the UN conference, Media training with HuffPost Citizen journalism editor Matt Palevsky, HuffPost blogging privileges, and a flip camera to record events.

The duties of the Hopenhagen Ambassador will include:

Representing the people of Hopenhagen to the media and at official events throughout the week, reporting on events in blogs and videos posts for HuffPost while in Copenhagen, doing celebrity interviews, and spreading the message of hope throughout his or her personal and social networks.

WHO: Anyone over 18 can enter the contest -- you just need to upload a one minute campaign video for why you should elected ambassador. click here for the full contest rules.

Watch this video for more information on what we're looking for.


UPDATED DEADLINES: We are letting HuffPost readers pick the ten best candidates. The voting part of the contest will run from November 18th through December 4nd. We'll stop accepting new entries on December 2nd at midnight. We'll notify ten finalists that are being considered by December 5th by our panel of judges, which will include Arianna Huffington, Laurie David, Green Editor Katherine Goldstein, Citizen Journalism Editor Matthew Palevsky and others to be announced. We will contact the finalists through their YouTube or Facebook accounts (be sure you check those!) The winner will be announced Monday December 7th.

Videos will be published on HuffPost Green, where viewers can vote on who they think should be the Hopenhagen Ambassador. Candidates are encouraged to mobilize their networks of friends, twitter followers (use the hashtag #votehope), and even seek out celebrity or organizational endorsements for their candidacy. Be creative, get attention for yourself and the cause of bringing hope to Copenhagen.

Thanksgiving Wish from our President

Tomorrow, Thanksgiving Day, Americans across the country will sit down together, count our blessings, and give thanks for our families and our loved ones. American families reflect the diversity of this great nation. No two are exactly alike, but there is a common thread they each share.

Our families are bound together through times of joy and times of grief. They shape us, support us, instill the values that guide us as individuals, and make possible all that we achieve. So tomorrow, I'll be giving thanks for my family -- for all the wisdom, support, and love they have brought into my life.

But tomorrow is also a day to remember those who cannot sit down to break bread with those they love.
The soldier overseas holding down a lonely post and missing his kids. The sailor who left her home to serve a higher calling. The folks who must spend tomorrow apart from their families to work a second job, so they can keep food on the table or send a child to school.

We are grateful beyond words for the service and hard work of so many Americans who make our country great through their sacrifice. And this year, we know that far too many face a daily struggle that puts the comfort and security we all deserve painfully out of reach.

So when we gather tomorrow, let us also use the occasion to renew our commitment to building a more peaceful and prosperous future that every American family can enjoy. It seems like a lifetime ago that a crowd met on a frigid February morning in Springfield, Illinois to set out on an improbable course to change our nation. In the years since, Michelle and I have been blessed with the support and friendship of the millions of Americans who have come together to form this ongoing movement for change.

You have been there through victories and setbacks. You have given of yourselves beyond measure. You have enabled all that we have accomplished -- and you have had the courage to dream yet bigger dreams for what we can still achieve. So in this season of thanks giving, I want to take a moment to express my gratitude to you, and my anticipation of the brighter future we are creating together.

With warmest wishes for a happy holiday season from my family to yours,

President Barack Obama

Light Sculpture Maps Seoul’s Air Quality

by Ariel Schwartz
Seoul, South Korea is filled with blinding light-up displays and headache-inducing neon screens. But residents of the city who want to see these displays put to good use need only take a trip to the World Cup Stadium’s Peace Park, which is where this beautiful Living Light sculpture blooms. The permanent outdoor pavilion and glass canopy projects up-to-the minnute information about local air quality, and locals can send it a text message to receive a report from anywhere.

Designed by Soo-in Yang and David Benjamin of The Living, Living Light’s glass skin is actually a massive redrawn map of 27 Seoul neighborhoods. Every 15 minutes, neighborhoods light up in order of best air quality to worst based on real-time sensors from the Korean Ministry of Environment. And each night, neighborhoods are illuminated if air quality is better on that particular day than the same time last year.
Seoul citizens can also text the installation and expect a response (presumably detailing air quality in certain neighborhoods).

Yang and Benjamin imagine that similar glass skins could one day be attached to buildings, effectively making building facades a new kind of public space — one that is both beautiful and informative.

Aziz Ansari Wants To Stop Acting In Order To Reduce His Carbon Footprint