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This is the first in a weekly series of excerpts from the upcoming book “The B Corp Handbook: How to Use Business as a Force for Good” (Click here to read the rest of the series).

By Ryan Honeyman

I first found out about B Corporations while baking cookies.

The flour I was using — King Arthur’s unbleached all-purpose flour — had a Certified B Corporation logo on the side of the package. “That seems silly,” I thought. “Wouldn’t you want to be an A Corporation and not a B Corporation?” The carton of eggs I was using was rated AA.

I was obviously missing something.

An online search revealed that the B logo was not a scarlet letter for second-rate baking products. B Corporations, I found, were part of a dynamic and exciting movement to redefine success in business by using their innovation, speed and capacity for growth not only to make money, but also to help alleviate poverty, build stronger communities, restore the environment and inspire us to work for a higher purpose.

The B stands for “benefit,” and as a community, B Corporations want to build a new sector of the economy in which the race to the top isn’t to be the best in the world but to be the best for the world.

Since my cookie-inspired discovery, I have watched the B Corp movement grow rapidly and globally.

In addition to King Arthur Flour, big-name B Corps include companies like Ben & Jerry’s, Cabot Creamery, Dansko, Etsy, Method, Patagonia and Seventh Generation. There are now Certified B Corporations in more than 30 countries around the globe, including Afghanistan, Australia, Brazil, Chile, Kenya and Mongolia (to name a few).

Thought leaders such as former President Bill Clinton and Robert Shiller, the winner of the 2013 Nobel Prize in Economics, have taken an interest in the B Corp movement.

Inc. magazine has called B Corp certification “the highest standard for socially responsible businesses,” and the New York Times has said, “B Corp provides what is lacking elsewhere: proof.”

You ought to look at these B Corporations. . . . We’ve got to get back to a stakeholder society that doesn’t give one class of stakeholders an inordinate advantage over others.

—Bill Clinton, former president of the United States

I think B Corporations will make more profits than other types of companies.

—Robert Shiller, Nobel laureate in economics

B Corporations are a way to transcend the contradictions between the ineffective parts of the social sector and myopic capitalism.

—David Brooks, op-ed columnist for the New York Times

In a time of unfortunate political gridlock, the B Corporation is an idea that has generated incredible bipartisan support.

In the United States, legislation to create benefit corporations — a new corporate structure based on the B Corp idea — has been passed in “red” states like Louisiana and South Carolina, “blue” states like California and New York, swing states like Colorado and Pennsylvania, and even in Delaware, the home of corporate law, where more than 63 percent of the Fortune 500 are incorporated. It is not hard to see why this idea receives strong bipartisan support. B Corps are pro-business, pro-environment, pro-market and pro-community.

Finally, there are two things you should know about this movement.

First, B Corp offers a framework that any company in any state or country in the world can use to build a better business. This framework is relevant whether you are a B2B or B2C business, a local sole proprietor or a global brand, a start-up or a third-generation family business, a limited liability company or a partnership, an employee-owned company or a cooperative, a C Corp or an S Corp, or even if you are still deciding on the right structure for a new business.

Second, B Corp is relevant to you personally, whether you are attracted or repelled by such terms as green, socially responsible, or sustainable; whether you consider yourself conservative or progressive; whether you are a student, a young entrepreneur or an experienced businessperson. If you have ever thought about how you could make a living and make a difference, about your legacy and the example you set for your kids, or about leading a purpose-driven life — and especially if you’ve thought about how you could use business as a force for good — the B Corp movement is for you.

Welcome to the future of business.

Ryan Honeyman is a sustainability consultant, executive coach, keynote speaker, and author of The B Corp Handbook: How to Use Business as a Force for Good. Ryan helps businesses save money, improve employee satisfaction, and increase brand value by helping them maximize the value of their sustainability efforts, including helping companies certify and thrive as B Corps. His clients include Ben & Jerry’s, Klean Kanteen, Nutiva, McEvoy Ranch, Opticos Design, CleanWell, Exygy, and the Filene Research Institute.

To learn more, visit honeymanconsulting.com. You can also follow Ryan on Twitter: @honeymanconsult

Gambling is fun -- the rush, the bright colors, the chance to press your luck and win big money. But let's be honest. Vegas is often synonymous with excess -- cash, sex, fashion, food and booze, which isn't exactly sustainable. When you're up, you're up, and you can easily spend a month's rent on party time. But at the end of the day, every tourist destination has effective ways of removing dollars from its guests' pockets, and people are free to participate or leave their cash in the bank. There are plenty of vacation destinations, and over 39 million people choose Las Vegas for theirs every year -- and 85 percent of them are repeat visitors.

Such is my dilemma with the gaming and hospitality industry. Casinos make people happy; they are a popular vacation destinations, and they are job creators (46 percent of the workforce in southern Nevada is employed in tourism). But casinos can also have plenty of negative economic impacts.

Nevertheless, every company on the planet can work to operate more sustainably and improve the community where it does business. Every company has many good people working at it too, and I've never met a member of a corporate sustainability team I didn't like. Last week I got to meet the team at MGM Resorts, on the occasion of the Women's Leadership Conference, sponsored by the MGM Foundation. The conference was a gathering of more than 800 women (and a few men), aimed at inspiring and motivating executives to move forward in their careers. While the conference had a few too many motivational speakers for my personal taste, I was clearly in the minority. Just take a look at some of these tweets from happy attendees:

Phenomenal keynote speech from @soledadobrien this am @WLCLV #WLC2014 #inspired #starfishstory— Ashley Farkas (@ashleyfarkas) August 7, 2014

So lucky to be listening to @soledadobrien at #WLC2014 this morning. Love being inspired by influential successful women. — Advertising Aly (@AdvertisingAly) August 7, 2014

#WLC2014 I love this conference and proud to live in Vegas. MGM has provided an amazing lineup of speakers in a beautiful venue. — Marilyn Sherman, CSP (@Frontrowgirl) August 7, 2014

Overwhelmingly, this was a happy crowd. The conference is just one of MGM Resorts' attempts to advance minority populations and engage employees and community members alike. Diversity is a material issue for MGM Resorts, since 65 percent of their 62,000 employees are minorities.

The Women's Leadership Conference is in its eighth year and was born of a collaboration between Phyllis A. James, MGM Resorts International executive vice president and chief diversity officer, and several members of the Las Vegas community.  The original concept was a conference for women of color, but three years ago the conference shifted its focus to women in general. James explained, "All women share similar issues in terms of professional development, career development, professional tools that are necessary to prepare for leadership, job, family and community." James went on to explain why the advancement of women and minorities is a natural business practice for MGM Resorts:

"If you’re interested in reaching the highest level of development as a business, you want to develop all your talent: women, people of color. There's a war for talent and companies find it’s in their business interests to be open to all types of talent. You never know who’s going to be your best performer. If you want to be super competitive, it’s in your best interests to embrace diversity."

MGM Resorts also has an impressive record on inspiring its employees to make their own lives personally sustainable through the MyGreenAdvantage platform from WeSpire. The platform is a voluntary initiative to let employees get credit for environmental actions taken at home. Despite the fact that it's voluntary, MGM Resorts has seen impressive adoption by employees: 22 percent of the staff have signed up. (That would be 13,600 people for those counting at home. Nearly half of those participants check in to record an action at least once a month.)

The program has uncovered a number of personal sustainability evangelists throughout the organization including Bryan, a part-time dealer at Gold Strike Tunica who went out of his way to email Director of Sustainable Operations & Communications Sarah Moore, who oversees the program, and tell her how excited he was to have an outlet for his environmental leanings. He's become an environmental leader at the Gold Strike Tunica property and reports that MyGreenAdvantage makes it more fun to come to work. The program has even inspired competition between teams and properties to see who can be the most sustainable (Aria and Bellagio are currently going head to head).

While participation and reporting are both voluntary and the program relies on self-reporting, the WeSpire software picks up on unusual engagement patterns, like suddenly logging in and reporting an unlikely amount of water conservation. "In that case, it becomes an HR situation," explains Sarah Moore, because the company reports on the number of actions taken and wants those numbers to be accurate. The next step for the team is to roll out MyGreenAdvantage at work, to let employees get credit for the environmental actions taken while they are on the job.

When asked about some of the problems that come from gambling: addiction, increased alcohol consumption and further degradation to already impoverished communities, Phyllis James explained that MGM Resorts has an overall positive impact on the communities where it does business, in terms of employment, tax revenue, charitable gifts and overall community benefit.

"Our company is the largest employer and taxpayer in Nevada. We recognize that our gaming license is a privilege. With that privilege comes responsibility to be an economic leader, political leader and social leader. The Women's Leadership Conference is just one way in which we exercise that leadership."

Whether or not philanthropic and sustainability activities can overcome any negative repercussions from a company's activities, it's clear to me that this conference and the employee engagement undertaken by MGM Resorts had a positive impact on participants.

Image credit: Raging Wire, Flickr

Full disclosure: MGM Resorts put me up while I attended the conference on a press pass. 

The bottled water industry has grown exponentially the past few decades despite the fact tap water in the United States is generally safe. Never mind the fact bottled water producers have had more than their fair share of safety issues: Bottled water has become accepted by consumers. While companies such as Nestlé insist they are taking responsibility for water stewardship and recycling, they also bottle their water at dubious sources, including those in drought stricken regions.

In fact, much of the bottled water produced in the U.S. comes from areas affected by drought. As an article recently posted on Mother Jones illustrates, four of the most popular bottled water brands — Aquafina, Dasani, Arrowhead and Crystal Geyser — come largely from California. True, farming takes up the lion’s share of water in the state, and bottled water in the grand scheme of things is not parching California on its own. But at a time when California is struggling to provide residents, industry and farmers adequate supplies of water, more citizens are asking why it is bottled here and shipped out of state.

Part of the problem is regulation, or lack of it. While most states monitor and restrict groundwater use to ensure supplies are not depleted, California lacks any such laws. The state’s legislature is finally starting to address this oversight, but even if the legislation in current form is passed, the state will long be in danger if the current drought conditions do not improve. Agencies in charge of groundwater basins will not have to issue sustainability plans until 2020, and those plans would not have to be fully implemented until 2040, according to the Washington Post. Over half of the bottled water churned in California and ending up in PET bottles is groundwater, though the bottling companies prefer the more exotic term, “spring water.”

Whether it is spring water, groundwater or water coming from other municipal supplies, the point is that the state could be using this water for far better use than allowing beverage companies to bottle it and mark it up to sell it at obscene profit margins. Despite the bottling industry’s bizarre claims that bottled water production is “ironically” low compared to that of processing other beverages, it still takes almost 1.7 liters of water to produce a liter of bottled water. Add the wasted plastic resulting from the petroleum that could be better used as fuel, plus the energy required to produce bottled water, and we have an oddly unsustainable industry despite these companies’ fervent claims to the contrary.

In the end, consumers need to be convinced tap water really is the cost-effective and safe alternative. While many bottling companies refuse efforts at transparency when it comes to disclosing the actual sources of their water, recent snafus such as the loss of drinking water in Toledo, Ohio (through no fault of the city) give bottlers more ammunition to pitch their product. Nevertheless, the strange spectacle of bottling water in a state entering its third year of drought should give us pause before we spurn the tap in favor of those brightly-labeled bottles.

Image credit: Climate.gov

Leon Kaye has lived in Abu Dhabi for the past year and is on his way back to California. Follow him on Instagram and Twitter. Other thoughts of his are on his site, greengopost.com.

If you have ever traveled to a densely tropical area, you have probably taken anti-malaria medications. You probably also know that protecting yourself from the disease isn’t a piece of cake. My earliest childhood memories of living in Central America included a battery of shots that protected us from everything from typhus to yellow fever. When it came to shielding us from the bite of a malaria-borne mosquito however, protection was a bit more complex, and involved a regimen of either weekly or daily medications that served as a protective shield from the potentially fatal effects of the disease.

And since it depended upon good memory skills and sometimes the right immune system, the doses weren’t always 100 percent effective in warding off the disease. Although none of my family contracted it, we knew scientists and researchers who, even with their acute instincts for regimen, still ended up contracting malaria.

But the real problem today with anti-malaria meds isn’t the chance that they won’t work, but that the majority of the victims aren’t able to afford a lengthy prescription. That’s because most people who contract malaria aren’t incidental travelers from North America who are on a business trip or an excursion to see the local sights, but residents who would never be able to afford the cost of lifelong prescriptions.

According to the World Health Organization, of the more than 2 billion people living in malaria-infested areas, as many as 1 million die each year. Most are children. In sub-Saharan Africa, say researchers Vasee Moorthy and Adrian VS Hill, malaria plays a significant role in infant and maternal mortality. The chronic nature of malaria infections means that even if the patient lives, the illness often impacts the person’s ability to hold a job or provide support for his or her family. According to United Nations International Children’s Fund (UNICEF), infants born to women with malaria are often underweight, heightening the chance for further disease, health problems or early death.

“The socio-economic prospects for malaria-endemic countries may be linked closely to the disease burden of malaria,” say the authors.

So developing a vaccine against this destructive disease has been considered a priority by the medical community as well as by aid and governmental agencies. As Moorthy and Hill point out, meeting that challenge has been difficult because until recently options that were used in other types of vaccines, such as live, attenuated or inactivated sources, couldn’t be used in malaria vaccines. That left toxic insecticides and malaria nets as the primary methods for disease prevention in many tropical areas. Insecticide or drug resistance by the parasite, and the fact that some drugs are ineffective on different vectors of the disease has made it even harder to stop the transmission of malaria.

But according to the pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline, that goal may soon be in sight. A vaccine, which has been developed by GSK, the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative and 11 research centers in Africa, is now in the phase three stage of clinical trials in sub-Sahara Africa.

The company has managed to develop a vaccine that utilizes two proteins (RTS and S) from the virus and a form of yeast as its carrier. So far, the vaccine has shown positive results among infants in some of Africa’s most malaria-ridden areas. While its effectiveness still stands at less than 50 percent in most age groups, PATH notes that one of its biggest successes has been the destruction or blocking of the parasite in the liver, where malaria’s destructive sequence begins. Scientists have developed a means by which to heighten the body’s defense mechanism against the disease. It’s yet to be seen whether they have also developed a mechanism that can be used in other parasite-related diseases.

The medical incentives for developing a vaccine that can protect vulnerable populations from malaria have always been a major concern. But the impact of the disease can be measured economically as well. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, $12 billion is spent yearly on illness, treatment and the impact of premature deaths worldwide.

“The cost in lost economic growth is many times more than that,” says the CDC.

GSK is awaiting regulatory approval of the vaccine.

“If the required public health information, including safety and efficacy data from the phase III program, is deemed satisfactory,” says GSK, “the WHO has indicated that a policy recommendation for the RTS,S malaria vaccine candidate is possible as early as 2015, paving the way for decisions by African nations regarding large scale implementation of the vaccine through their national immunisation programs.”

Image of community learning how to use mosquito nets - Sallyforthwith

Mosquito - Kompak

Nearly 39 gigawatts of new solar photovoltaic (PV) power generation capacity was installed worldwide in 2013, a 38 percent year-over-year increase. That brought the amount of solar power generation capacity installed worldwide as of end of last year to 140.6 GW, up from 101.9 GW in 2012, according to Hanergy Energy Holding Group and China New Energy Chamber of Commerce's Global Renewable Energy Report 2014.

Hanergy and CNECC's 2014 report shows a dramatic shift in the geography of solar power deployment last year, illustrating that installations in China, and the Asia-Pacific region more broadly, far outpaced those of Germany and Europe, as well as those for the U.S. and the Americas region.

While Germany and Europe have been scaling back government incentives to install solar and renewable energy systems, Japan instituted a generous solar energy feed-in tariff (FiT) in July 2012 in the wake of the Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster. Japan's renewable power generation capacity rose by 5.86 million kilowatts with solar power accounting for 90 percent of the total, according to a Japan Times news report. That's equal to the cumulative total in Japan prior to the launch of the solar FiT.

For its part, China has upped national strategic targets for new solar power generation capacity and has been reinforcing that with market-based incentives, focusing particularly on trying to stimulate uptake in the residential sector. Responding to growing public discontent, as well as the rapidly rising social, environmental and economic costs of its dependence on fossil fuels, China's government is experimenting with solar and renewable energy FiTs and cap-and-trade markets. It's also providing consumers incentives to purchase plug-in electric and fuel-cell electric vehicles (PEVs and FCEVs).

Solar shift from Europe to Asia

“The global solar market is shifting from Europe to Asia,” Hanergy and CNECC state in press release announcing their Global Renewable Energy Report 2014. China installed 12 GW of new solar PV power generation capacity in 2013, a whopping 232 percent year-over-year increase. New solar PV power capacity in Germany, in contrast, dropped a sharp 56.5 percent to 3.3 GW, while Italy's fell 55 percent to 1.6 GW.

China also accounted for a much greater share of global solar industry financing. Some $23.56 billion of solar energy finance flowed through China's market in 2013, “equivalent to the entire amount raised in Europe,” the report authors highlight.

"Our research shows that China has already become the world's biggest solar market. Now the country is moving to a more green and sustainable model of development which will drive future global growth in renewable energy," Li Hejun, chairman and CEO of Hanergy and president of the China New Energy Chamber of Commerce, was quoted as saying, adding that:

"Governments are turning to greater use of renewable energy to tackle pollution and deliver energy security, underpinning growth momentum in the global renewable energy industry."

The renewable energy transition continues

The transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy continues worldwide, they wrote. Globally, energy generation increased to 22,513.8 terawatt-hours, up 4.3 percent from 2013. Renewable energy generation rose at a 13 percent annual rate, accounting for 5.2 percent of total world output.

A leading integrated manufacturer of thin-film CIGS (cadmium indium gallium selenide) solar photovoltaic (PV) technology, Hanergy and report co-sponsor CNECC noted that global thin-film solar production capacity totaled some 4 GW in 2013, a year-over-year rise of 20 percent from 2012.

Fossil fuels still dominate

Despite strong and faster renewable power capacity growth, fossil fuel power generation and project financing continue to dominate world energy markets, however, even as governments are singly and jointly striving to hammer out the details of a global climate treaty and deal with the rising costs and threats of greenhouse gas emissions and environmental pollution.

Global power generation increased 4.3 percent year over year in 2013, about the same pace as in 2012, reaching 22,523.8 terawatt-hours, according to the Hanergy-CNECC report. Fossil fuel power generation accounted for 70 percent of the global total, down slightly from 70.5 percent in 2012.

*Images credit: Hanergy, China New Energy Chamber of Commerce, "Global Renewable Energy Report 2014"

The food industry has been discovering the bottom line benefits of recovering biogas from food waste, and farmers are realizing similar returns from manure biogas recovery. Now the U.S. Department of Agriculture just chipped in with the new Biogas Opportunities Roadmap, part of which demonstrates how marrying food waste and manure could turn those two massive disposal streams into a valuable asset for U.S. farmers.

The Roadmap specifically focuses on the role that livestock farmers can play in reducing methane emissions while adding more renewable biogas to the U.S. energy portfolio. Since the Roadmap was prepared with considerable input from the agriculture industry including the Innovation Center for U.S. Dairy, let's take a look at the manure/food waste commingling aspect from the dairy farm perspective.

The road to the Biogas Opportunities Roadmap

For those of you new to the topic, as microorganisms feed on organic material they emit methane-rich gas. In nature, the process takes a relatively long time, and methane -- a powerful greenhouse gas -- escapes into the atmosphere. By enclosing manure, human waste, and/or food and agricultural waste in a controlled environment called a digester, you can speed up the process and capture the methane.

Tackling agriculture-related methane emissions is one focus of the Environmental Protection Agency's climate change management strategy, but the sticking point is how to convince farmers that investing in a digester system will pay off.

That's where the Roadmap comes in. The figure of $2.9 billion comes from a biogas research report prepared by the Innovation Center last year, which informed part of the Roadmap's strategies. It refers to the market potential for recovering biogas from 9 million tons of manure annually, from 4 million dairy cows.

Rather than focusing exclusively on manure, the Innovation Center looked at the potential for combining manure and food waste in co-digester systems at 2,647 dairy digesters.

The payoff could be significant for individual dairy farms. In addition to producing captured methane that could be used to power farm operations, leftover solids are inert and can be used as fertilizer or soil enhancer without wreaking the environmental havoc posed by land-based methods for disposing of raw manure (namely, storing it in open lagoons or spraying it on fields).

With further drying and processing, the solids could also be recycled for livestock bedding, and there is also some potential for recovering useful plant nutrients.

Dairy biogas partnerships pay off

Darigold, Inc., is a showcase effort for the dairy industry's biogas initiatives. The Innovation Center cites Darigold Chairman Jim Verkhoven, who is also a dairy farmer, to sum up the benefits of manure digesters in a nutshell:

On dairy farms, digesters can increasingly be part of the solution to manure management challenges and enhance our ability to sustain our farms for the next generation.

When you introduce food waste biogas into the equation, you also get the potential to form high-profile community partnerships that benefit both the manure producer and the food waste producer.

One standout example is a manure/food waste co-digestion partnership with the Cleveland Browns football team, which is showcased in the Agriculture Department's Dairy Power initiative.

The Obama administration's new Food Waste Challenge, which has been joined by sustainability leaders Unilever and General Mills, could spark additional partnerships.

It's also worth noting that biogas co-digestion is starting to emerge in municipal wastewater treatment, as illustrated by a New York City pilot program for commingling food waste with its existing wastewater biogas recovery systems.

The Biogas Opportunities Roadmap

The Roadmap itself is a voluntary, strategic plan that leverages a long history of innovation in U.S. dairy operations and its broad involvement with strategies for climate management (the Climate Data Initiative is another good example).

It calls for the Environmental Protection Agency and the departments of Energy and Agriculture to work with the dairy industry and other stakeholders to overcome obstacles to bigas digester investment.

Tracking biogas digester performance and tweaking digester systems to produce more high-value products, such as nitrogen and phosphorus, are two key parts of the plan.

Also included is the development of new financing arrangements, which we're thinking could include something similar to the power purchase agreements (PPAs).

PPAs have already kickstarted the market for distributed solar energy, and PPA-style financing is already starting to emerge as a means of enabling property owners to invest in energy efficiency improvements without an up-front investment, so biogas digesters could be a logical next step.

Image (cropped): cheeselave

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Food waste is a real problem in America. The economic impact of food waste in the U.S. is equivalent to $197.7 billion, according to a report by the Barilla Center for Food & Nutrition (BCFN).

Massachusetts is about to test drive a law to deal with the mounting issue. Back in January, the state government announced that a statewide ban on commercial food waste would take effect on Oct. 1, 2014. Regulated by the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP), the ban requires any entity disposing of at least 1 ton of organic material per week to either donate or re-purpose the useable food. The remaining food that can’t be used will be either sent to an anaerobic digestion (AD) facility and converted to energy or to composting and animal-feed operations.

Residential food waste from small businesses is not included in the ban which affects about 1,700 businesses and institutions across the state.

The food waste ban will help the state reach its goals to reduce all waste by 30 percent by 2020 and 80 percent by 2050. (Food waste accounts for over 25 percent of the waste stream in Massachusetts or more than 1 million tons a year, according to MassDEP estimates.) There are currently about 30 composting and AD operations accepting food waste in Massachusetts with a capacity to accept almost 150,000 tons of organic material a year.

The Environmental Protection Agency and MassDEP estimate that less than 10 percent of food waste is diverted from disposal. However, some Massachusetts businesses already have food waste separation programs, including 300 supermarkets, that save up to $20,000 a year per store location, according to MassDEP.

“We are committed to protecting our natural resources and creating jobs as the Commonwealth’s clean energy economy grows,” said Energy and Environmental Affairs (EEA) Secretary Rick Sullivan. “The disposal ban is critical to achieving our aggressive waste disposal reduction goals and it is in line with our commitment to increase clean energy production.”

The state government is providing technical assistance to composting and AD operations and up to $1 million in grants. MassDEP and the state's Department of Energy Resources awarded the first grant of $100,000 to the Massachusetts Water Resources Agency for its wastewater treatment plant at Deer Island. MWRA processes sludge and uses the biogas to provide heat and power for the plant.

A pilot project later this year will start processing food waste to determine the effects of co-digestion on operations and biogas production. MassDEP also created a program called “RecyclingWorks in Massachusetts” to help businesses and institutions increase recycling and comply with waste disposal bans. The program provides free Internet-based resources and guidance.

Image credit: Muu-karhu

Kohl’s has long been one of the most innovative and successful department store chains in the United States. Its rapid growth is matched with the company’s increased focus on sustainability, particularly when it comes to solar power. As part of the company’s plan to ramp up investment in renewables, Kohl’s solar power portfolio now includes “solar tree” structures at one of its offices in Dallas to provide both shaded parking and electric vehicle charging.

The solar trees are a product built by Envision Solar, a San Diego-based solar design company. The first deployment occurred late last week at the company’s offices in Dallas, Texas, and Kohl’s has plans to install more at various locations across the company. I had a telephone conversation with Envision Solar’s CEO, Desmond Wheatley, to learn more about the company and how they fit in with Kohl’s clean energy strategy.

Mr. Wheatley explained that Kohl’s gravitated to the company’s solar trees for several reasons: Their single-column design involved less installation headaches than the conventional solar arrays seen in parking lots across the country. Each of the structures provides enough shade for six parking spaces, and in turn Mr. Wheatley said one solar tree could generate enough power to charge six electric vehicles daily. Each solar tree generates between 25,000 to 35,000 kilowatt hours of power annually; he expects the six trees Kohl’s purchased to generate over 200,000 kWh of emissions-free electricity a year. “We take a different view from most solar companies,” Wheatley said, “what we do is design products that are capable of doing much more than simply compete with the utilities."

To that end, Wheatley insisted that a product like that of Envision Solar does more than simply promise to reduce Kohl’s utility bills. Such a “solar grove,” while offering an aesthetic quite different from standard solar installations, makes electric vehicle charging far more seamless, and provides cars shade from the Texas heat. Deployment is faster, too, as these solar trees can be deployed in as quickly as seven days. Efficiency also gets a boost because the solar panels bow to match the position of the sun -- effectively extending high noon throughout the day and therefore generating more electricity. Customers and employees in turn can directly see the benefits of solar — not necessarily true with rooftop arrays that clearly have an economic and environmental purpose, but generally go unnoticed.

For Kohl’s, working with companies such as Envision Solar helps diversify what is already an aggressive clean energy agenda. The company continues to retrofit existing stores while opening new ones that are Energy Star certified, up to 821 in total according to Kohl’s most recent sustainability report. Kohl’s is also a big purchaser of renewable energy certificates (RECs), to the tune of over 1.5 billion bought. And at last count, the company has 156 solar arrays in its solar portfolio.

So investment in solar projects such as the one at Kohl’s Dallas office can generate financial benefits, insisted Wheatley as we wrapped up our talk. While figures vary based on the cost of local utility rates, he claimed Kohl’s can expect the payback from the purchase of these solar trees to be less than 10 years. General Motors was one of Envision Solar’s first big customers, and while the company is going after other high-profile companies, the company has other products such as a mobile solar car charger within its portfolio as well.

The future certainly looks heady for solar as its cost reaches parity with that of fossil fuels. But it is also a fiercely competitive industry, not immune to price wars and strong-armed tactics typical within any sector. Companies such as Solar Envision present clean energy entrepreneurs a timeless business school lesson — product differentiation and going after a niche is a way to set your company apart from the competition and find success.

Image credit: Envision Solar

Leon Kaye has lived in Abu Dhabi for the past year and is on his way back to California. Follow him on Instagram and Twitter.

On August 5, Wells Fargo announced that it is partnering with the Grameen Foundation to expand its international volunteer Global Fellows program, formed in 2008. Through the Grameen Foundation’s Bankers Without Borders, Wells Fargo employees will have more opportunities to volunteer their time and skills on projects for microfinance and poverty-focused nonprofits around the world as the organization matches Wells Fargo employees with the nonprofits in their network.

This expanded Global Fellows program is starting on a pilot basis, featuring 12 spots, six volunteers each for two yet-to-be-identified nonprofits in Colombia and India. Four volunteers will work on-site, while eight volunteers will support the project virtually. The on-site volunteers will be in place for up to six weeks, while the virtual volunteers will donate up to 60 hours each. "We're going to look to see how well it does and see if there is room for expansion moving forward. There are only 12 spots this time, but there is opportunity for growth in the future," said Dasha Ross, vice president of corporate social responsibility communications for Wells Fargo.

Response to the program has been very positive. Previously, the Global Fellows program was only open to employees in the International Group business line, but with this new partnership, the pilot is open to Wells Fargo employees in any business line. This widens the reach of the program, explains Jon Campbell, the bank's head of government and community relations. Now, projects can not only focus on finance or operations, but also marketing, human resources, technology or even community involvement. 

Another new aspect, and an important one, according to Campbell, is the virtual part of the program. "It allows us to include more people in the program and gives the organizations we're helping even more support, utilizing the people that are on-site along with people that are still back in their offices. I'm really excited to see how that part works out. I think it's rather novel, and the world's becoming more virtual, so it is keeping pace with the real world and I think that's a really nice component of the program," Campbell said.

Why did Wells Fargo decide to invest in an international employee volunteer program? Campbell answered:

"The program aligns very nicely with Wells Fargo's mission and vision in a number of ways. Providing these experiential leadership opportunities for team members through a global community evolvement assignment is huge. And we're big believers in helping the communities where we do business succeed, and so anytime we can improve the capacity of a social enterprise organization that's supporting the community, that aligns perfectly. Our brand and reputation are very important to us, and global leadership opportunities help enhance our reputation, and finally, anything we can do to promote diversity and inclusion by helping our team members develop their cross-cultural competencies is a huge win for Wells Fargo."

Global Fellows is not the only volunteer leave program that Wells Fargo supports. It has a domestic volunteer program through which employees can submit an application detailing why they want to dedicate up to six weeks of paid leave to a nonprofit of their choice, and, Campbell says, competition is fierce. "The selection process to pick the number of people for volunteer leave is really hard because we have a lot of people who want the opportunity to match their vocation and their passion to do important nonprofit work."

Wells Fargo encourages participants to share what they've learned with their colleagues after they return, and employees that volunteered with Global Fellows reported inspiring experiences.

Efraín Amado worked in Bogotá, Colombia, for two months in 2012. A communications consultant for the International Group, Amado worked on developing a customer service plan for Opportunity International and helped with communications and marketing processes. In his Wells Fargo debrief, he said: “This trip gave me the chance to explore my potential. I met locals who would stretch $50 over four months, yet they weren’t complaining about their situation — they were striving to make a better life for themselves and their communities. How can you not be inspired by that?”

So far, Wells Fargo has received 24 applications for the international pilot program (the application period runs through August 15) and is in the process of selecting the 12 participants. Bankers Without Borders will identify the two nonprofits and design the projects and tasks to be completed. Participants will be matched to the projects and they will run from January to March 2015.

Image credit: Mike Mozart, Flickr creative commons

Lyft and Uber have announced new features that could bring them closer to true ridesharing than ever before. Last week, Lyft launched its new “Lyft Line," which allows users to share rides with strangers going along similar routes. Not to be outdone, Uber preemptively announced that it would be launching a similar feature -- UberPool -- on August 15.

There has been a lot of controversy over the use of the term “ridesharing” to describe the services provided by companies such as Uber and Lyft, with many claiming it to be a misnomer. Just a few months ago, for example, one reader commented on an article I wrote about Lyft’s new insurance coalition:

“Uber, Lyft and Sidecar are NOT ridesharing! Ridesharing is when the driver of the car is going some place for their own reasons, and gives other people who want to go on the same route, a lift.”

Well, technically the reader was not wrong. If we break up the term ridesharing into its two parts, “ride” and “share," this implies that two or more people are agreeing to share a ride that they would have otherwise taken separately. In reality, Lyft and Uber are more like taxi services, where a driver is paid to pick up a passenger and deposit them wherever it is they want to go. But Lyft and Uber also aren’t quite taxi services.

This is why in September 2013, the California Public Utilities Commission’s (CPUC) decided to establish a new business category called a “Transportation Network Company” (TNC) to describe companies such as Uber and Lyft. In creating this new category, along with a series of rules and regulations, CPUC effectively legitimized Lyft and Uber’s businesses, at least in California.

Despite the establishment of the TNC label, popular discourse continues to favor the “ridesharing” verbiage -- granted, Uber and Lyft have since carefully eliminated it from their marketing.

But this could all change with the launch of new carpooling features. Both Lyft Line and UberPool will initially operate exclusively in San Francisco, with plans to add more cities in the future. To access Lyft Line, users request a ride through the app's "Line" feature, enter the destination, then wait while Lyft's algorithm matches them with one or two other Lyft riders who want to go in the same direction. The driver picks each rider up in order of proximity, with curbside wait time for the second and third rider limited to one minute. Once all of the passengers are onboard, the driver takes them to their desired destinations.

The primary benefit of the carpooling function is that users are guaranteed cheaper rides even if they aren’t matched anyone to share the ride. However, drivers still receive the same amount of each group fare as they do on solo trips. For example, a trip to the airport that normally costs $40 could cost $25 or even less, depending on how many riders are sharing with you. Lyft says most Lyft Line trips can cost up to 60 percent less than regular rides.

Another upshot to the carpooling service is that it could service people who don’t live near existing public transportation lines. In fact, Lyft says its carpooling function is creating a new category of transportation -- personal transit. The company said in a blog post:

“Personal transit is about access for everyone. We believe that modern cities should offer reliable, affordable transportation wherever you live. We want to bring the best parts of Lyft — on-demand service, door-to-door trips, and community — to daily travel.”

Lyft and Uber have been locked in an epic battle for ridesharing … or should I say, TNC … supremacy. Lyft’s closing of a $250 million Series D round in April finally leveled the playing field against Uber’s Google-backed endowment. For now, the incessant competition seems to be benefiting consumers with ever-more exciting innovations. Stay tuned for what else awaits further down the road.

Based in Washington, D.C., Mike Hower is a writer, thinker and strategic communicator that revels in driving the conversation at the intersection of sustainable business and policy. He has cultivated diverse experience working for the United States Congress in Washington, D.C., helping Silicon Valley startups with strategic communications and teaching in South America. Connect with him on LinkedIn or follow him on Twitter (@mikehower)