With the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) looming just around the corner, the online news has been full for the last week or so with stories of those that are doing good and those that will have to buy carbon credits to meet requirements.
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It appears that UK consumers are among some of the most aware and discriminating when it comes to spotting companies that are genuinely ethical and sustainable and those that are just ‘greenwashing’, as complaints to the ASA continue increase about companies that advertise one thing, but practice quite another.
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Last week, UN representatives (not leaders, though) met in Bonn to progress the on-going climate change talks that will culminate in the Copenhagen conference at the end of this year. If members of the business community were hoping to derive guidance from the political arena, they got it, but not in the way that they might have thought and certainly not the guidance that the educated majority were hopeful would emerge.
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News this week that that much-neglected, yet green energy source, hydropower returned, if not exactly to the headlines, to encourage us to consider it seriously as an investment opportunities.
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Whether you are in manufacturing, banking, investment or just a corporate spread-better, electric automotive technology continues to raise its profile in the news. In the USA, President Obama has just announced a $2.4 billion stimulus plan into electric vehicle technology and even the UK’s own modest £230 million of subsidies for electric car use, to come into effect in 2011, has been extended to the fleet market in recognition of wider implications of this technology.
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Only a few days into August and news from the automotive sector on both sides of the pond is positive. Last month’s registrations were up to 4.5% higher than the same period last year due entirely to the scrappage scheme here in the UK and the ‘cash for clunkers’ scheme in the US.

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The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) have had to pull the recently launched GreenHouse Gas (GHG) conversion rates to be used by businesses to calculate their footprint in advance of reduction measures, after it was discovered that their figures were flawed and that there were ‘other data and methodology’ concerns and ‘inconsistencies between the way in which overseas and domestic electricity is accounted’, according to sustainability consultancy Best Foot Forward (BFF).
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The report of a study conducted by BPM Forum and E2open earlier this year entitled “Acceleration of ECO-Operation: Achieving Success & Sustainability in the Supply Chain” (read it here: http://www.eco-opscenter.com/report.php ) makes for interesting reading and highlights the difference between the perception and reality of the actions of the great and the good.
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CSR, Sustainability, Environmental concern… these themes have been yo-yoing up and down the corporate agenda as client and stakeholder pressure mounts and eases – and it is not wholly unconnected with the multiple legislation streams that are gaining traction and taking their place in the list of levies, fines and taxes that are becoming a common-place consideration for companies of all sizes.
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The camel’s back has finally broken; nine years after being appointed by Tony Blair to the post of chairman of the Sustainable Development Commission (SDC), Sir Jonathon Porritt has finally had to accept that Gordon Brown has as little understanding of the importance of sustainability and its key role in the future viability of business in the UK (and globally) now, as he had when he was chancellor.
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