Japan Goes Uber-Eco with New Zero Emissions House.

July 8, 2008 by admin · Leave a Comment
Filed under: eco & sustainability 

Just in time for G8, It\'s Japan\'s Zero Emission House
Is GW soaking his feet in a fuel-cell powered foot bath, as Honda’s Asimo humanoid robot serves him green tea?

With the eyes of the world on all things eco at the G8 Summit in northern Japan, this week is the perfect time for Japan’s tech innovators to dazzle us with their most droolworthy green gizmos. And droolworthy they absolutely are, ranging from Sanyo’s Aqua waterless washer to Sharp’s solar-powered TV to Mitsubishi’s human-sensing air conditioner to Honda’s gracious tea-bot. But stealing a bit of their thunder is where the eco-gadgets are displayed — in the new Zero Emissions House.

The 200 million yen, 2152 square foot, one-story house has been built near the Summit and will be moved to another area afterwards, where the general public can gawk at the high-priced, high tech appliances in the Japan-style uber-eco home. The house is powered by a wind-turbine generator and a photovoltaic generation system and sports a rooftop vegetation system plus solar panels.

Zero and low emission houses have been sprouting up around the world, including one in the UK, where the first one went up last June.

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Are The Carbon Cops coming? Will We Be Dragged Off to Carbon Rehab?

June 26, 2008 by admin · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Uncategorized, eco & sustainability, marketing & advertising 

41% of Britons think the Carbon Cops are coming.

25% think ‘repeat offenders’ will be shipped off to Carbon Rehab and forced to take Carbon Addiction classes.

So reports Reuters in an article about a recent survey conducted by the Energy Saving Trust, an organization set up to help people kick the carbon habit.

“The UK’s perception is that by 2050 we could have the sort of draconian infringements on our civil liberties that have been highlighted in our research. This need not be the case,” said EST chief Philip Sellwood said in the Reuters article.

Note: I’ve been waving this green flag for a while now.  Do you want your product to be the plastic bag of the future?  It’s either abide by our new millennium’s mantra — Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. Or expect a visit from the Carbon Offset Police enforcing that fourth R: Regulate.

I will undoubtedly be the first to be taken away in (hemp) chains.  Convicted of cheeseburger, paper towel and Crystal Geyser addiction.

 

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Going Bananas Over Dole Organic’s Marketing Savvy.

June 26, 2008 by guruofnew · 3 Comments
Filed under: eco & sustainability, food & beverage, marketing & advertising 

I always love it when I get a new food project.  I get to wax eloquent with phrases like farmers-market-fresh and sun-plumped perfect. I get to invent new blends, flavors and colors. I get to nose around in my stockpile of ingredients and decide whether they should be mulled, cold-pressed or frappe’d.

But all of this is wimpy indeed — mere puffery, in fact — when compared to the way in which Dole has masterfully re-tooled its Organics line, giving it new life and a compelling new story to tell.  In an era when our favorite veggies suddenly turn villainous, made in China means made with mercury and lead, and no one is really sure what ‘green’ means anymore, Dole has taken not just the eco road but the ethical one as well.

The story: Dole Organic lets consumers “travel to the origin of each organic product”.  By typing in a fruit sticker’s three-digit Farm Code on Dole Organic’s website, customers can find the story behind their banana. Each farm’s section on the website includes background info, shows photos of the crops and workers and tells consumers more about the origin of Dole’s organic products.  You can even use Google Earth to get a closer look at the community.  A new Carbon Compensation 2008 chart is available as well.

I typed in code 698 and here’s what I got:   

Farm Name: La Gloria and Las Palmas

Las Palmas Farm and La Gloria Farm belongs to Andrés Altamirano, a member of VRAM group. La Gloria farm has 20 hectares of organic bananas and 20 hectares of organic cocoa. The farm is located in Machala, Province of El Oro in Ecuador. The farm is been certified by BCS Öko Garantie since 2005. Mr. Altamirano as well as his partners of VRAM group is commited with the improvement of the organic farming.  Las Palmas farm has 25 hectares in third year of conversion to organic, next January 2008 the farm will be certified as organic and will start exporting its organic fruit with Dole Organic Program too.

Now that carbon footprinting and corporate transparency are here to stay, it’s likely that more marketers will soon come up with their own seed to spoon stories and labels. Enquiring minds now urgently want to know: Where the heck did my dinner come from? Who grew it? How did it get to my local Safeway? What kind of footprint did it leave behind?

And the ultimate question of all: Which is worse? Carbon or calories?

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Whole Foods + Other ‘Green’ Grocers Land on The Seafood Red List

June 19, 2008 by admin · Leave a Comment
Filed under: Uncategorized, eco & sustainability, food & beverage, marketing & advertising, non-profit/social cause, telecom/mobile 

Greenbiz.com breaks the news today that even our supposedly uber-green grocery stores came close to flunking Greenpeace’s recent exam on sustainable seafood. Grocers with big green reputations such as Whole Foods, Ahold USA and Harris Teeter failed to score more than four out of 10 possible points in the report: ‘Carting Away The Oceans: How Grocery Stores Are Empting The Seas.”

Wegmans, Wal-Mart and Target followed with three out of 10 points.

The RED LIST is a compilation of 22 fished and farmed species with the most significant environmental impacts. All grocers surveyed sold fish from the Red List, which includes certain tuna varieties, Atlantic halibut, orange roughy and Chilean Sea Bass.

Anyone who lives on the Monterey Peninsula in the spectacular shadow of the famed Monterey Bay Aquarium knows better. Some ten years ago, the Aquarium developed Seafood Watch, a program designed to create consumer awareness about the importance of buying seafood from sustainable sources.

All anyone at Safeway, Aldo, Kroger and Costco — the supermarkets that scored two out of 10 points – had to do was get out their mobiles and check the Aquarium’s online pocket Seafood Guide. Or maybe the grocers who scored a single point out of 10, including Trader Joe’s and Publix — might want to check out the Aquarium’s handy tips about how to ‘avoid items on the AVOID LIST.’

While apparently the authors of the report were somewhat upbeat about improvements in sustainability practices to come, inevitably what news like this does is increase consumer skepticism and ups complaints about greenwashing. These days, with a growing group of citizens making a tangible effort to green up their acts, there is an urgent need for transparency, not tricks.

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