Shipping 3.6 million bracelets a week to retailers worldwide

DHL Express Global CEO joins the Board of DHL-Sinotrans JV

EBITA advances 39.0% on a comparable basis

Kyocera plans to install solar power generating systems using the company’s own solar modules at six domestic plants by March 2011, generating a total of 593 kW. This move will increase the number of Kyocera domestic manufacturing sites with solar power to 10, which is all of the company’s manufacturing sites in Japan, and the number of global group company sites to 20.

Kyocera will install the solar systems at the Yasu Plant (Shiga), which is the company’s new solar cell manufacturing plant; the Kitami Plant (Hokkaido), which mainly manufactures mobile phone handsets; and the Sendai Plant (Kyushu), which mainly manufactures ceramic components and ceramic knives.

Kyocera already has 14 solar power generating systems installed at group companies in Japan and globally, which when combined with the new systems, will boost the company’s total output to 1,815 kW (1.8 MW). These installations also are expected to help reduce the company’s CO2 emissions.

Some of those installations include a 214-kW solar power generating system at its global headquarters in Kyoto, and a solar tree grove in the parking lot of Kyocera’s San Diego facility, which also act as shade to keep sun off the cars. 

Solar groves have been installed at a variety of different businesses, ranging from computer maker Dell to fast-food restaurant McDonald’s.

In other solar news, Harris Tea, a tea and beverage packager, will start operating its first solar power system this week (August 31). The array is installed on the company’s two buildings in Anaheim, California, and will generate 450,000 kilowatt hours annually.

The solar installation is expected to reduce the company’s CO2 emissions by more than 300 tons annually, avoiding 15 million pounds of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions over the lifetime of the system.

The project was partially funded by the Anaheim Public Utilities’ Solar Advantage Program through the California Solar Initiative.

As part of its global sustainability efforts, Chiquita Brands International has installed a biodigester system at its Mundimar S.A. facility in Guapiles, Costa Rica. The biodigester uses excess fruit material and processing water from the facility to produce energy that is used by its facility and fertilizer for local palm producers and farmers.

The unique “gravity utilizing” design of the biodigester system allows for the circulation of processing water without using electricity, which creates a carbon neutral circulation process, according to the company.

In June last year, Chiquita Brands was awarded the 2009 Circle of Excellence award for its sustainability in supply chain logistics.

In other biomass news, Carr Farm in the UK is installing an anaerobic digestion (AD) plant that is said to mark the biggest “energy farming” expansion program in Britain, according to Farmgen, a green energy specialist.

Crops are being grown nearby specifically to supply the new plant, which is expected to generate 1-megawatt of electricity that will be exported to the national grid. Local businesses have already signed up to buy the “green” energy from the Carr Farm. The plant will start providing renewable energy to power more than 1,000 homes next year.

The project is part of Farmgen’s £30 million (approximately $46 million) investment in energy farming. The company says AD plants are already commonplace across Europe, with around 4,000 operating in Germany alone.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates that there are about 150 on-farm manure or anaerobic digesters now operating at livestock facilities with about 8,000 farms across the U.S. that are good candidates for capturing and using biogas.

The U.S. Coast Guard has installed a 2.4-kilowatt turbine as part of a “green energy” effort at the Southwest Harbor base that includes solar energy and renewable heat sources, reports the Bangor Daily News. Sitting atop a 70-foot tower, the wind turbine will supply electrical power to a duplex housing unit on the base.

The Coast Guard also has installed a pellet boiler that provides heat and domestic hot water for the two homes in that unit, while solar panels provide electricity and charge batteries for backup power, and solar thermal tubes provide up to 80 additional gallons of hot water for those homes, according to the article.

Capt. James McPherson, the sector chief for Coast Guard Sector Northern New England, told the Bangor Daily News it’s part of the Coast Guard’s plan for a “net zero” home concept for base housing.

Lt. Ashley Thomas, the sector field officer for the base, also said in the article the wind turbine is part of a larger renewable energy push for the Coast Guard in Southwest Harbor.

System upgrades, including insulation improvements, also are on tap at the 10 duplex base housing unit, starting in October.

The Coast Guard is considering the use of wind power at other base housing units in Maine and at other sites around the country.

The U.S. Army and Navy also are making a big push to use renewable energy sources to help the Defense Department meet its internal goal of generating 25 percent of all energy from renewable sources by 2025.

A campaign to boycott Alberta-sourced gasoline has gained momentum after several U.S clothing manufacturers and a major U.S. drugstore chain announced they would avoid oil sands-related fuels.

The Gap, Timberland and Levi Strauss, as well as Walgreens, have joined a growing list of corporations choosing to avoid using gasoline refined from Canadian bitumen, reports the Calgary Herald.

Whole Foods and Bed, Bath and Beyond had previously joined the boycott according to the Canadian Press.

Federal Express has promised it will consider the environmental and social impacts of the fuels it uses, although it didn’t specifically mention the oil sands.

The move to less carbon-intensive fuels was sparked by an ongoing campaign by San Fransisco-based environmental group Forest Ethics, Walgreens spokeswoman Tiffani Washington told the Calgary Herald.

“We found that it was a relatively simple process of surveying our vendors, seeing which ones may have tar sands oil sourcing and simply avoiding those vendors,” Walgreen’s spokesman Michael Polzin told The Canadian Press. “We are in that process right now.”

The drugstore chain, which operates more than 700 trucks in its 7,500-store network, surveyed its fuel providers to avoid any sources of oil sands-sourced gasoline, Polzin said.

“What this signals is the beginning in earnest of the financial war over the tar sands,” said Todd Paglia of the environmental group Forest Ethics, which is organizing the campaign.

“In the U.S., customers are increasingly saying we don’t want to be part of the tar sands,” Paglia told The Canadian Press.

Paglia admits the U.S. produces heavy oil of its own that isn’t singled out in Forest Ethics’ campaign. But he said the size and environmental impact of Alberta’s oil sands as well as the plans to increase its imports into the U.S. makes it an appropriate target.

Canada is the largest exporter of oil, both conventional and synthetic, to the United States, shipping approximately 1.99 million barrels per day of its 2.6 million bpd production south of the border.

The list of U.S. based refiners processing Canadian bitumen include BP, ConocoPhillips and ExxonMobil, as well as Sunoco, Murphy Oil and Marathon Oil.

Forest Ethics’ campaign wasn’t the first against the oil sands sourced gasoline. Last month Corporate Ethics International urged Americans and Britons to “Rethink Alberta” as a polluting, environmentally challenged province rather than a Rocky Mountain tourism destination, reports the Canadian Press.

The news that more retailers were avoiding Canadian crude, raised the ire of Albertans, from politicians to business associations, which called for reverse boycotts of U.S. products.

The Alberta Enterprise Group urged residents to stop supporting retailers that say they have stopped using bitumen-based gasoline but continue to face allegations of using child labor in Asia.

“It smacks of hypocrisy,” David MacLean told the Alberta Herald. “It’s a public relations stunt at our expense, and by ‘our,’ I mean Albertans and Canadians.”

International and Intergovernmental Relations Minister Iris Evans noted the industry is one of the most heavily regulated in the world, and urged consumers to learn more about what Alberta is doing to produce cleaner energy.

“We’ve been talking to a lot of global transportation providers and retailers and a lot of them understand the complexities of not only oil sands, but about removing any type of fuel from the fuel supply,” Janet Annesley, a spokeswoman for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers told the Calgary Herald. “And they want to work with us to find solutions rather than simply make a PR statement about a boycott.”

The 1450 Brickell office tower in Miami, Fla., has implemented a wide range of energy-efficient features and technologies that help save over 14 percent more energy and over 40 percent in water use than standard buildings built to code.

These savings helped the 35-story office tower earn the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold certification for core and shell category for new construction. Rob Hink, a LEED Accredited Professional and Principal of the Spinnaker Group, the office tower’s environmental consulting firm, said 1450 Brickell is the only newly constructed LEED Gold certified office tower in Downtown Miami.

Other key features of the 582,817-square-foot office tower include low-flow water fixtures that are projected to save more than 2.5 million gallons of water per year, preferred parking spaces allocated for low emission, fuel-efficient vehicles, and pedestrian and cyclist-friendly amenities including 44 bike racks and shower and changing facilities.

However, the highlight of the building is its glass curtain wall system, which played a central role in attaining LEED Gold status, while setting a new standard for commercial building strength, according to the Spinnaker Group. The curtain wall system is said to improve impact resistance, solar performance, energy efficiency, sound attenuation and UV blocking.

The glass façade, fabricated entirely of large-missile impact glass, was tested to withstand wind loads over 300 mph, which makes 1450 Brickell one of the nation’s most wind-resistant office buildings, according to Spinnaker. The tower also has two generators, one for use in emergencies and another that can power tenants’ basic electrical needs during outages.

During construction, the project recycled about 78 percent of construction waste and purchased 40 percent of all materials from sources within 500 miles of the construction site.

Other office towers that have recently earned LEED certification include Larimer Office Tower, Wells Fargo’s Duke Energy Center, Metro Park Towers, and Bank of America Tower.

Flextronics is committed to a 15 percent CO2/revenue dollar reduction by 2015, according to the company’s first Corporate Social and Environmental Responsibility (CSER) report. The electronics manufacturing services company expects to reduce its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and carbon footprint by focusing on energy efficiency and renewable sources.

Flextronics’ CSER program, called FLEXpledge, addresses stakeholder engagement, CSER development and management, ethics and governance, employee programs, environmental sustainability, and community partnerships.

In the area of environmental sustainability, Flextronics’ strategy encompasses a “5 pillar environmental framework,” which is focused on chemical substance management, product take-back and recycling, pollution control, resource conservation, and climate change.

Under chemical substance management, the company has a system that enables it to collect and manage Full Material Content (FMC) from each of its supply chain partners to ensure that the products it makes are fully compliant to any law or legislation.

In the area of product take-back and recycling, the company refurbishes, remarkets or resells product into secondary markets enabling the extension of the products’ life. It also ensures that any recycling and disposition of scrap materials are ethically disposed of and not dumped and discarded into landfills, especially in developing countries.

As an example, Flextronics Aguascalientes (Mexico) has established its own recycling center. Since 1998, it has recycled 80,000 tons of waste for Xerox. Its capabilities include 100 percent industrial scrap control, gray market avoidance and the ability to trace recycled materials. In addition to recycling waste, the facility can also recycle roof insulation, plastic flooring, plastic bricks and pallets.

Many of Flextronics’ manufacturing sites are evaluating alternative forms of energy. As an example, Flextronics Althofen (Austria) uses renewable energy made of wooden chips to provide heating in the facility, cutting the facility’s energy use by 10 percent.

Flextronics’ environmental strategy also includes “5 CLEAN Value Propositions,” addressing compliance with all legal and customer requirements, liability and cost protection for Flextronics and its business partners, environmental stewardship, asset recovery and new business opportunity.

In the area of product design, Flextronics’ Design for Environment goal is to reduce environmental impacts throughout the full product life cycle and incorporate environmental solutions into the product design to mitigate compliance issues. The company also established an eleven-step closed loop compliance process.

The electronics manufacturing services company also strives to cut water consumption. As an example, Flextronics Guadalajara has established a “closed loop” water system to better manage and save its water consumption. The treatment center enables the facility to recycle 9,600 of the 16,300 cubic meters of water extracted from its deep water wells every month, translating into tens of thousands of dollars in savings annually.

Over 70% of Fortune 500 companies have sustainability mandates, but do they go far enough? In a sea of corporate social responsibility programs, green “seals of approval” and eco claims, business really has not changed significantly. Seeking to enable a deep green business transformation, the Environmental Defense Fund is hosting a series of Sustainable Solutions Labs across the U.S., “un-conference” think-tanks. Orchestrated by DigIn, the Labs bring together green business leaders throughout each region to share successes, lessons learned and needed future actions that will accelerate the sustainability shift.

At the Seattle event, on August 10th at the lovely eco campus of Seattle University, conversation catalysts from Microsoft, REI, Starbucks, Brittingham Partners, and the Bainbridge Graduate Institute shared their experiences to spur the ensuing discussions. Microsoft’s Director of Environmental Sustainability Steve Lippman described a successful new practice of billing data center energy use by square foot to individual business units. The result: business units specify more efficient equipment and share in the savings. “But it’s low-hanging fruit,” he said. “The systems we create [as a society] don’t harbor sustainability.” He went on to state that the real challenge is creating large scale change, and soon. Scientists say we have 10 years in which to bring down CO2 levels in the atmosphere to avoid irreversible climate change. Despite scientific consensus, many of our policy makers, business leaders and consumers believe it’s all hype. However, if green business is good business anyway, change will do us good regardless of the climate issue. Lippmann emphasized, “Don’t let small wins distract from the bigger task at hand.” Microsoft, REI and other NW companies are part of a business coalition pushing for bigger changes through tougher energy efficiency legislation in Washington State.

As one of the event’s facilitator’s, I spent the day with the Effective Collaboration for Sustainability discussion. Our discussion groups agreed that a big focus of collaboration should be getting major corporations to support green business policies, incentives and legislation. Additional suggestions repeated across many of the day’s topics. Whether discussing Organizational & Cultural Change, Urban Agriculture Infrastructure, or Green Investing, a consensus emerged. Attendees urge corporate America to ask better questions, establish industry-wide metrics that help everyone make better decisions, and educate themselves and each other about proven success strategies.

Kevin Hagen, Director of CSR at retailer REI, underscored the need to overhaul the business decision process; “Question your assumptions, which are almost always wrong!” When looking into the company’s carbon footprint the REI team expected product transportation would be the heavy hitter. Instead, employee commuting had twice the footprint, at 14% of their total carbon emissions. Another assumption overturned, REI says they save money by purchasing renewable power, by using long term contracts that hedge them against spikes in conventional power prices.

A good example of finding and addressing the larger environmental issues is the ubiquitous disposable coffee cup. Ben Packard, Starbucks’ VP of Global Sustainability, relayed the fact that consumer concern focuses on use of disposable cups. However, only 1.9% of those concerned customers bring their own cup. Furthermore, the bigger environmental impact for coffee drinkers is tropical deforestation, not cup disposal. Starbucks has integrated sustainable purchasing practices into its entire coffee supply chain, a fact that is relatively little known yet has enormous environmental benefit.

We have a long way to go, but a lot of good data is already out there. If you have something to share or want to get involved in creating change, visit the Sustainable Solutions Lab 2010 wiki and join the discussion.

Teresa Burrelsman is a senior sustainability consultant at Eco Via Consulting in Seattle. She has worked with private and public organizations on implementing green buildings and sustainability programs. She is also a member of the Sustainability Collaboration Network, a multi-disciplinary consultant collective that focuses on regenerative development and creating sustainable expertise through training and research.

Nestle will invest CHF 500 million (approximately $487 million) to address responsible farming, sourcing and consumption across its coffee supply chain. Nestle purchases around 780,000 tons of green coffee a year or 10 percent of the world’s supply.

Nestle’s Nescafé Plan is a global initiative that builds on the CHF 200 million (approximately $195 million) the company has already invested in the coffee industry over the past 10 years.

Under the plan, Nestle will double the amount of coffee it buys directly from farmers to 180,000 tons over the next five years. In addition, 90,000 tons of Nescafé coffee will be sourced according to the Rainforest Alliance and Sustainable Agriculture Network (SAN) principles by 2020. It also will ensure that all directly purchased green coffee will meet 4C sustainability standards by 2015.

The company also commits to deliver 220 million high yielding, disease-resistant plants to farmers over the next 10 years as well as establish 300 demonstration farms showing best practices. It will also increase the number of agronomists from 24 to 96 and field technicians to 350 who will provide technical assistance and advice on farming and harvesting to 10,000 coffee farmers a year.

The company also will reduce the environmental footprint of its coffee producing factories around the world, although targets or goals weren’t provided.

The Rainforest Alliance, the Sustainable Agriculture Network, and the coffee association, 4C, will help support Nestle’s Nescafé Plan objectives related to farming.

The Nescafé Plan is similar to Nestle’s Cocoa Plan, launched in October 2009, which called for a CHF 110 million investment to improve the sustainability of the cocoa industry.

Nestle recently announced it will stop buying palm oil from suppliers linked to deforestation after a two month campaign by Greenpeace.

The Tennessee Valley Authority plans to begin idling nine coal-fired power generation units in the next fiscal year as it moves toward cleaner sources of energy.

Japan plans to bind large firms to CO2 caps

Reuters

Goodwill, better business grow from going green

Chicago Tribune

USGBC Recognizes New Orleans as an Emerging Environmental Leader

TMCnet

Energy Star Failings: Much Ado About Something

CleanTechies

American Vanguard Files Action Against EPA for Relief from Stop Sale Order for Fungicide Product Line

Businesswire

First Pentagon Combat Energy Manager Looks to Mission

The New York Times

SunHydro to Receive Toyota Fuel Cell Vehicles

Businesswire

NEC builds a better bioplastic from plant stems and cashew nut shells

Engadget

California to Launch Next-Generation Feed-in Tariff for Solar Energy

Businesswire

Diversey President & CEO Ed Lonergan talks about the Johnson family legacy of sustainability; innovations that save water, energy and labor; and how his team has reinvented his first summer job: waxing grocery store floors.

Simple steps, such as power management software and using available green ratings can lead to big savings in energy and money for companies large and small.

Over 40 tons of clothes, food and household items delivered

Introducing a new business model; increasing operational reliability

Highly specialised logistics with constant focus on cost effectiveness

Catering to Eastern India as well as Nepal and Bhutan

Today is Power IT Down Day, a global effort to get workers to turn off their computers, monitors, printers and other peripherals before they go home. And though it may be a small action to take, the rewards are potentially huge.