World is Green

FTSE said that it has teamed up with cleantech-focused investment firm Impax to launch a new index dedicated to tracking investments in alternative energy and energy efficiency, water treatment and pollution control, and waste technologies and resource management.

Meanwhile, NASDAQ OMX Group said last week that it was to introduce a series of Carbon indices designed to both underpin derivatives trading and provide a benchmark for the global carbon market. The company said that the new indices would make it easier for investors to enter the carbon market and gain an accurate picture of how their investments are performing.

The lesson here? The prophets of slow food can preach its benefits all they want, and as eloquently as they want, but nothing will make the case for buying locally better than price.

Two news items from Reuters: Total U.S. ethanol capacity will hit 9.25 billion gallons in 2008. Six new ethanol plants opened this month alone. "About a dozen" biofuel plants have filed for bankruptcy, victims of high prices for corn and soybeans.

In my opinion, this system is very intelligent, because, after all, it is the money of the person who is sending it and this system allows him to decide how it is spent. It ensures that the people back home get what he wants them to get - in the case of Construmex, a house.

Software consultancy TG Allison, for example, which helps dairy farmers in rural Wales maximize their milk yields, has cut average weekly mileage by its employees from 200 down to 40 miles — an 80% drop — at the same time as increasing productivity and customer satisfaction. Instead of spending hours driving out to a client’s farm whenever something goes wrong, the company’s staff now use an Internet link to connect to the farm’s computers and resolve the problem, often within minutes. Many farmers are also pleased to know the company has reduced its carbon emissions, says owner Thomas Allison.

And one company that we met in the halls of the conference that is helping companies manage power is San Francisco-based CSRware, which offers what it calls “eco-analytics,” or a suite of services that measures and manages a company’s energy consumption, water use and waste.

Both are in the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, an area peppered with volcanoes and home to the world's biggest reservoir of geothermal power. "When I think of Indonesia and energy, I think geothermal. Indonesia has more than 500 volcanoes, of which 130 are active," Lester Brown, president of the Washington-based Earth Policy Institute, told CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets in a speech in June.

"It is necessary for all major emitters to participate in efforts" to fight climate change, he said, speaking in front of lawmakers from the world's eight most industrialised nations as well as five major emerging economies.Climate change "is a borderless problem. It will remain unresolved if only some countries participate, even if they do their best," he added at a forum on climate change where former British PM Tony Blair was also present.

Purchasing ethanol from so far away may seem a little counter-intuitive, but Anders Fredikson, VP of Sekab, says that this sustainable ethanol will reduce CO2 emissions from farming, production and transportation to Sweden by 85% compared with petrol. Plus, mills will receive 5-10% more for their traceable product than mills that do not adhere to the sustainability guidelines. Half of the 800 million liters of ethanol consumed by Sweden per year is supplied by Brazil, so going with sustainable ethanol will make a significant impact.

While the study acknowledges that there is potential to extend taxation in the area of natural resource management to other sectors, it also reflects that the four countries surveyed in the report have achieved mixed results. Italy and the Czech Republic showed weak evidence of improved landscape following the introduction of the tax, whereas Sweden has succeeded in reducing demand for natural gravel — an invaluable resource to guarantee groundwater quality.

Apple's new iPhone 3G will be shipped on July 11 in a potato starch paper tray. Apple placed an order with Dutch company PaperFoam, which also makes packages for Motorola.

Arentsen doesn't want to reveal too many details, but says the iPhone will be delivered in a cardboard box with a starch tray (the inner part of the box), which is fully recyclable. The company claims a carbon footprint reduction of 90 per cent compared to plastic. The product consists of 100 per cent natural resource, either potato starch or Tapioca starch.

"The whole idea of carbon pricing is that if it doesn't hurt it won't work," he told Canberra ABC radio today. "Essentially, prices, for example for petrol as well as a whole bunch of other things, have to go up in order to encourage us to be more careful with how much we use and in order to encourage business to come up with new ways of getting it to us in ways that don't pump out greenhouse gases."

South Australia's solar feed-in scheme, which pays people double the going rate for excess solar power they feed back into the electricity grid, has come into effect. Premier Mike Rann said the scheme could provide for a bonus payment to households of up to $400 a year.

Only 36 per cent of the senior executives surveyed were aware the federal government's carbon trading scheme will kick into action in 2010, the Australian Institute of Management, Victoria and Tasmania, (AIM) survey found. Eighty per cent of respondents said they knew very little or were only somewhat aware of the scheme.

In the United States, bottled water outsells both milk and beer. And if projections about the bottled water industry prove correct, within four years it will surpass soft drinks, the only beverage category that stands in its way to the top. Considering that clean tap water in the West is widely available for next to nothing, the bottled water industry has tracked a remarkable journey over the last 30 years to the point where it is worth $US60 billion ($62 billion) a year, says author Elizabeth Royte, who has investigated its global ascent.

Supervisory workers in Japanese Pruis assembly plants are overworked to the point of exhaustion, and sometimes, death, the report said. One-third of assembly line workers are poorly paid temp workers. Its parts supply chain is "riddled with sweatshop abuse," including trafficking of tens of thousands of foreign guest workers, sometimes working 16-hour shifts. The report tweaks celebrities for endorsing the Prius without considering the human capital aspects behind the way they are produced.

Razzle-dazzling the reps at a Select Committee hearing on Energy Independence and Global Warming, Agassi explained that if the average American got 25 miles (40 kms) per gallon (3.8 litres) and paid $4 for every gallon guzzled, he’d end up paying 16 cents per mile (1.6km). Still with us? Meanwhile, the operating costs of an electric car, including the depreciation of the battery, works out at only six cents a mile. Savings in Europe where petrol is even more ludicrously expensive would be significantly higher.

I don’t know why using G.P.S. isn’t part of the standard eco-advice, like replacing your light bulbs with compact fluorescents or keeping your tires properly inflated.