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Hotels are making dramatic progress in sustainability as they realize its compatibility with luxury and cost savings, global consultant Ashlan Cousteau says. Trends range from organic cocktails to in-room monitoring of water and electricity use.

Every Fall, college and universities across the country welcome companies on their campuses to provide networking opportunities for students. These events can include career fairs, interviews, and industry specific networking gatherings. One such company is PepsiCo, major user of Conflict Palm Oil and top corporate laggard in Rainforest Action Network's Snack Food 20. "Pepsi's palm oil supply chain is saturated with rainforest destruction, human rights and labor abuses, and species extinction," said Adam Stackable, an Oklahoma student, "I won't work for a company that uses Conflict Palm Oil." Adam and several other students confronted a Pepsi recruiter at Oklahoma State University and delivered a letter urging the company to take action to address the egregious practices in its supply chain.

Logging emissions is an important step in securing the transparency that China needs to solve its pollution problems, Mr. Ma argues. Among the harmful pollutants are air particles known as PM2.5, which can enter deep into the lungs and even into the bloodstream. In an interview, he talked about the considerable progress he sees in the Chinese government's approach to air pollution, but also how concerns about social unrest continued to constrain discussion of pollution's damage to public health. Before 2013, levels of PM2.5 [the finest and deadliest particulate matter] were not monitored or made public in a single city. Now it's monitored and released in more than 400 cities. China has entered an era when air quality information is released. It's much more transparent. The 11th and 12th Five-Year Plans only referred to "emission reduction targets," so local governments could play games by claiming they had reduced emissions. Now, by saying by what year the PM2.5 must be below a certain amount, it's much harder to fake. The 13th Five-Year Plan is a progressive plan because it says that the public has the right to participate, to monitor, and that it's the public's right to know.

A study from Unilever reveals a $1 trillion market for companies that effectively and transparently market the sustainability of their products. About 20,000 people in four countries and the UK were interviewed, and 33% said they would prefer to purchase a product that benefits the environment.

The events of 2016 have underscored just how volatile, complex and ambiguous the world is today. Drawing on insights that we have collected around the world from thousands of interviews and engagements with stakeholders and consumers, we take a look at the global shifts that will continue to shape the world for leadership organizations in 2017.

For our annual trends report, we honed in on key issues and opportunities that will define the field - including global geopolitical instability, Paris Agreement implementation, growing importance of sustainable finance, and the continuing rise of cities and regions - via SustainAbility's ongoing issue tracking plus interviews with two dozen international sustainability experts.

The interactive report, produced in partnership with Trucost, features: our ninth annual State of Green Business report, This year's report continues our tradition of taking the pulse of corporate progress in sustainability, in the United States and around the world.  * The top 10 trends for 2016 * Video interviews with key sustainability leaders * 30+ metrics assessing the environmental performance and progress of nearly 2,000 companies

France's environment minister, Nicolas Hulot, abruptly resigned from his post during a live French radio interview Tuesday, citing "an accumulation of disappointments" in Emmanuel Macron's government.

Shell plans to link executive bonuses to greenhouse gas emissions and take other actions to reduce its carbon footprint. In an interview with Reuters, Shell CEO CEO Ben van Beurden said the oil and gas company has "to be at the forefront of the transition" to a low-carbon economy and that means focusing on renewable energy, especially wind and solar, as well as low-carbon biofuels and hydrogen as key growth areas beyond 2020.

Shell plans to link executive bonuses to greenhouse gas emissions and take other actions to reduce its carbon footprint.

The Obama administration's rule leans heavily on renewable energy to meet its goal to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 32 percent by 2030, which is an increase of 2 percentage points from the draft it released in the summer of 2014. While states have two additional years until they must begin cutting emissions - 2022 instead of 2020 - they are expected to start devising ways to improve their environments, which will focus on shifting to cleaner burning fuels and away from carbon-heavy ones. "The trend we are on will get us there," says Rob Gramlich, senior vice president for government affairs at the American Wind Energy Association, in a phone interview. "As the nation moves from coal to gas, and as it adds more wind, solar and energy efficiency, we will reach that 32 percent target."

The Obama administration's Clean Power Plan rule will require states to begin cutting carbon emissions by 2022. "The trend we are on will get us there. As the nation moves from coal to gas, and as it adds more wind, solar and energy efficiency, we will reach that 32% target," said Rob Gramlich of the American Wind Energy Association. To comply, states can choose among options including boosting renewables, improving heat rates for coal-fired steam generators, and using more nuclear energy and lower-emitting natural gas. Forbes (8/4) 

Martin von Hildebrand, founder of the Fundacion Gaia Amazonas, is working to establish an ecological corridor protecting 333 million acres of rain forest stretching from Colombia to the Brazilian coast. That will involve finding ways to work with the loggers, miners and farmers already active in the area, he says. "We have to look at those areas where there already is something like oil, or like agriculture, or like cattle ranching and approach it from a sustainable point of view," he explains.