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This week I had the opportunity to attend the Third Global Forum for Businesses as an Agent of World Benefit at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. The theme for this year's forum is 'Flourish and Prosper.' The event, which was pioneered eight years ago by David Cooperrider -- best known for his work on appreciative inquiry.

As Barbara Snyder, Case Western president said, "We've come a long way from talking about sustainability to talking about flourishing." That sentiment was repeated several times on this first day -- that it is time to reach beyond merely sustaining, and time to stop thinking in terms of trade-offs. We need to be smart enough to include the considerations of people, profit and planet in everything we do, to synthesize these requirements into smart solutions.

There is another dimension to this, as well. The idea of flourishing, says Cooperrider, means that the energy for innovation must come from an intrinsic caring. It must acknowledge the interconnectedness of all things. Citing the Dalai Lama, when asked about corporate social responsibility (CSR), he said that 'responsibility' is not the right word. It's intimacy.

It's time for a transformation that means moving away from a preoccupation with the self and focusing on the interconnectedness. As the book "Flourishing Enterprise," written collectively by several of the conference organizers from the Case Weatherhead School says: "Flourishing is not anchored in mundane notions of continuity.  It is not about passing along what is now available. Giving future generations the opportunities faced by the current generation may not mean much if all we now have is the prospect of bleak material survival. Instead, flourishing is about the world for which we all yearn."

How we get there is not a simple answer and is indeed the subject that this three-day event, at which the many distinguished thought leaders and practitioners are present, will attempt to move forward on. One distinguishing facet of this gathering is the intent to go beyond sharing information, to form teams to enter into a series of design summits.

One step that keynote speaker, peacekeeper and former Finnish president, Marti Ahtisaari, says is required will be to "redefine the purpose of a company to that of creating shared value." Indeed, my first breakout group, when asked to visualize the world 10 years from now, agreed that a world in which such a shift in consciousness had become widespread would be one with far less resistance to adaptive change. Indeed it would be far more likely, as one participant said, "to be open to possibilities that are currently unimaginable."

We then heard from Vitamix CEO Jodi Berg, who, talking about "presenteeism," cited the current health crisis as an opportunity -- noting that wellness, including improved diet, could potentially save 18 percent of the current $3.8 trillion health care tab.

Naveen Jain spoke of using the power of innovation to move from scarcity to abundance. Expressing what I would call hyper-optimism, he said we will be multi-planetary in 20 years and there will be no place on Earth we can't get to in 1.5 hours.

One theme I heard repeatedly was the idea of visualizing an ideal state and then reverse-engineering it from the end point back to the present. Apparently, that had been the approach first used with the Apollo program. That is very different from the problem-solving approach which has been more commonly employed, since problem-solving tends to preserve the existing order. Jain made a similar point, asking us to question deeply whether a system that was not functioning was broken or if it was obsolete. That's the kind of thinking going on here.

Chris Killingstad, of Tennant Corp., gave us an example of the kind of synthesis I mentioned earlier with a floor cleaning solution, called electrically converted water, that uses no chemicals at all.

Bart Houlahan told us how companies that had met the B-Corp criteria had a 65 percent better chance. We also heard from Marcella Kanfer Rolnick of GoJo, makers of Purell, about how they had set a target to bring well-being to 1 billion people each day, in the form of hand sanitization.

Keith Hammonds led a breakout session about the Solutions Jounalism Network. The network centers around bringing balance to media coverage, rather than focusing on the bad news that people seem to be so fixated on. Research shows that a continuous dose of negative news leads to "learned helplessness," that people get tired of. 'Solutions' journalism is rgiorous, evidence-based reporting on responses to social problems."Systems only change," says Keith, "when people see the possibility of the positive."

Finally, Nadya Zhexembayeva gave a workshop on working with companies operating in an environment of resource scarcity. Using the metaphor of fishing in the ocean, she stated that many companies are oblivious to the fact that their ocean is running dry.

Increasing expectations, declining resources, and radical transparency are all applying pressure on company's ability to create value. They need to respond to this with "smart"solutions that not only meet sustainability demands, but also bring new value to the customer.

Some examples she gave include:

• Rolls-Royce providing aircraft engine hours as a service


• Mud Jeans renting out jeans for predetermined periods of time


• Microsoft distributing cloud servers as furnaces


• Sharing economy concepts like Floow2, which enables utilization of excess capacity of large scale capital equipment


• Throw and Grow Confetti, which extends the useful life of confetti from a few seconds to a growing season.

All of this is just the tip of the iceberg, of what has been a fascinating first day.

Image courtesy of the Third Global Forum for Businesses as an Agent of World Benefit

By Jeff Yorzyk

We have all heard the old axiom that states, “What gets measured gets managed.” But sustainability practitioners are frequently confronted with a tough question: “How do I measure that?” Furthermore, the definition of sustainability metrics also runs into the challenge of recognizing how the capital “S” of Global Sustainability distills down to specific sustainability priorities for any individual organization. Life Cycle Thinking is an approach that helps answer both of these questions.

Life Cycle Thinking is defined by the United Nations Environmental Program's Life Cycle Initiative as “going beyond the traditional focus and production site and manufacturing processes to include environmental, social and economic impacts of a product over its entire life cycle.”

While the quantitative process of Life Cycle Assessment is not explicitly required to do this, it is a strong supporting tool. The fundamentals of both Life Cycle Thinking and Life Cycle Assessment include mapping the value chain and identifying inputs and outputs at each stage – an exercise that takes an organization well beyond the “boundaries” it typically considers for its operations.

Mapping the value chain

Mapping a value chain can seem daunting at first, but with the help of a team familiar with the product or service in question, it can be reduced to a few hours (or less) of brainstorming on a white board. By starting where you are in the value chain (for example “retail” or “final assembly”), the group can easily identify upstream and downstream partners (i.e. vendors and customers). Each step further away gets a little more challenging, but the team should be able to make assumptions and take follow-up actions to flesh out the map over time. Key inputs and outputs (materials, energy sources, emissions and products), and/or key issues known or suspected (hazardous waste generation, human rights issues, etc.) should be identified at each link of the value chain.

Value chain mapping can be seen as an iterative process, where detail and depth of understanding is added over time. It surfaces key issues related to a product or service that may not be visible within the commonly considered “boundaries” of an organization's operations by explicitly going beyond that traditional focus. The mapping step allows potential issues and opportunities to be identified and flagged for investigation, focusing future efforts on the most important items. When this map is assessed in relation to the larger suite of (capital “S”) Global Sustainability challenges, it can provide deep insight for understanding an organization's sustainability priorities. It can also provide insight into where the organization can control or influence those key issues, and how.

Translating sustainability priorities into performance metrics is the second trick. Two common first sources for consideration include (a) what competitors may be reporting publicly, and (b) publicly available guidance from groups like the Global Reporting Initiative and Global Environmental Management Initiative.

Often, the key metrics will present themselves along with key issues and opportunities observed in the investigation of the value chain. Generally speaking, metrics are used to measure performance, drive improvements and help businesses focus their people and resources on what’s important. Taking a Life Cycle approach, indicators can also be developed to drive improvement and focus activities across the entire value chain. This requires careful attention to metrics related to value chain influencing factors, such as product design (material choices and production requirements), purchasing policy and value chain engagement.

A closer look at environmental performance indicators

Ideally, metrics tell us more about the future than the past. ISO 14031 (Guidelines on Environmental Performance Evaluation) provides for establishment of measurable and verifiable performance indicators that are appropriate to any public or private enterprise, defining Environmental Condition Indicators (ECI), Operational Performance Indicators (OPI) and Management Performance Indicators (MPI). The strength of this approach is that these indicators represent three levels of control – low (ECI), medium (OPI) and high (MPI). These can be leveraged beyond environmental indicators to include Social Condition Indicators (SCI) and the corresponding OPI and MPI elements.

ECIs represent the ambient environment, which has a large number of influencing factors largely outside of an individual organizations control. OPIs represent the direct performance of the organization and generally relate to inputs and outputs of the organization, which are within the organization's span of influence (if not control). MPIs – an often overlooked set of metrics – represent the organization's efforts to control the inputs and outputs, such as training, product and procurement scorecards, supply chain performance evaluations and waste minimization programs, all of which are fully within the organization's span of control. Conceptually, MPIs (direct control) allow an organization to strongly influence OPIs, in the attempt to make a positive contribution to global ECIs.

The key to this approach is that MPIs, which are in full control of the organization, can be actively managed. When developed using a Life Cycle perspective, MPIs can have a tremendous impact on OPIs at both the operating and value chain level, and can be viewed as “forward looking” in that regard. Examples of this would be product, procurement and supply chain scorecards. ECIs and SCIs, in turn, then create context for the level of management attention that need to be paid to activities that impact the organization's sustainability priorities (MPIs). Bottom line, organizations that establish and track indicators at all three of these important levels using a Life Cycle perspective maximize the benefits to themselves, and to the world they operate within.

At the upcoming ISSP Conference 2014, these issues and more will be explored in a break-out session about Life Cycle Assessment led by Jeff Yorzyk, Senior Asset Sustainability Specialist at Cardno, Inc., and Tad Radzinski, co-founder and president of Sustainable Solutions Corp.

Image credit: "Greening the Economy Through Life Cycle Thinking" report by United Nations Environmental Program Life Cycle Initiative.

Jeff Yorzyk is a member of ISSP’s Board of Directors. ISSP Conference 2014 will be held November 12-14 in Denver. For more information, visit http://www.sustainabilityprofessionals.org/

SSE plc, the UK's second largest energy supplier, has become the first FTSE 100 company to be awarded the Fair Tax Mark.

Launched in February 2014, the Fair Tax Mark is the world's first independent accreditation process for identifying companies making a genuine effort to be open and transparent about their tax affairs. 

Richard Murphy, director of the Fair Tax Mark, commented: “Today is a major breakthrough for the campaign for responsible tax behaviour with the award of the Fair Tax Mark to SSE plc. As was the case with Fairtrade and other successful ethical standards, we anticipate that the accreditation of a major FTSE 100 company will prove to be a game-changer for the reporting of responsible tax planning in the UK.”

“Corporation tax avoidance costs the UK economy billions a year – money that is needed to support vital health, education and social security services in this country.”

Alistair Phillips-Davies, chief executive of SSE, said: “As a provider of an essential service SSE firmly believes it has a responsibility to contribute to the societies in which it operates. Paying the appropriate amount of tax is core to this; and we are determined to abide by both the spirit and letter of the UK’s tax regulations.

“Almost nine million SSE customers now have an independent guarantee that their energy comes from a company that seeks to pay the right amount of corporation tax, at the right time, in the right place and explains how it does that."

 

Want to learn more? Join TriplePundit, SAP and our special guests at #SAPsocent on October 23 at 9 a.m. PST / Noon EST for a special Twitter Chat about millennials and social entrepreneurship. Click here for more info.

With a busy week behind you and the weekend within reach, there’s no shame in taking things a bit easy on Friday afternoon. With this in mind, every Friday TriplePundit will give you a fun, easy read on a topic you care about. So, take a break from those endless email threads, and spend five minutes catching up on the latest trends in sustainability and business.

According to a study conducted in 2012 by leadership strategist Erica Dhawan, 75 percent of the global workforce will be made up of millennials by 2025. We all know millennials love their smartphones and are more likely to shun car-centric suburban life in favor of big cities -- but those aren't the only things that make this generation tick.

If employers are looking to attract and retain top talent, they'd be wise to learn these five things about millennials.

1. They're looking for purpose, not just a paycheck ...

A recent PwC study found that more than half of recent college graduates are seeking a company that has corporate social responsibility (CSR) values that align with their own, and 56 percent would consider leaving a company that didn’t have the values they expected. As Andy Savitz, author of “Talent, Transformation and the Triple Bottom Line,” put it in a panel discussion at the 2014 Sustainable Brands conference: “They’re looking for purpose, not just a paycheck.”

2. ... And they're willing to take a pay cut for a company they believe in

According to a survey conducted by Net Impact, the majority of millennial respondents (including students and young professionals) said they would take a pay cut to work for a company they believe in. Thirty-five percent of respondents said they would take a 15 percent pay cut to work for a company committed to CSR; 45 percent would take the same pay cut for a job that makes social or environmental impact, and a whopping 58 percent were willing to earn less for an organization with values like their own.

3. They have their eye on your sustainability performance ...

Cloud-based engagement platform WeSpire (formerly known as Practically Green) recently released the results of a five-year research study that shows the influence millennials have in organizations stepping up their employee engagement action. According to the study, more than 50 percent of employees would like to see their employer’s stance change on employee sustainability efforts, with millennials leading all age groups.

As Susan Hunt Stevens, founder and CEO of WeSpire, told TriplePundit in a recent interview: “People are realizing that these are not ‘nice-to-have’ programs. They drive the bottom line and the top line of business.”

4. ... And that of their coworkers

Another intriguing findings from WeSpire’s “State of Employee Engagement” study is how interested millennials are in the sustainability activities of not just their company, but also their colleagues.

“Employees see sustainability as social,” the report’s authors write. In fact, 65 percent of respondents said they want to learn more about what their co-workers are doing. This finding persists throughout nearly all age groups — from millennials to Baby Boomers — but is much stronger in the millennial generation, as high as 75 percent.

5. They're kind of a tough sell, so be ready

As Nicolette Van Exel, who heads up SAP's Emerging Entrepreneur Initiative, put it in a recent interview with 3p: "You really have to have a very, very compelling proposition for people coming into the workforce and especially in the technology sectors.”

Adam “Smiley” Poswolsky, author of "The Quarter-Life Breakthrough," agreed. “This is a generation that wants to align interest with purpose,” said Poswolsky, who noted that it’s also “a generation that thinks deeply” about what they want out of life.

So, if you're trying to land top talent, you better be ready with a pitch about how your company benefits not only employees -- but also your community and the planet. As Poswolsky put it, “they are going to work harder for you,” if they are happy.

Image credit: Flickr/thetaxhaven

Based in Philadelphia, Mary Mazzoni is a senior editor at TriplePundit. She is also a freelance journalist who frequently writes about sustainability, corporate social responsibility and clean tech. Her work has appeared in the Philadelphia Daily News, the Huffington Post, Sustainable Brands, Earth911 and the Daily Meal. You can follow her on Twitter @mary_mazzoni.

Everyone seems to be wracking their brains about how to combat climate change these days. From the conservatively pragmatic to the impressively ambitious, there seem to be no end of theories on what will ultimately slow the heating of the atmosphere. While most of us have already heard of, and probably implemented, solutions like less driving and paring down on landfill refuse, there’s a whole lot of other ideas on the table these days that take a more imaginative tact.

One concept that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has proposed is called geoengineering: a fascinating collection of brainstorms that would mostly be relegated to the extreme of impressively ambitious goals. One approach that you probably heard about a few years ago involved wrapping Greenland in a huge blanket to reduce glacier melt.

While the success of this idea is still being measured, there have been lots of other ideas proposed as well. They include:

• Creating giant solar buffers, or shields


• Pumping spurts of aerosols into the atmosphere to cool the temp.


• Erecting giant stand-alone cloud seeders on the surface of the ocean


• Mining the earth’s vast storage of silicate rocks

The interesting thing is that the IPCC has actually thrown its weight behind some of the ideas. One proposal the IPCC has entertained involves carbon capture methods that essentially block the carbon from being re-emitted to the atmosphere. The captured carbon could then be stored in capsules underground.

It’s no surprise that this type of geoeneneering has received a fair amount of push back in recent years, as well. Critics argue that using unproven science to engineer the atmosphere comes with its own unknown risks – risks that could make the problem worse, rather than better.

Aerosols, Scientific American pointed out way back in 2008, could actually worsen droughts, not improve them. And remember that phenomena that Canadian environmentalists discovered years ago called acid rain? Tampering with the content of our atmosphere could change what falls to the earth.

But what’s really interesting is that both sides of this argument are pretty much airing the same criticisms of the other: Neither side feels putting all the eggs in the other one’s basket is a good idea. Both are afraid that human inertia will win out over the other side’s ability to reverse climate change. Those who feel that renewable energy sources, reducing carbon emissions and other human-directed methods is the answer aren’t sure they want to put the fate of the planet in the hands of industries driven by novel design. Those who support geoengineering aren’t sure humans have the motivation or the organization to drastically change the way we live. And both sides predict disaster if something isn’t done quickly.

And unfortunately, both may right.

There’s tremendous risk in innovation. As University of Washington Professor Stephen Gardiner points out, ethics have to be at the forefront of geoengineering concepts. Political inertia has affected our ability to implement global policies, but using geoengineering as an “intervention” could still herald the same effect.
“We might try and adopt a quick technological fix but one that holds the worst impacts for a few decades without much attention to what happens after that,” said Gardiner in an interview with the Guardian.

Ethics is also at the core of what controls our ability to reshape the way we live. It’s far harder to implement global policies that cut profits from carbon sources than it is to try to come up with a quick fix that someone else designs.
But as scientists have pointed out, we’re fast reaching the age of consequences when revamping human nature may not have the impact we would hope. It has taken generations to put better cars on the road, despite the fact that we have had the technology for decades.

And sitting in an apartment in Vancouver, one of the greenest cities in the world, with green bylaws and landfill reduction policies in force and a mountain of challenges clearly still being met, it seems abundantly clear that human nature, like technology works or fails based on the ethical policies that drive the innovation.

Geoengineering can work if those innovations are driven by the same policy that drives success in how we handle carbon emissions and our garbage: ethical, sustainable management, not profit margins and Nobel Prize-sized notoriety.

And that’s the catch. Irrespective of the answer applied, it all comes back to how we look at our relationship to the future. If Mother Nature has taught us anything, it’s the fact that there are no quick fixes. Stopping climate change requires making sure that the technology we investigate and policies we choose  will be sustainable not only for us, but for future generations.

 Image credit: NASA Goddard Flight Photostream

Kansas is a political mess right now, and its leaders have hardly been hospitable to sustainable development, but a new biofuels project underway, close to the border with the Oklahoma panhandle, shows that new clean energy technologies do have a future. This morning the Department of Energy and the Spanish multinational Abengoa are officially kicking off the company’s first commercial-scale biorefinery in Hugoton. Once known as Kansas’s natural gas capital, this town of 4,000 may very well become known as the catalyst for next-gen biofuels, such as cellulosic ethanol, finally scaling and becoming cost-competitive with other fuels.

So why would a €7.8 billion (US$10 billion) company be bothered with this corner of the prairies? A conversation I had with Chris Standlee, Abengoa’s executive vice president of global affairs, shed some light on the future of cellulosic alcohol—which could finally play a role in diversifying our country’s energy portfolio, reduce carbon emissions and generate revenue for farmers. According to Standlee, Albengoa’s investment in the Hugoton plant reflects the company’s confidence that cellulosic alcohol is finally becoming a more cost effective option.

The new biorefinery was completed in August and started production late last month, and according the company, will be able to produce as much as 25 million gallons (95 million liters) of fuel annually. The plant collects agricultural waste, mostly the stalks and leaves that comprise corn stover and other residues, from farmers within 50 miles of the plant—paying local farmers as much as $17 million annually for that feedstock. The company expects to process 1,000 tons of biomass daily. One challenge with biofuels, of course, is the question whether a company would be able to source enough feedstock for the long run. Standlee assured me that the amount of waste Abengoa is collecting only scratches the surface: about 300,000 tons out of the 15.3 million tons of agricultural residues generated within 50 miles of Hugoton annually.

Waste from corn, wheat and sorghum production, as well as switchgrass, is rich in sugars, but (in layman’s terms) they are trapped in cellulose, and breaking through those stubborn cell walls has long been the bugaboo of ethanol production—which is why for decades the U.S. has favored corn ethanol while Brazil has had a 40-year history of advanced sugarcane ethanol production. But as Standlee explained to me, advancements in enzymes are proving to be the big difference. Four years ago, enzymes accounted for about $1.85 of the cost per gallon of cellulosic ethanol, which is why costs hovered between $6 and $8 per gallon. Albengoa manufactures their own enzymes, hence one reason why those costs have gone done as much as 30 percent since 2010. And Standlee claims the cost of enzymes per gallon of production could hit as low as 50 cents in a few years. The result: a gallon of cellulosic alcohol costing $2.30 a gallon in 2016 is not unrealistic—and could be very attractive considering fossil fuel’s price volatility.

The results are higher yields: in 2010 a ton of agricultural waste yielded about 55 gallons of fuel. Now that amount is up to 75 gallons, and Standlee sees that figure increasing to 85 gallons within two years. The company has invested at least $100 million over 10 years in its research and development of cellulosic alcohol. Full disclosure: the DOE did provide Abengoa a $132 million loan guarantee and $97 million in grants. But to keep this in context, annual federal government subsidies for fossil fuel production in the U.S. range from $10 to $52 billion; this year that figure could reach $21 billion.

This Kansas plant is only one cog in Abengoa’s biofuels portfolio. The company is also testing generating ethanol from municipal trash, and is also investing in biofuels for airplanes as well as bioplastics. The ability to create fuels out of what would otherwise be waste could make a huge difference by the end of this decade—and also help make a dent in the food-vs-fuel debate that have spooked many investors, and governments, away from biofuels.

Image credit: Abengoa

After a year in the Middle East and Latin America, Leon Kaye is based in California again. Follow him on Instagram and Twitter. Other thoughts of his are on his site, greengopost.com.

I've always wanted a Ford Mustang. As a youngster, I often daydreamed about cruising down the highway with the top down and the wind in my hair. Many a homeroom game of MASH ended in disappointment -- not because I got stuck living in a shack or married to a boy who pushed me down at recess, but because the luck of the draw left me with something other than a Mustang.

I never would have guessed that the first time I'd sit behind the wheel of my dream car would be as an environmental journalist -- about to punch the pedal of the most fuel efficient Mustang ever made.

For the model's 50th birthday, the folks at Ford Motor Co. decided to do things a bit differently by launching the first Mustang with EcoBoost. Available with both manual and automatic transmissions, the EcoBoost model promises 32 miles per gallon on the highway. Now, before you get too excited, I'm not talking about the V8 version -- or even the V6. The 2015 Mustang EcoBoost comes equipped with a 4-cylinder engine. But at 2.3 liters and 310 horsepower, it still has a good deal of pep. The 320 pound-feet of torque doesn't hurt performance either. In fact, the EcoBoost produces more horsepower and torque than the Mustang GT engines did just 10 years ago.

Unlike many 'eco' vehicles, there's no lag when I put my foot on the gas, and the car pushed me back in my seat as I took off from a red light. The Mustang EcoBoost may not have as much rumble as the GT, but its smooth steering and curve-hugging agility make for a good time behind the wheel. It definitely lived up to my childhood fantasies, and its fuel economy raises the bar for Mustang.

Under the hood, the 2.3-liter EcoBoost is the first Ford engine to use a low-inertia, twin-scroll turbocharger. For those who aren't up on the technical terms, this feature provides quicker boost response while enabling lower emissions and improved efficiency. The cylinder head features an integrated exhaust manifold that separates the inner and outer pairs of cylinders into each of the two inlet passages to the turbo. The result is similar performance to a more complex twin-turbocharger configuration, meaning quicker torque delivery when the driver needs it for passing maneuvers. The separated exhaust ports also enables improved fuel consumption.

Active grille shutters help make the EcoBoost engine even more fuel efficient by further reducing drag at higher speeds when extra cooling capacity is not needed.

Mustang is known for its gorgeous interiors, and the 2015 EcoBoost model does not disappoint. The interior dash features a slick look that was modeled after the cockpit of an airplane. Although it's tough to knock the luxurious race car feel of all-leather seating, my vegetarian lifestyle (and fondness for all things sustainable) makes me partial to the Repreve fabric alternative -- which is actually made from recycled plastic bottles and post-industrial waste. Additional sustainable materials include soy-based foam in seat cushions and seat backs, as well as recycled denim insulation.

As Tom Barnes, Ford Mustang vehicle engineering manager, put it, the EcoBoost model "satisfies the Mustang enthusiast while introducing Mustang to a different group of people."

Speaking of bringing Mustang to the masses: Ford plans to roll the vehicle out in 140 countries this fall -- its largest market ever. The company is also going on a 10-city tour to show off the Mustang's new 'green' look. The 'Mustang Bucket List' tour heads to Orlando and Miami at the end of this month, then to Houston and Dallas in mid-November before wrapping up in Los Angeles Dec. 2-7. So, stop by to make your Mustang dreams come true -- just like I did.

Monday on Triple Pundit: Keep an eye out for an in-depth look at how Ford is revolutionizing sustainable materials in the auto industry. 

Images by Mary Mazzoni

Editor's Note: Travel accommodations for the author and Triple Pundit were provided by Ford. 

Based in Philadelphia, Mary Mazzoni is a senior editor at TriplePundit. She is also a freelance journalist who frequently writes about sustainability, corporate social responsibility and clean tech. Her work has appeared in the Philadelphia Daily News, the Huffington Post, Sustainable Brands, Earth911 and the Daily Meal. You can follow her on Twitter @mary_mazzoni.

Two-thirds of America's largest retailers, most of which pay minimum wage, are citing "flat or falling disposable incomes" as a serious risk factor to their business models. This according to a report by the Center for American Progress. The report isn't based on squishy personal corporate responses from public relations staff. No ... It's based on the actual Securities and Exchange Commission filings for these companies as they cite risk factors to their businesses. These 10-K filings show that major retailers are highly concerned about how low and stagnant wages among consumers are a threat to business.

Median household incomes are not doing well. In 2013 they were 8 percent lower than in pre-recession 2007 which, according to the report, "leaves the median married couple with two kids with $5,500 less to spend annually on food, clothes and other essentials that retailers sell."

Low estimates are that the middle class accounts for 30 percent of the 115 million American households. That's about 35 million households, times $5,500 less per year, for a total of about $193 billion less in available funds each year that could be going to Walmart, Burger King, Kohl's, Sears or whatever favorite retailer you might have. That's a huge hit to America's retailers, and it's got Wall Street worried. While our leaders in Washington, D.C. keep insisting on the merits of trickle-down economics, retailers, restaurants and Wall Street economists are starting to notice that not only is money not trickling down -- but it's also no longer trickling up.

This is no small thing. Consumer spending is the largest segment of the U.S. economy.

The horrible irony of course is that many of these retailers, acknowledging that stagnant incomes hurt their sales, are part of their own problem as they pay low wages while lobbying aggressively to keep the minimum wage low. Meanwhile, their 10-K corporate filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission tell a story at odds with their own pay scales, with 88 percent of these retailers citing "weak consumer spending" as a risk factor to the very stability of their own business model.

JCPenney's 10-K filing says, "The moderate income consumer, which is our core customer, has been under economic pressure for the past several years, and may have less disposable income for items such as apparel and home goods"

Burger King's 10-K filing says, "Increased unemployment and underemployent of our customer base, decreased salaries and wage rates ... adversely affect consumer behavior by weakening consumer confidence and consumer spending."

Goodness. If only some ... entity ... could increase the salaries and wage rates so people could afford a delicious flame-broiled burger, had Your Way. Don't look to the National Restaurant Association, however -- also known as the NRA. Restaurants send millions of dollars per year to D.C. to lobby to keep wages low -- one reason $7.25 has been the national minimum wage since 2007.

It's unclear whether or not retailers and restaurants are connecting the dots between their own low wages and their struggles to sell to the increasingly struggling middle class.

Wall Street and banks are also struggling with the same apparent cognitive dissonance.

Says Ellen Zentner, executive director and senior economist at Morgan Stanley, “Faster employment and wage growth for those at the bottom, were it to have staying power, would help lift consumer spending, the biggest part of the economy.”

And says Michelle Meyer, senior economist at Bank of America Merill Lynch, "Wage growth has been, as you know, extremely lackluster. So that’s one of the factors that’s weighing on primary home buying."

Is it possible this is one of those scenarios where everybody knows what it takes to solve the problem -- but nobody wants to make the first move? Retailers, restaurants, Wall Street, all know that consumer spending and low wages are dragging the U.S. economy down, and yet they continue to funnel millions into efforts to keep wages low. It's bizarre. If these dudes can't get their act together even to save their own skin, let alone the skin of those struggling, maybe the government should in the form of the minimum wage increase. It's clearly what everybody needs.

Image credit: Mike Mozart: Source

Back in March, eco-friendly cleaning supply company Method broke ground on its first U.S. manufacturing plant, set to be built on Chicago’s South Side. Now the San Francisco-based company has revealed more details about the green roof planned for the factory: Through a partnership with urban farming company Gotham Greens, the facility will boast the largest rooftop farm in the world, producing up to 1 million pounds of produce each year.

Gotham Greens will design, build and operate the 75,000-square-foot greenhouse, the Brooklyn-based company announced in a joint press release with Method in early October. The pesticide-free produce harvested from the urban rooftop farm will be distributed through local Chicago retailers, restaurants, farmer’s markets and community groups – bringing fresh, healthy fruits and vegetables to the food desert that is the Windy City’s South Side. The greenhouse can also provide full-time green collar jobs for residents in the community, Gotham Greens’ Marketing and Partnerships Manager Nicole Baum told Method in an interview on its blog.

Gotham Greens’ farming practices yield numerous environmental benefits: Its irrigation methods use 20 times less land and 10 times less water than traditional agriculture requires, the company said in a statement. And although its produce isn’t certified organic, Gotham Greens does not spray pesticides on its fruits and vegetables. Instead, the company utilizes beneficial insects to combat the pests that threaten its crops – releasing at least 10,000 beneficial bugs into each greenhouse every week – according to Baum.

The sterile environment of greenhouses also reduces the risk of foodborne pathogens like E. coli and salmonella, Gotham Greens said in a statement – a safety issue that the conventional food industry has continued to struggle with.

Growing produce on a Chicago rooftop and then distributing the harvest throughout the local community is also clearly environmentally preferable to shipping food across the country for consumption. But Chicago residents will not only reduce their “food miles” – the distance their fruits and veggies have traveled from farm to plate – but they will also take advantage of the better taste and higher nutritional value of ultra-fresh produce. In fact, the urban farming company predicts that on many shopping trips, Chicagoans will find Gotham Greens’ produce in their stores or farmer’s markets that has been harvested and packaged that same day – even in the middle of winter.

The rooftop farm on Method’s factory will be Gotham Greens first venture outside of New York, where the company operates several rooftop greenhouses, including a 20,000-square-foot facility on top of the Gowanus, Brooklyn Whole Foods. While Gotham Greens focuses on growing leafy greens like lettuces, chard and kale, it also cultivates tomatoes and herbs, such as arugula and basil.

In addition to hosting the world’s largest rooftop farm, Method’s “soap factory” will incorporate numerous other environmentally and socially responsible elements – so many, in fact, that the company hopes the facility will become the first manufacturing plant to attain LEED Platinum certification.

Designed by William McDonough + Partners, the facility is being constructed on a former lumberyard that is now a brownfield site in Chicago’s Pullman neighborhood. The building plans include a 230-foot wind turbine that will generate about half of the factory’s annual electricity, as well as solar panels that can turn themselves to track the movement of the sun. Also slated for the factory roof, in addition to the greenhouse: a 1,500-square-foot canopy of greenery to help the building reduce energy use, improve neighborhood air quality and curb stormwater runoff.

And Method estimates its factory, scheduled to open its door next spring, will create nearly 100 new manufacturing jobs for Chicago residents.

With so many benefits to both the local residents and the environment, Method is reinventing the factory: from a neighborhood eyesore spewing pollution to a valuable community resource. And if anyone can pull off such a grand vision, it’s the same company that taught us green doesn’t have to be drab (check out its sleek product design) and made product packaging out of plastic litter from the ocean.

Image credit: William McDonough + Partners, Architects

Passionate about both writing and sustainability, Alexis Petru is freelance journalist based in the San Francisco Bay Area whose work has appeared on Earth911, Huffington Post and Patch.com. Prior to working as a writer, she coordinated environmental programs for Bay Area cities and counties. Connect with Alexis on Twitter at @alexispetru

This post is part of Triple Pundit’s ongoing coverage of the SXSW Eco conference. For the rest, please visit our SXSW Eco page here.

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