We marvel daily at the blossoming of new renewable technologies. Their promise of a low-carbon economy gives us optimism, and their downright coolness makes our synapses jittery with excitement. Earth: The Sequel is a deep dive into the most groundbreaking and enticing new modes of harvesting energy. Thin-film solar and flying wind turbines are just the beginning. Authors Fred Krupp (president of
Environmental Defense) and Miriam Horn gave TreeHugger an exclusive interview about this new book and its message of hope and prosperity. ::
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Before Stonyfield Farm was a $325 million company, Gary Hirshberg was milking the cows and trying to get the bills paid. Now, as the
largest organic yogurt-maker, he is fulfilling the original mission: make money and save the world. From milk cows to yogurt cups to food miles, Hirshberg has been an innovator and a ground-breaker, going where no business men would dare. Here he speaks with TreeHugger about green business, presidential politics, and the hidden power of camel poo. ::
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If you say there’s no silver bullet to kill climate change, architect Ed Mazria says you’re wrong. The bullet is here and Mr. Mazria is challenging the world to lock and load. He’ll also tell you that trees won’t save us (no matter how much you love to hug them), and that the LEED standards aren’t getting us where we need to go. ::
TreeHugger Radio
Check out part one of our interview with Ed Mazria
here.
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(Thanks to
Calabash Music for our soundtrack.)
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Architect
Edward Mazria was one of the first to draw major attention to the source that emits almost half of all greenhouse gas emissions: our buildings.
Architecture 2030 has been his vehicle for communicating a design logic based on stemming the carbon footprint of the built environment, and his widely adopted 2030 Challenge has laid a strategy for rendering those buildings carbon neutral. Mazria was featured on PBS’s
e2 series on sustainable design, and his
2010 Imperative is a call to teach ecological literacy to the fledgling designers of the world. ::
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In part two of our interview with Yvon Chouinard, the maverick businessman talks about politics and the irony of living simply in a consumer society. He also rebuffs his brand’s “Pata-Gucci” reputation and explains why he’s started pouring cheap wine down the toilet. ::
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The founder of Patagonia started out when he was little more than a teenager, selling his home-forged climbing hardware to “dirtbagger” mountaineers like himself. Although all he really wanted to do was travel and climb, he had a knack for innovation and invention, and Chouinard Equipment Co. evolved into Patagonia, arguably the most successful outdoor clothing company in history. In his fifty-something years of experimentation, Yvon Chouinard has racked up a list of industry firsts that defies enumeration, yet he describes himself as a reluctant entrepreneur who really just loves to climb, surf, and kayak the wilds of the world, and hopefully save them along the way. ::
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Check out part two here.
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It’s been three years since Sheryl Crow’s last album, and the world has changed a lot in that short time. Crow’s new release,
Detours, looks at war, oil, and climate change as hard as it looks at love, heartache, and hope. Sheryl spoke to us from her farm in Tennessee where she’s settled with her young son to live a greener, more peaceful life. She told us about her musical inspirations, her time touring with
Laurie David and StopGlobalWarming.org, and even sets the record straight about the infamous
one-square-of-toilet-paper remark that had us TreeHuggers
scratching our heads.
Listen to the podcast of this interview via
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click here to listen, right-click to download....
In the final portion of our three-part interview with David Orr, the environmental polymath bring us to the 30,000-foot view and points to where hope and optimism must go their separate ways. With his closing thoughts, Orr reminds us that true hope means staring down the barrel of a gun.
Listen to the podcast of this interview via
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Part One here and
Part Two here.)
Full text after the jump.
...
In the second part of our interview, David Orr traces the dirty trail of coal from ravaged Appalachian mountains to the carnage of the Gulf Coast, both of which he knows firsthand. Listen to the podcast of this interview via
iTunes, or
listen/right-click to download. (Listen to
Part One here)
TreeHugger: The last time that I saw you, David, was down in New Orleans. Global Green, Brad Pitt, and the neighborhood associations of the Lower Ninth Ward were unveiling a green development. Building green in New Orleans is an idea that’s certainly got traction now. But you’ve spoken about a bigger problem which seems to overshadow these sort of steps. Can you tell me about that?
David Orr: Well, first of all you have to take your hat off to people like Matt Petersen [of Global Green] and Brad Pitt. There are hundreds of people, thousands of people, that are working to rebuild New Orleans. But there's this remorseless working out of large numbers; all of that effort is going to be in vain sooner or later unless we deal with the big issues of rising seas, which is an attribute of climate change, and the mismanagement of the lower Mississippi....
When other people shake hands, David Orr hugs. He’s one of those rare intellectuals. And although he comes from a lineage of preachers, Orr’s ecological conscience is not religious (he didn’t even know that his grandfather presided over Rachel Carson’s christening until reading Silent Spring). As the Chair of the Environmental Studies Program at Oberlin College, Orr lets his focus range from education to ecology to green building and beyond. His sagely presence is friendly and relaxed, unstained by his five books and multiple degrees. In part one of our three-part interview, David Orr paints his views of patriotism, conservatism, something he calls “happy talk,” and why we can’t build ourselves out of the mess we’re in. Listen to the podcast of this interview via
iTunes, or
listen/right-click to download....
In the second part of our in-depth interview with The Home Depot's green point man, Ron Jarvis speaks about sustainable forestry, transportation's deep footprint, and the evolution of the big box.
Listen to the podcast of this interview via
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listen/right-click to download. Check out part 1 of the Ron Jarvis interview
here.
TreeHugger: So, there's obviously a strong impetus here to move toward a more ecologically sensitive way of doing business. Is there a clear picture of what a truly sustainable business of your sort would look like? What would be an archetypal business that could be truly sustainable in the sense that it's not liquidating the assets that future generations will be relying on?
Ron Jarvis: There are two ways that I look at that. There's the utopian dream, where products are manufactured at a very local level from very low impact products and shipped a very short distance to the homeowner. That is the most sustainable market that we can ever find. But today there are a lot of tradeoffs that have to take place....
The Home Depot is reluctant to call itself a green company—maybe because of the contradictions built into being the country’s second largest retailer—but green has indeed become a guiding light for this 90-billion-dollar corporate behemoth. The company has
partnered with BP in California to make home solar a plug-and-play item, has made
alliances with universities to advance energy efficiency, and is working hard to peddle its Eco Options line, a series of products screened to meet standards of sustainable forestry, energy efficiency, clean water, and healthy homes.
Ron Jarvis is the green man in the orange apron, and he’s at the front lines of this amorphous and very hot topic that is mega-corporate sustainability.
Listen to the podcast of this interview via
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(For part 2, click
here.)
...
Amid
notable speculation and eyebrow-raising,
Andy Ruben, the man leading Wal-Mart's sustainability charge, has stepped aside. Details of what goes on within Wal-Mart's HQ fortress in Bentonville can be scant, but Mr. Ruben was kind enough to speak with us about the change, as was his replacement, Matthew Kissler. As Ruben moves on to private brands at Sam's Club, his replacement brings with him the engineering of Wal-Mart's famous packaging scorecard (which we first mentioned
here). In this interview, we spoke to both men about the shuffle, the future of Wal-Mart's sustainability lens, and what car seats and Hamburger Helper have to do with corporate eco-strategy.
You can read this rare exchange below, grab the
podcast on iTunes, or
click here to listen.
TreeHugger: Andy, the New York Times says that you were "reassigned;" that's sort of the big news here. Can you tell me what the deal is with this?
Andy Ruben: As you know, I've been involved in leading the sustainability efforts at Wal-Mart for the past three years or so. Of the three goals that we have, products is the third goal. Private brands is a dream. I mean, private brands sit on our shelves in the stores and connect to 137 million customers in the U.S. every week. It's a dream opportunity....
In part two of our interview with the author of
Zoom: The Global Race to Fuel the Car of Future, Vijay Vaitheeswaran explains why hydrogen is not a red herring (and how Who Killed the Electric Car? got it wrong), how infighting is holding back the clean energy revolution, and anticipates the divorce of cars and oil.
Zoom is now a finalist in the Financial Times/Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award.
Listen to the podcast of this interview via
iTunes, or
listen/right-click to download.
(Listen to part one
here. )
...
"Oil is the problem. Cars are the solution," says Vijay Vaitheeswaran. For the past decade, Vijay has written for the Economist magazine, covering energy, transportation, and economy. His newest book is
Zoom: The Global Race to Fuel the Car of Future, which he wrote with fellow Economist correspondent Iain Carson. Vijay knows he can’t make everyone happy with what he proposes, but in his eyes the race is already well underway and the revolution is at hand.
Listen to the podcast of this interview via
iTunes, or
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TreeHugger: In Zoom, you and Iain Carson talk about this “Great Awakening”—capital G capital A. Explain this, what is this Great Awakening?
Vijay Vaitheeswaran: What we call the Great Awakening is really the American body politic waking up to the twin problems caused by the way we use fossil fuels, particularly oil. The twin problems are global warming and oil addiction....
David Orr is a man of hope. Coming from a long line of preachers, Orr’s gospel is the science and sociology of human survival. Chairing Oberlin’s environmental programs department, Orr’s expertise ranges from the built environment to the educational environment. In our conversation, David shared his views on green design, denial over New Orleans’ true future, and the powerful differences between hope and optimism.
With this interview we bring our weekly TreeHugger Radio segments to a close. We will continue to deliver in-depth interviews that explore climate change, business, art, design, and beyond. You can find Simran Sethi on NBC News, CNBC, The Today Show, and Sundance Channel. Stay tuned to TreeHugger Radio on
iTunes or
listen/right click to download. ::
TreeHugger Radio
...
This week, president Bush tries to convince the world he’s serious about the fate of the human race, while a new poll finds public satisfaction with climate leadership down in the dumps. With the construction of
the world’s highest climate monitoring station, Mexico proudly enters the global warming tracking community, and TreeHugger’s Eliza Barclay is on the scene to speak with key players. Melding toxic waste with interactive art is a delicate science, but
Superfund365 has done just that, and artist Brooke Singer discusses her creation. Listen to TreeHugger Radio on
iTunes or
listen/right click to download. ::
TreeHugger Radio
...
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