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Levi Strauss & Co. has recently begun to work closely with the Rhode Island Institute of Design (RISD) on sustainable design education. The collaboration is emerging out of  Fabric Transformation Takes Form, a five-week program the apparel company and fine arts and design college launched last week.

The hands-on program is another step in Levi’s efforts to become a more sustainable and responsible apparel manufacturer. In addition to the iconic company’s work on water efficiency and climate change, the San Francisco-based firm has also led in the push to end the sandblasting of denim and even held a contest to rethink the clothesline. Since so much of the sustainability of a product relies in its design, the Levi’s-RISD partnership is a nimble approach to embed ecological thinking within the fashion industry.

Paul Dillinger, Senior Director of Global Design within Levi’s Dockers division, is one of the participants within the Fabric Transformation Takes Form program. Working with his colleague, Nada Grkinich, Dillinger will work with art and design students to intertwine fashion and sustainability within a product. Students and instructors will work together to find new approaches towards the foundation of fashion design: the sewing, cutting and manipulation of fabric. And similar to a Project Runway episode, additional Levi’s designers will arrive at RISD for a critique at the end of the program--hopefully no one will bark auf wiedersehen and will be told he or she is “out.” This is not just a sustainable fashion course: students in programs such as interior architecture and graphic design will join those from the apparel design and textiles programs.

As more consumers become aware of the impacts that the textile and fashion industry have on the planet, watch for more companies to follow Levi Strauss’ lead. The company has already started to rethink its lifecycle assessment (LCA) evaluation by involving designers in the beginning steps of its products' designs. So rather than suddenly deciding to include a certain amount of recycled PET bottles in a jacket or pair of jeans, designers can use the firm’s LCA software to make decisions where they are most critical--at the point when they decide what kind of fibers, dyes and washes to use for new clothing designs. Apparel companies have a long road ahead until they are truly sustainable and low-impact companies, but Levi’s has certainly been no slouch on this front.

Leon Kaye, based in Fresno, California, is a sustainability consultant and the editor of GreenGoPost.com. He also contributes to Guardian Sustainable Business; his work has also appeared on Sustainable Brands, Inhabitat and Earth911. You can follow Leon and ask him questions on Twitter or Instagram (greengopost). He will explore children’s health issues in India next month with the International Reporting Project.

[Image credit: Leon Kaye]

This post originally appeared on the Green Money Journal blog.

By Aron Cramer, President and CEO, BSR (Business for Social Responsibility)

Twenty years after the Earth Summit in Rio, and in this BSR’s 20^th anniversary year, we are both looking back and looking ahead. And as we reflect on the past 20 years, it seems that everything has changed…and nothing has changed. There are reasons to celebrate great achievements, but even more reasons to redouble efforts to achieve the tangible successes that are necessary to put the world on a genuinely sustainable path. Just recently there has been an unprecedented turnout by business and civil society at Rio+20, while at the same time the American Meteorological Society reports that freak heat waves in the U.S. and fatal floods in Russia were likely caused by climate change.

Most businesses, and many other institutions, now recognize that we have in our hands the ability to create an economy that delivers dignified lives of comfort and opportunity for the 9 billion people we expect in 2050; an energy system that enables economic growth without irreversible climate change; and access to food, energy, water, and technology. Whether or not we turn this vision into reality is not just of interest to sustainability professionals, it is nothing less than the central challenge of the 21^st century.

There are indeed many great accomplishments that have been achieved since 1992. As sustainability enters the mainstream, we see that hundreds of millions of people have escaped poverty in the past generation, something never before achieved in human history. Most large multinational companies and countless small and medium enterprises (SMEs) all across the world have embraced sustainability. Consumers, investors, and governments have vastly more information than ever before to enable them to assess how business is performing on sustainability, allowing rewards for the best performers. Collaboration and dialogue between business, NGOs, and community organizations, once taboo, is now considered basic. Technology’s ability to connect us has created a global community unprecedented in human history. And where companies once saw corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a risk mitigation exercise, more and more understand sustainability to be the mother of all innovation opportunities. All this is great cause for optimism.

And yet, there are many, many areas in which, twenty years after the initial Earth Summit, progress is insufficient. Our planet continues to warm, with carbon levels nearing 400 parts per million, dangerously close to the point at which irredeemable changes will occur. We need only consider the thousands of record high temperatures in the early summer of 2012 in North America, capping the hottest year on record in the United States, to make the point. The International Energy Agency, hardly an alarmist organization, now sees serious risk of catastrophic climate change. Deforestation proceeds. Progress towards the Millennium Development Goals is inconsistent. The number of water-stressed regions in the world grows annually. And our measures of economic vitality remain tied to unsustainable levels of natural resource consumption. Governments have largely abdicated responsibility to take concerted action to promote low-carbon economic growth, wilting in the face of the global financial crisis. This litany makes clear that, by many objective measures, progress is far too slow – at best.

Without a change in course, the remarkable rise in living standards that have enabled countless people to live lives of dignity will either be halted or reversed.

But with new thinking, innovation, and collaborative action, we can transform our world, and turn the vision of sustainable, prosperous lives for nine billion people into a reality.

Where we need to go

If we are to build on the successes of the last twenty years, we need to change course. The task ahead is no longer about defining the challenge; it is about meeting the challenge. We don’t need more roadmaps; we need to move faster towards the destination.

The path forward is fundamentally different than the one we have traveled over the past two decades. In the first decade after the original Earth Summit, the time when BSR was founded, the primary challenge was to raise awareness in the business community about why sustainability was a crucial and legitimate topic for the private sector. In the subsequent decade, energies were directed less to awareness raising, and more to the integration of social and environmental strategies into business strategy and operations. For the decade ahead, integration remains crucial. Companies have made great progress in the past two decades, and we have been proud to play a role in that. There is considerable room to go further, and we write about that elsewhere in this article.

But a new decade brings a new approach. More substantial progress, however, depends on change not only inside individual companies, but also within entire systems. The era of the hermetically sealed, vertically integrated company is long gone. Every business, in every part of the world, operates within a web of systems: economic, cultural, political, and natural. Every business in every part of the world relies on networks of suppliers, customers, and investors. Even the most innovative companies won’t capture the potential of their efforts if these systems disregard sustainability. And as much as we value best practices, we also know from the past two decades that even the most creative experiments and demonstration projects are not going to meet the scale of the challenge.

So the solutions we need to achieve our goals must also be systemic. A genuinely sustainable economy depends on four inter-related elements: (1) the operational systems in which companies act; (2) the markets that shape the way investments are made and value is defined; (3) the stakeholder world that holds great promise, and (4) the world of ever more empowered individuals and connected communities.

Truly Integrated Business Models:

Business decision-making does not currently integrate environmental, social, and governance (ESG) factors into investment calculations. Fifteen years after John Elkington popularized the triple bottom line, very few companies have actually integrated this model into their economic valuations. Whether or not financial markets change the game, there is an opportunity for companies to get smarter about the intangible assets that increasingly make or break their success. While some companies are experimenting with economic valuations that include elements like carbon, we have not yet seen widespread adoption of economic models that place a value on ecosystem services, community goodwill, or the risk of stranded assets. It is now widely agreed that these things have value; our task for the next decade is to get more precise about what the value is, and how to measure it. The Natural Capital Declaration that 57 companies signed at Rio+20 is a good start down this path.

Financial Markets That Promote Long-Term Value: 

Despite the Great Recession, public markets focus as intensely as ever on short-term returns. Shares in publicly traded companies in the United States are held for an average of seven months, down from seven years two generations ago. Markets allocate capital with great effect, and the challenge ahead is to maintain the best aspects of market flexibility while reducing the relentless pressure of short-termism. Financial innovation, which was blamed for the crash in 2008, can also be parlayed into new mechanisms that help create long-term value. Integrated reporting, integration of non-financial risks and opportunities into definitions of fiduciary duty, the creation of “L shares” as proposed by Al Gore and David Blood, as well as other mechanisms will create a virtuous circle in which companies are rewarded for taking the long view, and investors are cushioned from the risks of excessive short-term thinking. And there is little doubt that there is also the need to restore trust in our financial system if the “real economy” is going to thrive.

New Frontiers of Collaboration:

The past 20 years introduced the concept of collaboration among companies and an increasingly powerful network of NGOs around the world. The next 20 years will see the lines between for-profit and not-for-profit organizations blur substantially. A world of dialogue between organizations defined by whether they are for-profit or non-profit may be drawing to a close. Can we imagine a world in which every enterprise is a social enterprise? A world in which every NGO thinks about market solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges? How will companies collaborate when every individual has a megaphone bigger than those available to the world’s biggest NGOs 20 years ago?

The Empowered Individual:

The next ten years will continue to put more and more information and autonomy into the hands of individuals and self-forming groups. The demise of business models relying on big businesses selling to passive mass audiences will accelerate. More and more information will be available to individuals. The “internet of things” and widespread sensors will make the invisible visible. Advances in biotechnology will provide quantum leaps in our understanding of how the world around us, and our choices as consumers and citizens, affects our health. These changes can – under the right circumstances – be a net positive for sustainability. And it is undeniably the case that companies will need to adapt to a world of truly radical transparency.

At BSR, we want to see a world with a truly inclusive economy that enables all people to meet their needs, shape their futures, and achieve their potential. We want to see a world that values and preserves natural resources so that future generations have the same – or better – opportunity to thrive. We see a world where economic health – for individuals and for nations and enterprises – is measured not by the quantity of consumption, but by the quality of life that economic activity delivers. And we want to see a world in which public policy and markets create the incentives and rules that make it possible for businesses that point in this direction to thrive. Companies that embrace this challenge will be the ones to achieve the greatest success…and the ones who create a world of which we can be proud.

The road ahead needs greater emphasis on systemic solutions like those I describe here. If real progress is made in these areas over the next twenty years, we will have done a great deal to accelerate… and will have more reasons to celebrate.

Article by Aron Cramer, President and CEO, Business for Social Responsibility (BSR) (www.bsr.org ). Mr. Cramer is recognized globally as an authority on corporate responsibility by leaders in business and NGOs as well as by his peers in the field. He advises senior executives at BSR’s nearly 300 member companies and other global businesses, and is regularly featured as a speaker at major events and in a range of media outlets. Under his leadership, BSR has doubled its staff and significantly expanded its global presence. Mr. Cramer is co-author of the book Sustainable Excellence: The Future of Business in a Fast-changing World, about the corporate responsibility strategies that drive business success. He joined BSR in 1995 as the founding director of its Business and Human Rights Program, and opened BSR’s Paris office in 2002, where he worked until assuming his current roles in 2004.

Previously he practiced law in San Francisco and worked as a journalist at ABC News in New York. He has expertise in integrating sustainability into business strategy, human rights policies and practices, and stakeholder engagement.

[image credit: Jack Temple: Flickr cc]

There seems to be some evidence to suggest that as the storm tide swept over the East Coast last fall, it lifted the tide of public opinion in its wake. Scientists warn of a global warming tipping point driven by positive feedback loops such as the declining albedo effect of ice turning to water or the liberation of methane gas from thawing permafrost. Are we finally reaching, in the aftermath of yet another temperature record-breaking year, featuring another deadly American  storm, a tipping point on public opinion on the urgency of global warming?

One thing that is apparently beginning to thaw, besides the polar ice caps, is the stance of a number of traditional media outlets that had heretofore been considered solidly conservative. Take, for example, the Financial Times which recently featured a column that said, "Another year has passed where the physical signs of climate change came fast and furious, while the political process for dealing with it remained glacial." That was perhaps a surprisingly strong statement. “Doubts,” the author went on to say, “that weather changes are a serious risk to lives and livelihoods - thus a matter for public policy - are by now theoretical or delusional.”

Financial mainstay, Forbes, also came out against-the-grain in a piece in suggesting that Shell should reconsider its Arctic drilling plans.

Then of course, there was Bloomberg’s now classic headline, It’s Global Warming, Stupid.

Of course, there are still many pages of denial still being pumped out every day, but the wave of awakening now seems to be breaking at a point  close to shore, at least for the business media, who as James Murray points out, “are more astute to these audience and market pressures than most.”

Back in April, a broad NY Times poll found that 69 percent of respondents felt that climate change was affecting the weather in the U.S.

A Rasmussen poll taken in November, after Sandy, found the 63 percent of U.S. likely voters found global warming to be at least a somewhat serious problem. However, 49 percent said that they were unwilling to pay more, either in taxes or higher energy prices. Not a particularly impressive reflection of our people.

The Brookings Institution has also been following public sentiment on this issue. They found that the number of “believers” peaked in the fall of 2009 at 65 percent before beginning a steady decline, to as low as 52 percent, thanks to the concerted misinformation campaign of Fox News and their oil-stained sponsors, before gradually recovering back across the 60 percent line.

The range of public opinion is still surprisingly wide, though it is slowly narrowing, as more people become informed, while consensus within the scientific community is nearly unanimous on the broad issue of human-induced warming. Opinion still varies on the exact timetable and the severity of consequences.

Brookings Co-Director Elizabeth Ferris recently wrote a memo to President Obama on the issue which stated,

“Unless urgent action is taken now, the effects of climate change on life on this planet and on life in the United States will increase. Climate change is a domestic, foreign policy, security, development, human rights, and intergenerational justice issue. Preparing better for climate change disasters at home and abroad is a good short-term prophylactic. But making serious and sustained efforts to reduce global warming can solidify America’s present leadership in the world. It can lay the foundation for the country’s sustainable future development. It can address the causes of future humanitarian crises and alleviate future human suffering. It can be a legacy issue for the Obama administration that will impact the world for generations.”

The geophysical tipping points are marching steadily towards us as we  blithely sail along. The extent of damage will depend to a large degree on how much longer until the human tipping points occurs. Perhaps 2013 will be the year when we finally get it.

[Image credit: Trine og Mads: Flickr Creative Commons]

RP Siegel, PE, is an inventor, consultant and author. He co-wrote the eco-thriller Vapor Trails, the first in a series covering the human side of various sustainability issues including energy, food, and water in an exciting and entertaining format. Now available on Kindle.

Follow RP Siegel on Twitter.

Amid the shiny cars, people with dusters keeping the cars impeccably shiny, and shiny women, a few items were on display at this year's North American International Auto Show in Detroit that would hold any crusty old environmentalist's attention. Bikes. Not just any old, embarrassing can't-get-your-ass-up-a-hill electric bikes. A shiny, highly-engineered bike.

The Prius Parlee asks, "What if the Prius were a bicycle?" Toyota didn't take on this challenge on their own - they teamed up with Parlee Cycles to design the bike of the future.

The Parlee's frame is carbon fiber - which keeps things light and easy to move around. Its brakes are molded into the fork to increase aerodynamics. It's even got a built-in dock for a smartphone to track speed, cadence and heart rate. Bike enthusiasts know that all of that is mostly available now if you have the money to spend.

The last feature is not available on the market - perhaps for good reason. The helmet packs neurotransmitters to help rider to shift gears just by thinking about it. The press guy told me that it actually works.

I for one am glad that I can't buy this at my local bike emporium. A helmet that could read my mind would mean a whole lot more stops at donut shops and aggressive pursuit of dangerous drivers.

Toyota's press materials speak highly of this feat of engineering:

"Embued with the spirit of Prius, this aero-road bike is also a purpose-built machine that blends simplicity with the complex to become a better, more efficient, version of something that already exists."

Now doesn't that sound fancy?

So what if it was announced in 2011 and still remains firmly in concept mode?

Travel to NAIAS was provided by Ford. Opinions are 100% mine (obviously)

[Image credit: Jen Boynton]

If a sustainability-related contract could drip with irony, this one's a regular Niagara Falls: Siemens Government Technologies will construct the largest wind project ever undertaken by the federal government, and electricity from the wind turbines will account for more than 60 percent of the electricity needs of the Pantex nuclear facility. If "Pantex" and "nuclear facility" don't ring a bell, well, we had to look it up, too. It's a high security installation near Amarillo, Texas, run by an agency of the Department of Energy called the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), which conducts a set of interlocking missions related to nuclear weapons security and emergency response.

Why a nuclear facility needs help from wind power

In a word, money. Unencumbered by the safety issues and water resource issues that have been bedeviling the nuclear power industry, wind energy is rapidly proving to be an economical choice in wind-rich states like Texas.

The wind farm will be built with no up-front cost to NNSA, under the kind of power purchase agreement that is becoming commonplace in the solar industry, and it will provide the Pantex Plant with an average of $2.9 million annually in savings over the life of its 20-year contract.

The wind farm, which is actually located on about 1,500 acres of federal property just east of the Pantex Plant, will be composed of five 2.3 megawatt turbines and will generate about 45 million kWh of electricity annually.

As an important side benefit, the wind farm will also serve as a research site for NNSA's education partner, Texas Tech University, which was recently selected as the site of the Department of Energy's new wind turbine test facility, the Scaled Wind Farm Technology.

Wind farms and federal installations

The federal government has been notoriously cautious about siting wind farms on or near government installations, primarily due to concerns over interference with radar and communications equipment.

However, those concerns are beginning to fade as new technological solutions arise, one example being a holographic radar system developed by the company Aveillant, which can distinguish between wind turbine blades and other objects.

Siemens and the wind tax credit

Given the aforementioned cautious approach by the federal government, the new Siemens wind farm is a real breakthrough. It took about three years and overcoming "numerous hurdles" to win approval for the project, which will begin construction in December 2013 with completion expected in the spring of 2014.

If those dates raise a red flag, you're probably thinking of the production tax credit for wind power. Last year, Republicans in Congress balked at extending the longstanding tax credit, leading wind companies like Siemens to scale back plans for expansion and lay off employees.

However, earlier this month the tax credit was finally granted a one-year extension by Congress after hard-fought lobbying by the wind industry, aided by military veterans affiliated with the energy security organization The Truman Project, along with bi-partisan cooperation that included several key Republican legislators and governors from wind-producing states.

Part of what the wind industry fought for was a new definition of the projects covered by the one-year extension. In previous iterations, the tax credit only covered projects that were completed within the specified time frame. However, modern large-scale wind farms typically take 18 months to two years to develop, putting all but small, modestly sized projects outside of a one-year time frame. In order to make the extension meaningful for modern wind development, the industry fought for and won a definition that covers any wind farm that begins construction this year, regardless of when it will be completed.

Another innovative notch in the Siemens belt

The rather daring nature of the Pantex wind farm is right in line with several other recent cutting edge projects undertaken by Siemens, as exemplified by its new showcase building in London called the Crystal.

Another recent example is an "eHighway" that updates the old electric trolley model to provided an electrified lane for trucks that would otherwise run on diesel fuel. When equipped with a rooftop pantograph, trucks could switch seamlessly to electric power whenever an electrified lane is available, then switch back to diesel as needed.

Last year, Siemens also launched a partnership with Volvo to develop electric vehicle technologies.

[Image: Wind turbine courtesy of Siemens]

Follow me on Twitter: @TinaMCasey.

Virgin Hotels and Ritz-Carlton are among hospitality companies starting to purify and bottle water within their properties and sell to guests in a program led by the Whole World Water Initiative. Such a step is important considering the environmental impact that bottled water has on municipalities--especially those in regions of the world lacking an effective trash collection and recycling infrastructure, not to mention safe water for drinking.

The Whole World Water campaign, which launched this month, will have an impact on hotel guests, too. Spending over $10 on a bottle of water in Africa is not unheard of--and in other countries it can be the cruel reality where “don’t drink the water” means really, do not drink from the tap, even in a hotel or resort property with a sophisticated filtration system. This initiative should not only reduce waste and emissions from hauling bottled water absurd distances, but raise awareness about clean water and  generate funds for many NGOs--not to mention the fact it is another cool example of sustainable design.

Hotels and business that participate in the Whole World Water program will have access to a Vivreau Table Water Bottling System, a company that has installed such systems for over 20 years. The reusable glass bottle key to this campaign is the brainchild of (who else?) Yves Béhar, the CEO of fusepoint, a design firm that has partnered with PUMA, Herman Miller and SodaStream. Among the partnership’s advisors is billionaire rabble rouser Richard Branson, who has been especially vocal on sustainability issues for several years.

While businesses can save money--Whole World Water insists businesses can increase the bottom line as much as 25 percent--the fund seeks to raise as much as $1 billion a year for the 780 million to one billion people who lack access to safe water. As many as 3.4 million people annually die from water- and sanitation-related causes. Meanwhile the environment benefits from the elimination of plastic waste and reduction in pollutants by the elimination of toxic chemicals.

This three year campaign is another example of where businesses within the same industry are collaborating, not competing, on an issue that can save lives while contributing to improved profits. Companies within the hospitality industry pay $1,000 per property to install the system, and they gain a variety of benefits including, what else, social media. Considering the nightly rate at some of these resorts, such an opportunity to do good, and improve lives, is a bargain.

Leon Kaye, based in Fresno, California, is a sustainability consultant and the editor of GreenGoPost.com. He also contributes to Guardian Sustainable Business; his work has also appeared on Sustainable Brands, Inhabitat and Earth911. You can follow Leon and ask him questions on Twitter or Instagram (greengopost). He will explore children’s health issues in India next month with the International Reporting Project.

[Image Credit: Whole World Water]

Can a Netflix for neckties succeed during this rise of the sharing economy? Yes, many of us men still wear ties, whether we work as i-bankers on Wall Street or are fashionistas who wear them with shorts. Ties also keep spiking in price: prices over $100 are the reality at high-end department stores. Even if you catch a sale at a store such as Macy’s, a decent variety of neckties will cost you. Now online sharing services that specialize in neckties and other accessories such as cuff links are jumping on the sharing economy bandwagon. So whether you want to change your look without having a closet full of ties, or covet that Versace or Prada tie but will not walk on the runway anytime soon, necktie sharing services for the man with exquisite taste (or a very small closet) are a reality.

FreshNeck, TieTry, Tie Society and Tie-Man.com are among the companies that allow subscribers to borrow ties by paying a monthly fee. FreshNeck and TieTry lead the pack of necktie sharing services: both not only appeal to the idea of the sharing economy, but offer a large selection of ties from a variety of designers. The fact that most men wear their neckties only once every few weeks makes the switch to a sharing service a compelling option.

New York-based FreshNeck provides access to neckties, bow ties, cuff links, tie clips and pocket squares. Founded by David Goldberg, who started his career as a public attorney and then worked for large financial institutions, FreshNeck avoids the tired and inefficient model of purchasing ties. Instead, the service offers its members a vast selection of ties and other accessories, and therefore offers unlimited access to over 100 designer brands. Subscribers can choose from three different memberships that range from $15 to $55. For those who want the experience of wearing a Hermes or Versace tie, the most pricey gold level gives you unlimited access to ties as well as first dibs on clearance sales. Similar to Netflix, you receive an envelope of tie(s), and another prepaid one in which to insert your worn ties. Memberships include dry cleaning fees for minor stains, but really bad aim with that Starbucks morning coffee will set you back $8: and if you destroy or lose your borrowed tie after a wild night out with the clients, FreshNeck will bill you for the cost of replacement.

Located in Mobile, AL, TieTry is a similar necktie sharing service. Noting that many of their ties retail in stores for over $90, the company offers price points from $12 to $30: the more you spend per month the more ties you can receive per shipment. TieTry offers a large variety of necktie brands, from Abercrombie & Fitch to Zara. As is the case with FreshNeck, minor stains are forgiven, but if you ruin it, you buy it. Founded by two college friends, David Powers and Scott Tindel, the company emphasizes a social mission to work with charities providing educational opportunities for low-income kids. Like many companies vested in the sharing economy, TieTry has its share of growing pains--a pitch on the TV show Shark Tank did not end with an investment from Mark Cuban et al.

So while the sharing economy, or collaborative consumption, is permeating the fashion accessory industry, these services post some tough questions. Will men be quick to share ties with folks they do not know? Will they be patient and wait a few days to receive their ties (both services only send and receive ties from one location)? And in an era where less men wear ties to work, is there a large enough market? This is one corner of the sharing economy that deserves some follow up a year from now.

Leon Kaye, based in Fresno, California, is a sustainability consultant and the editor of GreenGoPost.com. He also contributes to Guardian Sustainable Business; his work has also appeared on Sustainable Brands, Inhabitat and Earth911. You can follow Leon and ask him questions on Twitter or Instagram (greengopost).

Image credit: FreshNeck

Plugging electric and hybrid electric vehicles into the grid represents the ultimate vision of a distributed, decentralized and flexible electricity grid based on clean, renewable electric power generation. That goal that may be closer to becoming reality than many think.

The Dept. of Energy's National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) Jan. 16 announced that it's establishing public-private R&D partnerships with  universities and industry in support of the DOE launching its Advanced Management and Protection of Energy Storage Devices (AMPED) program at a conference in San Francisco.

Funded through the DOE Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) the three-year research program entails NREL engineers working with counterparts from Utah State University, Washington University and Eaton Corp. “to optimize utilization, life, and cost of lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries for electric-drive vehicles (EDVs) through improved battery management and controls,” according to an NREL press release.

Providing a kick-start for AMPED, the DOE is investing more than $7.4 million to fund three projects via ARPA-E funding:

• $3 million; Goal: Reduction in battery size, 20 percent longer battery pack lifetime or 20 percent reduction battery pack energy content and 50 percent increase in cold temperature charge rate. Research teams from Utah State University and NREL's Center for Transportation Technologies and Systems (CTTS) will develop electronic hardware to maximize the lifetime of each cell in a battery pack. The University of Colorado Boulder and Colorado and Ford Motor Co. are also participating.


• $2 million; Goal: 20 percent utilization of untapped Li-ion battery capacity at the cell level. A Washington University research team will develop a predictive battery management system with innovative control hardware that uses advanced mathematical models to optimize battery performance that's to include projecting optimal charge and discharge of batteries in real-time.


• $2.4 million; Goal: 50 percent improvement in fuel economy of heavy-duty HEVs without sacrificing battery life. Eaton and NREL will team up “to develop a power control system to optimize the operation of commercial-scale hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs), integrating NREL battery life predictive models with Eaton HEV control algorithms.”

“If successful, the advanced sensing, diagnostic, and control technologies developed under the AMPED program will allow us to unlock enormous untapped potential in the performance, safety and lifetime of today’s commercial battery systems,” ARPA-E Program Director Ilan Gur stated.

“My hope is that these cutting-edge projects will accelerate the impact of vehicle and grid-scale energy storage in reducing our country’s reliance on imported fuels and improving the safety, security and economic efficiency of our electricity grid.”

Looking out over the life of the three-year AMPED project, a total of $30 million in ARPA-E funding is to be invested in 14 research projects “to develop breakthrough energy storage.”

“This latest round of ARPA-E projects seek to address the remaining challenges in energy storage technologies, which could revolutionize the way Americans store and use energy in electric vehicles, the grid and beyond, while also potentially improving the access to energy for the U.S. military at forward operating bases in remote areas,” Secretary of Energy Steven Chu stated while announcing the program in August.

“These cutting-edge projects could transform our energy infrastructure, dramatically reduce our reliance on imported oil and increase American energy security.”

For insight into the NREL's work on EDV and its R&D facilities check out its Advanced Vehicles & Fuels Research: Energy Storage web page.

Would you have traveled to Detroit this week just to see a bunch of trucks? After all, the North America International Auto Show is an avalanche of automobile eye candy, mostly sports cars like the 2014 Corvette Stingray and sleek sedans. I spent most of my free time snapping pictures of every red car on the floor of the COBO Center. Of course for all the glitz and show, for those seriously vested in the automobile business, there was much to learn about the 2013 models. And while design and new technologies left most visitors smitten, there was some attention paid to sustainability. Just about every automaker in Detroit devoted some focus on the improved fuel mileage of their cars--including Ford Motor Co.'s announcement yesterday that the new Ford Fusion Energi plug-in will score a range of up  to 620 miles.

But with all the focus on the latest in sedans, sports cars, SUVs and of course electric vehicles such as the new Tesla, commercial vehicles are an important slice of the pie for many automakers. We may complain about that truck on the highway or kvetch about the van temporarily blocking a lane to make a delivery, but the fact is that vans, pickup trucks and light to heavy trucks are the lifeblood of many small business and of course, the economy. And while the public’s buying habits are changing because of the cost of fuel, larger vehicles have long dominated the automotive market. Ford, which has led in commercial vehicle sales for over three decades, is making some progress on this front.

Commercial vehicles are crucial for Ford Motor Co’s success. As the company’s executives reminded us this week at its NAIAS press conference, vans, buses and pick-ups are one-third of the company’s sales in the U.S. and 29 percent globally. Almost half of the commercial trucks on the roads in the U.S. are Fords. And around the world, Ford trucks are a mainstay, such as the Transit, which in the UK has been one of the most popular trucks for decades. These trucks, whether they are built by Ford or its competitors, are used, abused and are central to small businesses around the world. So of course performance and reliability matter; but as fossil fuel prices ride, fuel efficiency will matter even more. A slight nudge in gas mileage can save a local business hundreds, even thousands, of dollars as they lug goods and people across cities and rural areas--hardly small change for businesses operating on thin margins.

Ford says it is paying more attention to fuel efficiency within its commercial fleet. For example, its 2014 Transit Connect Wagon can tow up to 2,000 additional pounds with a fuel economy of 30 MPG on the highway--which Ford estimates can save as much as $2000 in fuel annually. Meanwhile the 2013 Ford F-150 truck with a 3.5 liter EcoBoost engine edges out its competitors on the fuel mileage scale. And if the Ford Atlas concept truck rolls out as planned, the company will have an even more efficient option for businesses seeking to save money as the price of gasoline rises.

So will hybrid trucks become the norm? One Ford representative explained to me when Ford has hosted events in various cities, customers who own trucks because they have to for their businesses are clamoring for them as a way to cut cost. VIA rolled out electrified vans and trucks at NAIAS this week, and the Chevy 2013 Silverado Hybrid offers 23 MPG on the highway and 367 lb-ft of torque. There is still plenty of room for improvement, however. As diesel and gasoline prices rise in the coming decade, look for Ford and other companies to roll out new models of trucks and vans with even better mileage.

Leon Kaye, based in Fresno, California, is a sustainability consultant and the editor of GreenGoPost.com. He also contributes to Guardian Sustainable Business; his work has also appeared on Sustainable Brands, Inhabitat and Earth911. You can follow Leon and ask him questions on Twitter or Instagram (greengopost). He will explore children’s health issues in India next month with the International Reporting Project.

Disclosure: Ford paid for Leon Kaye's attendance at NAIAS.

[Image credit: Leon Kaye]

This post originally appeared on the Green Money Journal blog.

By Joe Keefe, President and CEO, Pax World Management

Twenty years from now, we will have either successfully transitioned from our current economic growth paradigm to a new model of Sustainable Capitalism or we will be suffering the calamitous consequences of our failure to do so. Likewise, sustainable investing will either remain a niche strategy or it will have supplanted mainstream investing. This is the critical point we must embrace: sustainable investing can no longer simply present itself as an alternative to traditional investment approaches that ignore environmental, social and governance (ESG) imperatives; it cannot simply be for some people; it must actually triumph over and displace traditional investing.

The current model of global capitalism – call it growth capitalism – is premised upon perpetual economic growth that must ultimately invade all accessible habitat and consume all available resources. Growth capitalism must eventually collapse, and is in fact collapsing, for the simple reason that a finite planet cannot sustain infinite growth.

Moreover, the dislocations associated with this infinite growth paradigm and its incipient demise – climate change, rising inequality and extreme poverty, resource scarcity (including food and water shortages), habitat loss and species extinctions, ever more frequent financial crises, to name just a few – will increasingly bedevil global policy makers in the years ahead. The public sector is already experiencing a high degree of dysfunction associated with its inability to confront a defining feature of this system: the need for perpetual growth in consumption spurs a corresponding growth in public and private debt to fuel that consumption, which has roiled financial markets and sovereign finances across the globe.

Meanwhile, the environmental fallout from this infinite growth paradigm is becoming acute. All of earth’s natural systems – air, water, minerals, oil, forests and rainforests, soil, wetlands, fisheries, coral reefs, the oceans themselves – are in serious decline. Climate change is just one symptom. As Paul Gilding said in The Great Disruption, “The problem is the delusion that we can have infinite quantitative economic growth, that we can keep having more and more stuff, on a finite planet.” The problem is an economic system that makes no distinction between capital investments that destroy the environment, or worsen public health, or exacerbate economic inequality, and those that are aligned with earth’s natural systems while promoting the general welfare.

Under growth capitalism, a dollar of output is a dollar of output, regardless of its side effects; short-term profit is valued regardless of the long-term consequences or externalities.

It is therefore discouraging that, in the U.S. at least, there is no serious discussion in mainstream policy circles about alternatives to the present system. Nor do I think there will be for some time given our current political/cultural drift. Political and economic elites, and the public itself, remain committed to growth capitalism, accustomed to “having more and more stuff,” for a host of economic, social and psychological reasons. As Jeremy Grantham has written, “[t]he problems of compounding growth in the face of finite resources are not easily understood by optimistic, short-term-oriented, and relatively innumerate humans (especially the political variety).” Our campaign finance system, wherein policy makers are essentially bought off by and incentivized to advance the very interests that stand to profit most from the current system, is no help.

Making matters worse, large segments of the public do not even accept what science teaches us about climate change, or natural systems, or evolution, or a host of other pressing realities. The late U.S. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan once said that everyone is entitled to their own opinion but not their own facts. Today, it seems that a growing number of people, aided and abetted by special interests that stand to benefit from public ignorance, are increasingly opting for their own “facts.”

So, neither the public sector nor corporate and economic elites, as a result of some newfound enlightenment, seem poised to consider alternatives to the current system. To the contrary, their first impulse will be to resist any such efforts. This is the critical problem at the moment: while there is an array of powerful forces aligned against the type of sweeping, systemic change that is needed, there is no organized constituency for it. There are individuals and groups who support this or that reform, or who are focused on critical pieces of the larger puzzle (e.g., climate change, sustainable food & agriculture, gender equality, sustainable investing), but there is no movement, no political party or leader, no policy agenda to connect the dots.

That is a shame because there is a clear alternative to growth capitalism that has been articulated in recent years by a diverse body of economists, ecologists, scientists and other leading thinkers – including leaders in the sustainable investment community.

Although there is as of yet no unified theory or common language, let alone any sort of organized movement to speak of, what has emerged is essentially a unified vision, and that vision might best be described as Sustainable Capitalism. Credit Al Gore, David Blood, Peter Wright and the folks at Generation Investment Management for putting a stake in the ground and endeavoring to define and popularize this concept.

Sustainable Capitalism may be thought of as a market system where the quality of output replaces the quantity of output as the measure of economic well-being. Sustainable Capitalism “explicitly integrates environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors into strategy, the measurement of outputs and the assessment of both risks and opportunities…. encourages us to generate financial returns in a long-term and responsible manner, and calls for internalizing negative externalities through appropriate pricing,” [PDF].

Essentially, business corporations and markets alter their focus from maximizing short-term profit to maximizing long-term value, and long-term value expressly includes the societal benefits associated with or derived from economic activity. The connections between economic output and ecological/societal health are no longer obscured but are expressly linked.

There is no question that growth capitalism must give way to Sustainable Capitalism. It’s as simple, and as urgent, as that. Over the next 20 years, the sustainable investing industry must play a pivotal leadership role in ushering in this historic transformation. We will need to connect the dots and catalyze the movement. Why us? For the simple reason that finance is where the battle must be joined. It is the financial system that determines how and where capital is invested, what is valued and not valued, priced and not priced. The sustainable investment community’s role is vital because the fundamental struggle is between a long-term perspective that fully integrates ESG factors into economic and investment decisions and our current paradigm which is increasingly organized around short-term trading gains as the primary driver of capital investment and economic growth regardless of consequences/externalities.

The notion that sustainable investing can simply keep to its current trajectory – a few more assets under management here, a few more successful shareholder resolutions there, a few more GRI reports issued, another UN conference, an occasional victory at the SEC – and achieve what needs to be achieved on the scale required is, frankly, untenable. We need to be more ambitious in our agenda.

We will also need to take a more critical stance, not only advocating for ESG integration but againsteconomic and investment approaches that ignore ESG concerns. We will need to consistently critique the notion that externalities associated with economic output are somehow collateral, or that financial return is sufficient without beneficial societal returns, or that markets are inherently efficient and self-correcting. We will need to unabashedly offer sustainable investing not as an alternative approach but as a better approach – as the only sensible, responsible way to invest.

I believe the sustainable investing industry will also need to align itself with a more explicit public policy agenda – while remaining non-partisan – and work with like-minded reformers to advocate for that agenda. For example, sustainable investors should be sounding the alarm about resource scarcity and advocating for a massive public/private investment plan in clean energy, efficiency technologies and modernized infrastructure.

The age of resource scarcity and the need for efficiency solutions is upon us. At Pax World, we offer a fund – the Global Environmental Markets Fund (formerly the Global Green Fund) – whose investment focus is precisely that. Our industry needs to fashion such investment solutions, and I believe there will be opportunities to do so collaboratively as well as competitively.

I also feel strongly that the greatest impediment to sustainable development across the globe is gender inequality. Advancing and empowering women and girls is not only a moral imperative but can unleash enormous potential that is now locked up in our patriarchal global economy. Sustainable investors need to press the case that gender equality needs to be a pillar of Sustainable Capitalism. At Pax World, we also have a fund – the Global Women’s Equality Fund – whose investment focus is exactly that.

In my view, the sustainable investing community should also be advocating for public funding of federal elections, either through a constitutional amendment or, absent an amendment, through a voluntary public funding system. The notion that we can tackle any major public policy issue, let alone undertake the epochal transition to Sustainable Capitalism, while politicians and regulators are captive to the very interests they are supposed to regulate, is beyond naïve. We will not be able to reform capitalism if we cannot reform Congress.

Finally, asset management firms like my own will need to find ways to craft new, more persuasive messages, launch new products, form new partnerships, and fashion new distribution strategies and alliances that are focused on lifting the industry as a whole, because a rising tide will lift all boats. Pax World has taken a step in this direction in launching our ESG Managers Portfolios, where many ESG managers and strategies are now available under one roof in one set of asset allocation funds. There is more to be done – together, as an industry.

The times call for leadership. The transition to Sustainable Capitalism is necessary and urgent, as is the triumph of sustainable investing over investment approaches that effectively prolong and exacerbate the current crisis. Twenty years from now, our industry will be judged by whether we have met this burden of leadership. Our impact either will be dramatic or inconsequential. We either will succeed or we will fail. We should resolve to succeed, and to work collaboratively toward that end.

Joe Keefe is President & CEO of Pax World Management, headquartered in Portsmouth, NH. Pax World manages approximately $2.5 billion in assets, including mutual funds, asset allocation funds and ETFs, all of which follow a sustainable investing approach. Prior to joining Pax World, Joe was President of NewCircle Communications (2000-2005), served as Senior Adviser for Strategic Social Policy at Calvert Group (2003 – 2005), and was Executive Vice President and General Counsel of Citizens Advisers (1997-2000). A former member of the board of US SIF (2000 – 2005), Joe was named by Ethisphere Magazine as one of the “100 Most Influential People in Business Ethics” for 2007, 2008 and 2011, and in 2012 was recognized by Women’s eNews a one of “21 Leaders for the 21^st Century, where he was the sole male honoree.

[Image credit: Vintaga Posters, Flickr]