Natural Capitalism Solutions 18 April 2007, Volume 5 ------------------------------------------------- TABLE OF CONTENTS: On the Road Wal-Mart Climate Protection Manual for Cities NCS Project Update U.S. Army's Ft. Carson Post Vietnam Brundtland Update New NCS Staff Operations Director Bookkeeper Join Us Take Action ------------------------------------------------- NCS On The Road Hunter’s habit of remaining in orbit around the planet continued unabated. In early December, she flew to Orlando, Florida to keynote Keeping America Beautiful’s annual conference. She then put her teaching hat back on, as she does one week each month, to address her MBA students at Presidio School of Management in San Francisco, CA. In January, the sixth cohort of MBA students, 50 strong, began their first semester.  Hunter is teaching four courses now. She still teaches her flagship courses, Principles of Sustainable Management, with NCS senior implementer, Paul Sheldon, and Implementation, also co-taught with Paul. She is also helping Dr. Russ Derrickson teach Products and Services, and Dr. Nicola Acutt with Government, Business and Civil Society. This means that every Presidio student has Hunter in class. If you want to join us at Presidio, contact George Kao. Also in January, Hunter hosted Fast Company’s Social Entrepreneur Awards in New York City. She then scooted back west to present at the Energy Forum in San Francisco, then joined our colleagues from PortionPac at the School Nutrition Association Conference in Tucson. At the Rocky Mountain Sustainability Summit held on the University of Colorado Boulder campus in February, she joined the University’s Chancellor Bud Peterson, and Arizona State University President Michael Crowe, as President’s of 40 universities signed the University President’s Campus Climate Challenge pledging to make their campuses carbon neutral. Presidio and the University of Colorado are among the first 100 campuses to make this pledge. She shared the plenary stage with NCS National Leadership Summits for a Sustainable America Project Director & Consultant Bill Becker at the keynote event, “Cutting Edge Sustainability.” Brianna and Kate, from the NCS office, staffed the table at the Green Products Expo held in conjunction with the Summit. Thousands of students from universities and high schools, as well as community members and experts in the field used the expo to learn more about sustainability and sustainable products. March found with Hunter keynoting the Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute’s annual meeting, and rejoining her old friend, Governor Dick Lamm, to speak to his class at the University of Denver. Then it was off to Everett, WA, to deliver the keynote address to over 700 people at the Built Green Environmental Conference. Perhaps the stellar event of the winter was the mid-March invitation for Hunter to brief the entire senior management of Wal-Mart at their Business Sustainability Milestone Meeting on Thursday, 15 March. Despite having to invert her schedule to make it happen, Hunter never hesitated: the chance to influence the world’s largest company was not an opportunity to be missed. --------------------- Attention Wal-Mart shoppers! It is hard to over-estimate the magnitude of their potential leverage. If Wal-Mart were a country, it would be the 20th biggest in the world. Previously one of the most reviled companies; it has become the poster child example of a company in profound transformation. Hunter was invited, in part because there is a bit of a culture clash between the “old” Wal-Mart culture of hunters and fisherfolk, who like to drive pick-up trucks, and who built the company; and the “new” Wal-Mart of Ivy-league MBA’s, environmental consultants and left coast change agents. Some Wal-Mart insiders thought that Hunter might offer a bridge. With NCS Operations Director, Jeff Hohensee, Hunter flew to Bentonville, Arkansas. Professor Jon Johnson of the Walton School of Business invited the NCS team to advise the interdisciplinary group at the University of Arkansas, charged with creating a Center for Sustainability. Hunter also met with University of Arkansas students and joined an evening panel with Jib Ellison of Blu Skye consultants, facilitator of Wal-Mart’s sustainability efforts, and her old friend Adam Werbach of Act Now Productions. Adam, the youngest-ever elected President of Sierra Club, has been hired to teach Wal-Mart managers about sustainability. He figures that by the time he has finished, he and his team will have spoken with 1% of the U.S. workforce. Talk about leverage. The three shared their perspectives about how Wal-Mart could use its market power to drive change. The next morning, the group joined Wal-Mart’s senior management, their major suppliers and non-profit partners in the huge auditorium at the Home Office. Hunter followed her old friend, Jim Woolsey, ex-head of the CIA to the podium. Jim warned the standing-room audience of the perils to the country of failing to get off imported oil. He spoke of the national security reasons to shift the economy to renewable energy and energy efficiency, drawing on the work he and Hunter presented in their 1981 book, Brittle Power. Hunter was equally challenging, raising the social issues that Wal-Mart critics have used to hammer the company. She asked, “What would a truly sustainable Wal-Mart business model be?” She continued, “Fair enough, it’s great that Wal-Mart is putting solar panels up and selling organic underwear. But if you roam the planet exploiting people in developing countries and communities in America so that people like me can throw away more junk . . . this is not sustainable.” She then posed what the company might do differently: work with communities to create business ecologies, in which Wal-Mart partners with local sustainable businesses who might co-locate and piggyback off Wal-Mart’s strengths. Urban Wal-Marts could partner with local community groups and suppliers to implement sustainability programs. Or the company could bring sustainability to communities in developing countries. . . . Hunter described the business case for behaving more sustainably, and how the elements of NCS’ Integrated Bottom Line can reduce cost, increase profits, reduce risk, preserve a company’s franchise to operate, increase labor productivity, attract and retain the best talent, reduce the cost of distrust, differentiate a brand and drive innovation. After she spoke, a senior Vice President came up and thanked her for bringing the missing conversation into the room. Is the Wal-Mart commitment authentic; is it cherry-picking or just very well presented PR? Hunter and Jeff sat beside Lee Scott for an entire morning, listening in some amazement to a litany of speeches that could have been presented by Hunter’s students at Presidio or by such business sustainability leaders as Ray Anderson (who has been advising Wal-Mart for some time). At one point, as Scott was speaking, he turned to his head of sustainability and asked where the company was “on getting that chemical out of the plastics in children’s toys....? Are we on top of that?” The executive jumped up and said “We are now!!!” The air filled with the whir of fingers on Crackberries, as the roughly 2/3rds of the room of a thousand people who were major Wal-Mart suppliers scurried to text home offices that they were going have to get phthalates out of plastic. Over a decade ago, Dr. Theo Colburn fell on her sword, sacrificing her career to expose the dangers of endocrine disruptors. Now a throwaway line from the CEO of the world’s largest company might just get the job started. As senior executives unfurled chart after chart demonstrating why sustainability is just good business, charts that looked eerily like the sorts that environmentalists have used for decades to argue that this is not an issue of environment versus business, Jeff turned to Hunter and said “We’re really are on a different planet.” Then the Wal-Mart marketing folk got up to say how they have studied the Wal-Mart demographic (and you’ve got to believe that they have. . .) There turns out, they reported, to be a very significant correlation especially between their female shoppers, the dominant demographic, and a desire for sustainability. Lee Scott stood up to state that: “Working class people should not have to choose between affordability and sustainability.” Wal-Mart will re-brand itself as “affordable sustainability.” As these marketers spoke, one of the company’s change-agents knelt beside Hunter. Did she realize, he asked, just how historic a moment this was. . . .? In all prior meetings, he explained, the marketers have said of Wal-Mart’s sustainability commitment, “Yeah, whatever. . .” This was apparently the first of the senior management meetings at which that whole segment of the company had gotten on board. With them acknowledging the business case for sustainability, the entire company was committed. The meeting over, Hunter raced for a plane to arrive in the waning moments of a Presidio open house that evening in San Francisco. When Presidio’s Director of Marketing, Rebecca Bell, asked her where she’d spent the day, Hunter told these stories, concluding with what a profoundly disorienting experience it was to be at such a meeting. Again, it is hard to overstate the magnitude of this transformation. Wal-Mart has moved the debate from whether there is a business case for sustainability to how to integrate the social issues, and just how fast can you implement everything that Natural Capitalism teaches. As Wal-Mart begins to send their environmental scorecard out to their 90,000 suppliers, the entire field of sustainability had better grab a whole new gear. Gives a whole new twist to Pogo’s observation that “We have met the enemy and he is us.” And, Hunter added, this is an even stronger reason to enroll in Presidio. “As I was leaving, a senior Vice President approached me and asked whether Wal-Mart could hire Presidio graduates.” Wal-Mart certainly has a lot of work to do. Hunter’s questions to the audience in Bentonville remain unanswered. Hunter and Jeff will begin discussions soon with Wal-Mart executives charged with sorting out the company’s relationships with communities around the world. It was clear from being at the Home Office that the corporate commitment to make compact fluorescent lights affordable to all customers could start at home: employee productivity at the “Cube Farm,” the company’s windowless, warehouse-sized concrete box of a World Headquarters, would soar if they day lighted their roof, as they once did in their first experimental green building. (Retail sales went up 40% in the day lit sections and all the employees wanted to work there.) But the lever has begun to pry: As Hunter and Jeff returned to Colorado, they were contacted by a Wal-Mart supplier asking whether NCS could help them design a sustainability program that would not only meet Wal-Mart’s scorecard, but position this company as a leader in their industry. Jeff will be traveling to Chicago this week to meet with the company. Hunter has long stated that a commitment to sustainability enhances every aspect of shareholder value, and that the companies that get it right will be first to the future—the billionaires of tomorrow. Every one of Wal-Mart’s suppliers now faces the challenge of proving that they are green enough to get shelf space. Does that make Bentonville now the epicenter of the worldwide sustainability movement? Is Wal-Mart The Hundredth Monkey? In the end, that will depend on each of you. Genuine sustainability means a lot more than some profitable waste reductions and cheap recyclables. Will each one of us insist that companies take the actions to become socially just and environmentally responsible business models? And as the companies adopt such practices, can we move at a pace fast enough to match the enterprise of tomorrow? We’re gonna give it a go. Join us in bringing the sustainability revolution to scale. ------------------------------------------------- It’s Out!  NCS Climate Protection Manual for Cities Premiers! The NCS Climate Protection Manual for Cities, released March, 2007 is available for free at our website: www.climatemanual.org. Leaders from state and local governments are filling the leadership void left by the Federal Government. Over 400 communities across the United States have pledged to reduce their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.) Many cities, however, do not know where to begin. Until now, no comprehensive plan has existed that shows cities exactly how to deliver the energy savings and greenhouse gas reductions needed to relieve the threat of climate change. Now, thanks to support from Paradigm Nouveau and other donations, Natural Capitalism Solutions is proud to release this manual. Commissioned by the National Leadership Summit for Sustainable America on Climate, the Manual provides local governments with the expertise they need to curb their city’s greenhouse gas emissions, while strengthening the local economy, enhancing the local security and improving the quality of the city.   The NCS Climate Protection Manual offers cities three basic tools: A comprehensive action plan for cities Best practices and resources Case studies and model ordinances The Climate Protection Manual for Cities arms mayors with the ammunition they need to build political support for aggressive climate protection. It gives mayors and their staff such chapters as the Drivers of Change, the Business Case for Climate Protection and Risk Mitigation. It presents a process that includes conducting a baseline inventory. It provides a simple, effective, standardized means any community can use to develop a Local Action Plan to reduce the emissions from both government operations and the community as a whole. The manual offers resources, tools, programs and case studies that describe how cities and communities can work together to reduce their emissions, reduce the impact of their current emissions and mitigate the impacts by global warming that are already inevitable. Review Process An initial draft of the manual was released to dozens of mayors for peer review at the Sundance Climate Summit. It was also offered for comments to municipal staff and climate experts in November 2006. The responses and recommendations were incorporated December through March 2006. This manual is for you. Whether you are a public official or citizen, we encourage you to download and share it with as many people as possible. The Natural Capitalism team is available to provide an array of services, accommodating any group size. We offer training sessions for mayors, city planners, local government leaders, sustainability coordinators and environmental departments. NCS staff can deliver workshops and consultation services. Sessions emphasize an interactive dialogue, as well as lecture-delivered content. NCS staff is recognized for its inspirational and effective ability to deliver climate protection expertise. Companies, communities and countries work with us over short or extended periods to implement climate protection programs. Between our core staff and ever-expanding network of associates, Natural Capitalism brings decades of experience to the table. Contact Natural Capitalism Solutions today about implementing the Climate Protection Manual in your city. The companion manual, Climate Protection Manual for Businesses is in the works. A how-to manual for small to medium sized businesses will be available at our website by next winter.  Watch for details! Thank you to our donors for making this manual possible. NCS’ Climate Protection Manual for Cities was made possible through the support of our gracious colleagues, Audrey and Rick Levine, at Paradigm Nouveau Enterprises, (PNE) and as well as many other donors. ------------------------------------------------- NCS Projects:  Implementing Natural Capitalism ------------------- U.S. Army’s Fort Carson Mountain Post Christopher Juniper continues his work with Fort Carson Mountain Post, leading its sustainability implementation team. This year’s challenge is to develop a 20-year (to 2027) sustainable transportation plan for the Post (20,000 people growing to about 30,000 in coming years). Christopher is leading a collaborative planning effort that includes the regional council of governments, City of Colorado Springs, Mountain Metro transit and the office of U.S. Senator Ken Salazar. There appear to be no templates for such a plan. Short-term goals for Fort Carson’s Sustainability Transportation team include reducing single-occupancy vehicle use and reducing greenhouse gases. The final plan is projected to be completed towards the end of 2007. ------------------ NCS in Vietnam to Present Tools at Asia Pacific Roundtable NCS friend, Olivia d’O Castillo Executive Director of the Asia Pacific Roundtable for Sustainable Consumption and Production invited Christopher Juniper to represent NCS at the Roundtable this April in Hanoi, Vietnam. APRSCP, a non-profit dedicated to sustainability progress in a rapidly growing corner of the world, hosts the biennial “Roundtable” to bring together development practitioners with governments and NGOs from throughout the region. This year, at the 7th APRSCP Roundtable, Christopher Juniper will present NCS’ tools for sustainable development: LASER, the Management Helix and the Natural Capitalism Life-cycle Analysis System (used by Clif Bar in 2006). Also presenting at the Roundtable will be Christopher’s daughter, Emma Juniper, a senior at Clark University who, as a “veteran” of three Youth Stakeholder groups supporting the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development, will present her research and conclusions regarding best practices for utilizing youth stakeholders by governments and corporations. Needless to say, Christopher is a very proud papa, and is excited to spread the wisdom of NCS’ cost-effective sustainability tools to businesses, governments and NGOs. For more info or to request a copy of Christopher’s paper for the Roundtable, contact: info@natcapsolutions.org. [back to top] ------------------- Define Sustainability: Brundtland + 20 Have you ever struggled to define just what sustainability means? Try it. All of Hunter’s students do, as writing their own definition of what sustainability means is the first exercise done in the Principles of Sustainable Management class at Presidio. In 1983, the United Nations established the World Commission on Environment and Development and appointed Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland, a former environmental minister and later the Prime Minister of Norway, to lead it. The Commission identified the critical global environmental and developmental issues facing the planet, and set out a course to address them. Over the course of three years, the Commission, featuring experts from 21 nations, the majority from World 2 and 3 countries, sponsored over 75 studies on environment and development issues and held public hearings. In 1987, the “Brundtland” Commission published its report, “Our Common Future.” It set forth the Brundtland definition of sustainable development: meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. That formulation has served as the United Nations’ official definition ever since. That was 20 years ago. This April, Hunter traveled to Capri, off the coast of Italy, as part of an international team tapped to update the classic definition of Sustainable Development. In May, the experts’ work will be presented to the United Nations in New York. Hunter is deeply honored to carry her students’ work, and her 30 years of experience in the field to help craft the next world definition. What is your definition of sustainability? See www.natcapsolutions.org/sustainability.org, or www.sustainabilitydictionary.com for a few popular definitions. ------------------------------------------------- Who Is New to NCS! ------------------- Jeff Hohensee – Operations Director & Natural Change co-author Jeff and Hunter met last year on Hunter’s trip to Detroit to speak at a regional Bioneers event. Both used to live in Los Angeles and work with TreePeople. They both drive trucks, like country music and enjoy sipping good whiskey while saving the world. Jeff is a change management expert who has worked in business, education and sustainability for over twenty-five years. Hunter was looking for someone to help write the sequel to Natural Capitalism who was experienced in making things happen. Jeff started traveling to Colorado to work with Hunter on writing the book they are calling “Natural Change: Bringing the Sustainability Revolution to Scale.” He got along so well with the entire Natural Capitalism team, that when Hunter and Robbie decided to bring someone in to take the organization to the next level of capability, Jeff was the first person Hunter suggested. Jeff has joined the NCS team as Operations Director. He is currently focused on new business development. Over time, he intends to solidify the business services and work with NCS staff to forge new relationships with government, local communities and for- profit ventures. Look for a revitalized business plan in the months ahead. Jeff worked in corporate finance for Barclays American Business Credit and Fuji Bank subsidiary Heller Financial. He specialized in time and motion studies, department reorganizations, cash management, financial analysis and negotiations. Leaving the private sector to teach, he worked as a public school teacher and as an adjunct faculty at Citrus College. Jeff served as the Program Director and Education Director at TreePeople, where he pioneered work on education, community building and social marketing that touched the lives of millions of people. Jeff frequently advises on environmental sustainability, community building and business development and has extensive experience in curriculum development, program evaluation, civic engagement, project management, business planning, strategic planning, focus groups, organizational development and change management. He is an inspiring speaker whose interviews and presentations include print media, television, DVD movie featurette, universities, professional associations, business, government agencies and community groups. He has keynoted such conferences as California Youth Service, Lake Tahoe Environmental Education Consortium annual meeting and the U.S. EPA Community Leadership Conference. You can contact him at info@natcapsolutions.org. -------------------- Michelle Brantley – Bookkeeper Michelle is a freelance accountant and recently joined NCS part-time to handle the finances. She has worked with several non-profits in Colorado and in her home state of South Carolina, such as the Colorado Conservation Trust, the Coastal Community Foundation of SC, and the SC Center for Birds of Prey, as well as being on the board of the Rocky Mountain Bird Observatory. She holds an M.B.A. from the University of South Carolina and a B.A. in Finance from Clemson University. She tries to spend as much time as possible outside bird watching, rock climbing or hiking with her dogs. ------------------------------------------------- Join the NCS Team Consider joining NCS as a summer intern. Information about our internship program and how to apply can be found at www.natcapsolutions.org/jobs.htm. Or contact Brianna Buntje for more information. Summer application deadlines are approaching soon!   ------------------------------------------------- Take Action! Take action by attending one of these sustainable events. Read more about these and other events on our website calendar Please see the online NCS calendar for the most current details of other NCS events and happenings. 4/18/2007 California Commonwealth Club San Francisco, California Green Capital. http://commonwealthclub.org/mlf/#greencapital 4/19/2008 Presidio event at which 3 lottery winners lunch with Hunter at Liverpool Lil’s. 4/19/2007-4/22/2007 Presidio Residency in San Francisco, California. MBA in Sustainable Business Management. www.presidiomba.org 4/20/2007 KB Homebuilders Community Advisory Board Meeting in San Francisco, CA. 5/12/2006 Ojai California Environmental Congress in Ojai, California. Open to the Public. http://www.ojaigreencoalition.com/ 5/17/2007-5/22/2007 Presidio Residency in San Francisco. MBA in Sustainable Business Management. www.presidiomba.org 5/26/2007 Second Alberta Summit on Environmental Education in Alberta, Canada “Trails to Sustainability. www.abcee.org/trailstosustainability/agenda.html 6/4/2007-6/8/2007 National Leadership Summit on Communities in Racine, Wisconsin Communities—and Climate Change, 40 top leaders convening at Wingspread Conference Center of the Johnson Foundation. http://www.summits.ncat.org/ 6/9/2007 Presidio 2007 Spring Graduation in San Francisco. www.presidiomba.org 6/13/2007 City Public Service Energy Meeting in San Antonio, Texas. Future of Electrical Energy. 6/19/2007-6/20/2007 Chicago Climate Exchange Annual Members Meeting in Chicago, Illinois. CCX members & special guests. www.climatex.com 6/21/2007 The Southwest Washington Sustainability Conference and Trade Show in Vancouver, Washington. Drivers of Change: The Business Case for Climate Protection and Sustainability. 6/25/2007 Goodwill Meeting in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. 6/26/2007 Backbone Campaign Summit in Atlanta, Georgia. 6/26/2007-6/28/2007 Presidential Climate Action Plan Racine, Wisconsin. 100-day action plan for next U.S. President.http://www.climateactionproject.com/ 7/28/2006 Earth Works Conference in Denver, Colorado. www.earthworks2007.com 8/7/2007 Leadership America Conference in San Francisco, California. 10/6/2007 Green Festival Washington, D.C. www.greenfestivals.org  (D.C. specific information: http://www.greenfestivals.org/content/view/625/280/) 11/1/2007 AME Conference in Chicago, Illinois. ------------------------------------------------- Consider Supporting Natural Capitalism Solutions. [Click Here] to email info@natcapsolutions.org with questions or more information. ------------------------------------------------- Natural Capitalism Solutions PO Box 398 Eldorado Springs, CO 80025 303-554-0723 info@natcapsolutions.org www.natcapsolutions.org [back to top]