End of denial

Tons of Carbon

2008-02-28T23:20:00.000-08:00

I spent yesterday in S.F. and am still amazed that I was able to attend 2 separate conferences that focused on carbon offsets and carbon footprints within 15 blocks of one another. Moscone Center hosted the larger one, which focused on the emerging market for offsets and seemed to be well attended by brokers and others who make up a typical commodity marketplace. My biggest impression from this one was the huge international contingent, particularly European. This appears to be one new market opportunity where the EU has a significant head start, and I'm sure the companies who have "figured it out there" are chomping at the bit to take a leadership position in the U.S. market.

The smaller conference focused on measuring carbon footprints of consumer products. It seemed to be a mix of consulting firms and auditors on the vendor side and rather large technology and product companies who were there to learn about footprint measurement methodologies. I listened to part of a talk given by the head of sustainability at the Mars Corporation, and he said something that stuck with me. He was discussing the full lifecycle of dog food, and he was contrasting the primary contributors to their product's footprint with the areas of the footprint that his company can reasonably impact.

He showed how the raw materials (agriculture) and consumer purchase and consumption were the parts of the lifecycle that are most carbon intensive. The product manufacturing phase, and even somewhat the distribution portion of the lifecycle, were relatively efficient and therefore not large contributors to the footprint. The point he made was that the ingredients of the product (particularly beef) are demanded by consumers, and those same consumers demand convenient packaging. In other words, until consumers are willing to alter these demands, there is not much that the producer can do to make a significant impact on the overall footprint. As much as companies need to change their ways and get greener, I have a feeling as we continue to peel the onion on this climate change crisis we will find that the consumer is going to have to make some drastic, perhaps even painful, choices along the way.

Low Carbon Diet - where to start?

2008-02-23T21:09:00.001-08:00

I am a member of the Cool Los Altos team, a group of volunteers who is helping our city and its residents reduce our carbon emissions. We managed to get the City Council and Mayor to agree to adopt the Mayor's Climate Protection Agreement last month (yeah!), and now we're putting together plans for how to get our city's residents at large to adopt a greener lifestyle in the months ahead.

So we're struggling with the question of what changes to ask people to make. When you look at the options for changes that we can promote to our residents, there are many. They range from reducing the amount you drive to lowering your thermostat at home to taking shorter showers. But when I tried to think through all the options and come up with a framework for deciding where to start, I came up with 3 criteria that help to determine the best options: ease of adoption, impact on the environment, and measurability. For now, I'm trying to decide between "ease" and "impact".

In my opinion, realistically, most people will not make wholesale changes to their lifestyle in a short period of time. And many carbon-reducing options are not realistic for large segments of the population (e.g. how many of us live and work near train or bus routes?).

My personal bias is for relatively easy, incremental changes. Clearly the changes required for us to overcome global warming are massive and systemic, so we need to start the ball rolling at a basic level that everyone can adopt. When combined with a growing awareness of other changes that we can make and the impact of each - coupled with the confidence that comes from having made 1 change successfully - I think we'll see a depth and breadth of adoption that will surprise us a couple years from now.

One of our neighboring cities (Palo Alto for those who are interested) has decided to push reusable bags as a major initiative. On the one hand, replacement of plastic and paper bags with a reusable bag is estimated to save only 80 pounds of CO2 annually per person; but, it does qualify as a relatively easy lifestyle change. It also occurs to me that it's a good choice for a community-wide initiative because it's one of the few activities that occurs in a public setting, thus introducing the ever-powerful force of peer pressure (you *will* sense the eyes of others upon you when asked "paper or plastic?").

I'm interested to hear from others what changes they think are the most important to promote to others at this point. Is it the easy to adopt and implement ones, or is it the ones that have the most impact on our environment?

Kent
www.ecounit.com

Hybrid drivers beware

2008-02-15T11:16:00.000-08:00

Okay, so it's not exactly my new Nissan hybrid. Which, by the way, got 550 miles on its first tank. I literally drove 3 weeks on 1 tank of gas - incredible. The overall MPG during the period was about 35...not bad!

So why should hybrids be afraid? Because the Tesla (I got to sit in this one at a recent fundraiser for Bing Nursery School at Stanford) and other zero-emissions vehicles are on the way. As long as they can figure out how to produce them in a relatively eco-friendly way, this is clearly the vehicle of the future.

Personal carbon bank accounts

2008-02-14T17:38:00.000-08:00

With all this talk of carbon credits and cap & trade, I started thinking about the possibility of personal carbon credits. In other words, if we continue to head in a direction where greenhouse gas emissions are measured, limited, and tradeable, it's not unrealistic that individuals would get in the game. So, just like a company that is "better than average" will be able to generate carbon credits that it can sell, a person who is "better than average" could potentially generate carbon credits for dollars. At last, revenge of the environmentalists!

As interesting as the idea is, I tend to think it won't happen. The primary reason is the difficulty of verification (e.g. who will certify that I rode my bike to work today?). Also, to the extent that certain activies are verifiable, the availability of the data and the ability of some third-party to access the data will invariably lead to privacy concerns (e.g. would you want your daily electricity usage to be publicly available?). And even though some of these issues can be overcome, we still have the sticky fact that limiting one's access to basic resources is anti-American (read: who's to say I'm only allotted 20 gallons of water per day?).

All that said, I can see a future where generating personal carbon credits will happen, albeit under a different name. As solar becomes more commonplace, it could become commonplace for utilities to credit individuals who give back to the grid. If a utility is able to buy and sell carbon credits, an individual's ability to sell solar energy to the utility essentially makes them a player in the carbon market.

For those who may stumble upon this post, my apologies for grossly over-simplifying a very complex scenario (but if you've read my other post you were forewarned). If you have something to contribute - especially if it helps to correct or clarify what I've written - by all means do so!

Kent
www.ecounit.com

What gets measured gets managed

2008-02-10T15:04:00.000-08:00

Wow, I just read that Bay Area pollution regulators have proposed to charge companies a fee for each ton of greenhouse gases that they emit! On the surface this may not sound all that groundbreaking, but it absolutely is. Consider that until now all efforts to regulate emissions have been voluntary. If this proposal passes, it would be the first legally mandated regulation in the U.S. which would result in financial consequences for greenhouse gas emitters. Apparently the air district, which is a state agency, is expected to vote on the proposal in May.

The proposed fee is small - only 4.2 cents per ton of greenhouse gas - because it's designed to fund the cost of the Bay Area's global warming reduction programs. In other words, it's not intended to offset the actual "cost" of the greenhouse gases.

But isn't that the next obvious step? And doesn't this mean that virtually all emissions will need to be measured and audited? And once there's a reliable or at least accepted system for measurement, shouldn't we assume that further "management" of these emissions will occur? This sounds to me like the first step in what will be a long (yet inevitable) series of steps towards the political portion of the global warming solution.

It's taken a bit of time, but it appears that government is now joining consumers and businesses in recognizing that they have a role to play if we're going to address global warming as well as the multitude of other environmental challenges that we face.

Importance of Immediacy

2008-02-05T18:06:00.000-08:00

One of the on-going mysteries associated with the environmental challenges we're facing is: if everyone knows that we have a problem, and everyone is motivated to make some changes in order to improve the situation, why is it so hard to get more than a few people to do the right thing? Of course there are many answers to this question, but one that strikes me is the importance of immediacy. What I mean by that is that I believe people *will* change their behaviors in ways that help the environment (or hurt it less) if they are given relevant, timely feedback about the impact that their actions are having.

As a proud new hybrid owner I am experiencing this effect first-hand. As I watch my miles per gallon reading during each outing (the hybrid's computer shows a lot of MPG-related data - very cool), I find that I'm compelled to take advantage of the gas-saving features more than I ever did in conventional cars. I am much more conscious of the "cost" of passing another driver, and I'm much happier to coast down hills with only the battery on.

Extending this principle to other parts of our daily lives, I can see a future when each of us is able to easily see the gas, electric, and water meters in our homes...and simply by seeing them (moving in the "wrong"direction) we will feel compelled to turn off lights, turn the thermostat down, and take shorter showers. Somehow the monthly bills - even though they show monthly and year-on-year comparisons and often times include financial inducements to lower our usage - just aren't timely enough to get us to make meaningful changes.

Out of sight, out of mind...

Kent Ragen
www.ecounit.com

Funny what we worry about

2008-01-30T09:45:00.000-08:00

Sitting here in Silicon Valley, it's easy to get caught up in all the tech talk. Yesterday's newspaper had a major story about how the semiconductor industry is sounding the alarm bells because Moore's Law will come to an end in 2020. The article goes on to tell us that we should all be concerned because, without Moore's Law continuing, we (presumably Silicon Valley and the U.S. at large) will not be able to be first with the latest in HDTVs and other electronics gear that will be all the rage in 2020 and beyond.

I can remember the day when issues like that seemed important to me. It wasn't that long ago. But seriously, is that really cause for alarm? If I can't get the 120 inch HDTV and must force myself to be satisfied with my 110 incher for an extra year or two, is that really cause for alarm? Many of us are beginning to realize that the answer to that question is obvious.

But the responsible capitalist in me wants a say as well. The issues go beyond whether or not I need a bigger TV. For instance, what happens to the jobs of those people who don't get to build the 120 incher? And what happens to the companies - not just the producer, but all of the upstream suppliers and downstream wholesalers, distributors, and retailers? The answer is that there's just as much economy - just as much of an opportunity for the motivations and efficiencies of capitalism - in the green economy as in the old economy.

Because the "next generation HDTV" that consumers want is *not* the 120 incher. It's the 110 incher that is designed by eco-engineers (educated in new technologies) with eco-friendly materials (based on new research) that uses renewable energy sources (solar panels installed by local laborers) and is 100% recycleable into the next generation of HDTVs. In other words, the "next generation" is not necessarily bigger, but it *is* greener. And making things greener means a total re-tooling of our economy...and when you re-tool, you create jobs and opportunities throughout the economy.

So no, I'm not worried about Moore's Law coming to an end. We already have the "green law" which represents a huge engine for growth while also improving everyone's quality of life.

Kent
Visit us at www.ecounit.com

Ads for Green

2008-01-17T17:32:00.000-08:00

I spend a lot of hours every day interacting with companies who serve the "green" market. It's a heartening site, and certainly it's a trend with more positive attributes than many that I've seen over the years (think legwarmers).

Like any trend there are negative aspects, and the one that's bothering me today is ad-sponsored "tips for greening your life". No doubt there are useful tips for greening our lives. And it's definitely true that the vast majority of us need to change how we live in various ways in order to get on a sustainable footing. But as I see these tips & tricks come through daily, I can't help but draw the conclusion that 80% of them are driven by the need for advertising dollars. They're simply not useful or practical...but they do represent real estate for ads.

My biggest concern with this is actually not that I think the publishers of the tips are immoral. I respect the desire to make money and the need to keep one's business running in order to serve some higher purpose. But the sheer volume of tips, and the questionable usefulness of many of them, threatens to turn readers off...the net result being that the truly useful, impactful tips that can help us move in the right direction will be lost.

The value of green

2008-01-14T23:46:00.000-08:00

It seems almost daily that the news reports of a study or survey showing that x% of people - usually a large % - wants their products to be more environmentally friendly. And those same studies often state that y% - again, usually a pretty high number - are willing to pay more for the same product if it's more eco-friendly. If you're really interested, you can find this information from sources like LOHAS and the Natural Marketing Institute.

While I'm willing to believe these statistics, the market really needs some hard evidence before we see mainstream producers react in a significant way. We need to see case studies of products that are equivalent in nearly all attributes other than their eco-friendliness and price, yet they sell in greater quantities within an identifiable segment of the population. Until this kind of hard evidence is available, I'm afraid the naysayers and claims of greenwashing will continue to hold a strong position.

We are building a group of consumers who want to facilitate this corporate transformation by providing constructive feedback. We invite companies who are interested in understanding the true costs and benefits of greening themselves and their products to visit www.ecounit.com and think about how they can utilize our member base to accelerate their transformation.

What's your cause?

2008-01-07T23:42:00.000-08:00

Sure, 2008 is the year that all of America goes green. But I think there is a related undercurrent that is less celebrated - Americans want to be part of a cause. It may be driven by the aging of the baby boomers, and surely it's enabled by the internet, but never in the last 30 years has a significant segment of the population felt so compelled to "do something".

You can see evidence of it in sites like www.freerice.com, which allows individuals to easily embrace the cause of stamping out hunger, and similarly by the growth of www.ecounit.com, which allows consumers to easily give back to the environment by earning rewards that are redeemable for carbon offsets.

I anticipate that this desire to get involved and make a difference will continue to help drive the eco-movement. But I hope that even as the eco-issues go mainstream and even become part of our every day culture, the compunction of people to do something and give back will spill over into other aspects of our culture and economy.

Too much noise, not enough rewards

2008-01-03T22:31:00.000-08:00

As we build the EcoUnit system, I'm struck by the multitude of companies offering to offset this or that based on a click. There may be some legitimate offers, but for the most part they look to me like blatant attempts to capitalize on the green trend and grow a list of unsuspecting email addresses in the process.

Our challenge is to rise above this fray, and I think we can do it. First, we are offering rewards to capture peoples' attention and keep them coming back. Second, the rewards are not only free, they're significant - it only takes 5 EcoUnit credits to offset a ton of carbon dioxide. That means that the average participant, who emits about 1.5 tons of CO2 each year, can completely offset their carbon footprint by earning only 7-8 EcoUnit credits per month. Third, and this will take a little bit more time to develop, we're going to put the individual in control of how their EcoUnits are "spent". So, with a relatively small investment of time, EcoUnit participants can earn free rewards, and they can use them to help the environment in significant ways.

You can see all this at www.ecounit.com. If you go, and if you like what you read, I hope you will sign up.

Far to go

2007-12-30T14:09:00.000-08:00

Being thoroughly immersed in the eco-craze, including the skyrocketing interest in alternative energy, it's easy to feel as though we're well on our way to a more sustainable future. A couple conversations recently reminded me how far we have to go. I recently spoke with a biofuels specialist who told me that, as excited as he is about the prospects for biofuels, the maximum amount of current energy use that biofuels can replace is 6%. The reason is that biomass is not in endless supply, and to create more we would need to do more damage to the environment (e.g. clear forests to grow corn) than good. 6% is of course important and significant, but there's still a long way to go. Separately, I spoke with an investor in alternative energy sources. He referenced a recent research project that attempted to determine how quickly alternative energ sources could completely replace oil. An unexpected result was that the more alternative energy that was introduced to the equation, the greater the demand for energy. In other words, the growth in energy consumption outpaced the ability to introduce new energy sources.

Sorry to not have more specifics on the findings referenced above, but I'll post them to www.ecounit.com soon.

Kent
kent@ecounit.com

Risk Management

2007-12-25T21:21:00.001-08:00

I suppose I should be writing something related to Christmas or the holidays and the excess that surrounds them, but I'm most excited about a video I recently watched:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDsIFspVzfI

This is the message that every naysayer needs to hear. It uses the simple concept of probability, together with possible outcomes, to see the obvious conclusion: that we must act now against climate change to assure ourselves of the optimal outcome. The beauty of the logic is that it takes into account the very real possibility that the scientists might be wrong and there will be no downside associated with climate change; even with this eventuality factored in, it's obvious that the wise choice is to take action now.

Another release!

2007-12-20T16:31:00.000-08:00

I'm excited that we've managed to get more news out there about EcoUnit! I love to see the spikes in traffic at www.ecounit.com in response. We just need to tell the story...if they listen long enough, people will join.
Kent
kent@ecounit.com
www.ecounit.com

Carbon offset

2007-12-19T22:34:00.000-08:00

I am pleased to announce that my company, EcoUnit, just offset our carbon footprint for the year. We did this through our partner, CarbonFund.org, which has a program that enables small businesses to offset their annual carbon footprint with one lump sum payment. Given how young and how small our company is, it's likely that we offset more than our annual footprint, but that's okay. We did a joint release to announce this on 12/28, released on CSRWire. Check it out at http://www.csrwire.com/News/10527.html if you're interested.

I know that there are those who think offsets are questionable at best. I don't dispute the issues with them, but I'm convinced that they're a positive step in the right direction. I also think that, as long as you choose high quality offsets that are 3rd-party certified, there is a high likelihood that the offsets will be effective. I look forward to the day when offsets are understood by the common consumer - for their benefits and drawbacks - and are one of many ways that each of us can impact the environment positively.

Kent
kent@ecounit.com
www.ecounit.com

The System

2007-12-15T22:19:00.000-08:00

I recently watched a video called "The Story of Stuff" that reminded me of just how far we have to go to get ourselves on a sustainable footing. Our entire system, really the way we have lived our lives since the industrial revolution, is predicated on continuing this ever-increasing pattern of consumption. Scarcity of resources, including a healthy and stable climate, is the manifestation, but this system really defines our time on earth during the 20th century until this point - it is what most of us do during the vast majority of our waking lives.

I think the recent re-thinking of bottled water is a good example of how some of us are starting to scratch our heads and realize that something is just not right. People did just fine drinking water from wells and streams for centuries. Then we managed to make them undrinkable, giving rise to the bottled water craze. We then realized that making and throwing away a plastic bottle for 16 ounces of water was environmentally wasteful. Then we realized that water from the tap is actually safer and better for you. From hindsight, it seems like one of those times that capitalism and consumerism should have just stayed home.

Again, this is just an example. But I like it because it shows how our most basic commodity (next to oxygen) has been impacted by the system. And when we extend this out to other items, most of which are less necessary to our daily lives, it hits home just how totally engorged we are with consumerism.

To be clear, I am a capitalist at heart. That's unlikely to change. But I'm beginning to wake up to how thoroughly we will need to re-think our systems - in addition to our daily lives - in order to attain a sustainable trajectory. In fact, I think capitalism may be the only system capable of overcoming such a monstrous challenge. If market forces can wake up to the realities of the direction that we're heading, theoretically they should move us on a new course as effeciently as any system short of a global dictatorship. But this will clearly be the biggest challenge that capitalism - and mankind - has had to face.

Thank You Far Left!

2007-12-10T20:51:00.000-08:00

I was born and raised a republican, and I'm pretty sure that I'll maintain that position even as I serve our planet. I don't want to think too hard about it, but I'm sure there were times when I snubbed my nose at the environmentalists who challenged us to re-think our values.

As I look at the world through a different lens today, I must say that these folks have done us all a great service. While we've been laughing and chastising them, they've been laying the foundation for today's mass green movement. If they had not been steadfast in their beliefs, today we would be starting essentially from zero to try to address the unsustainable path that we are currently on.

Recently I have spoken with many of these folks who have been toiling in the trenches for many years. While some are wary of the fair weather crowd who has suddenly emerged, by far I have experienced open arms...even relief, as they realize that all of their hard work is paying off. It took Al Gore, A Nobel prize, and some really bad weather to prove their point, but now they're vindicated. Fortunately, true to their sincerity of their beliefs all these years, they are welcoming us late-comers with open arms.

Not surprisingly, these long-time hard cores have been working at eco-aware companies for many years. Now that corporate America is waking to the opportunity, we are seeing them spread out like diaspora across "regular" companies in virtually all industries. Much like Chief Security Officers and Chief Privacy Officers have joined management ranks over the past couple decades, we will now see the Chief Sustainability Officer - whose role will span back office and front office, operations and marketing - join the management ranks. Even though they are not a vengeful sort, I'm sure the irony of their newfound position will not be lost on them.

Corporate awakening

2007-12-05T21:25:00.000-08:00

At a recent Eco-Tuesday event I heard an attorney from Morrison Foerster talk about how VCs can be seen "following the money" in clean tech investing. I'm sure she's right, because that's essentially the theme for the growth of the entire green movement. Now that "green" and "sustainability" are understood by a large percentage of consumers, and of course with this awakening comes concern and at least some interest in reacting positively to preserve the planet, consumer-facing companies have no choice but to follow the money.

The negative perception that many had of "environmentalists" is suddenly unimportant. The correlation between concern for the health of our planet and ultra-liberalism has eroded. So corporate America can embrace this new buying segment - recent estimates put the value of the LOHAS (lifestyle of health and sustainability) segment at $200 billion - with little downside. More to the point, increasingly, corporate America can't afford to ignore this growing segment. By all accounts the folks buying hybrids and organic foods are upper-middle class, well-educated, active young adults and families. There are a few companies who have grown up focused on appealing to the LOHAS segment when it was still small; but now that it's going mainstream we will see virtually all companies rush to figure out their strategy for capturing their share of the LOHAS pie.

Kent
www.ecounit.com

What's this all about

2007-12-03T22:48:00.000-08:00

Now that I have arrived on the blogosphere, I feel compelled to address why I'm here. Like a lot of people, I have been running fast and furious for a lot of years trying to get ahead. Though the pursuit of profit has been fun, and often times challenging and sometimes even rewarding, inevitably there were times when I would look up - usually while on a long flight or slaving away in a hotel room somewhere - and wonder what the hell I was doing. At those times it was difficult to come up with good answers. I did take heart in some of the benefits - like helping people to grow in their careers and job creation - but at the core there simply was not enough meaning.

I have often times come back to service, something that was ingrained in me from a young age and reiterated during my schooling. But working so many hours every day, it was difficult to find opportunities to serve that did not come at a cost that I was willing to pay (like time away from family). So my conclusion was always the same: I'll pursue profit now, and serve later.

With these thoughts ruminating, I began to wake up to the state of our world. The unsustainable ways in which we consume our resources. The sub-optimal decisions that are made because of how we consume our resources. These are issues that I'd been aware of for many years, but chose not to face fully. We're a resourceful people, I thought, we'll figure out a way. But when I realized that it would take 5 earths to support a population of people who live like me, it became more difficult to deny.

So the journey brings me here, to the blogosphere. I have resolved, through this and other avenues, to help build a more sustainable economy and culture. It's time to end the denial and get on with the work of building a more sustainable world.

Kent Ragen
kent@ecounit.com
www.ecounit.com