Some fantastic examples of greenwash today from jonasrisen on the greenline blog from Ziger/Snead LLP Architects. Have a look. The article is spot on and reinforces much of what we said in our own Greenwash Guide.

I think the one below from LG Eden might be my favourite.

A beautiful hippie. Levitating above a giant lily pad. In a jungle. With butterflies. And monkeys. And more gorgeous people cavorting in the background. Really?

As treehugger has pointed out - "the Eden Collection is created from a minimum of 12% pre-consumer recycled material." - somewhat akin to calling a product vegan when it is made from 88% lard.

...oh yes it's ladies night and the feelings right oh yes it's ladies night (oh what a night!). So sang Kool and the Gang way back in 1979 in their classic floor-filling favourite track of louche lotharios everywhere and last Thursday the same could be said of Triodos Bank's 'Women in Ethical Business Awards'. Our glorious leader was up for the 'Ethical Entrepreneur of the Year' award, and whilst George W. Bush might believe that "the problem with the French is that they have no word for 'entrepreneur'", we in Futerra think differently. Which is a good thing as Soli only went and won the gong from a strong field of amazing and inspiring businesswomen.

The theme of the night really was the tremendous sense of positive possibility conjured up by all the short-listed candidates for the awards, some of which, like the Ashden Awards that Doug blogged about earlier in the week, brought a wee tear to the eye. There was a small delegation of Futerrans in attendance (I even wore my kilt to blend in with the beskirted and summer frocked female throng) We were all very proud of Soli when the award was announced (she stands on the shoulders of giants of course!) and her brief acceptance speech was suitably stirring, urging us all to 'blow this niche wide open' and change the face and substance of business as a force for good. 

The only question is what this all means for Futerra. Last years winner, Ella Heeks of Abel & Cole said the best bit about winning was the ability to point to the award during awkward  business meetings or discussions and  use it to reinforce her point of view with the line '...and who's ethical business woman of the year?'! 

Alan Knight was one of our lunch guests last week and treated us to a wonderfully frank, and insightful presentation based on his Planet Earth Plc concept.

Before anyone gets excited Planet Earth Plc is not a corporatist plan to privatise the world! Rather it’s a creative way to frame the challenge of sustainability that will engage a top-level business audience. In short the argument Alan puts to business leaders is this: You wouldn’t run your business the way we run the planet.

It’s impossible to do justice to the presentation in a short blog post based on scribbled notes... so forgive me for this unjust, brutal summary...

Planet Earth Plc: The Earth is the business; the customer is mankind; the business proposition is wellbeing, shelter and food etc; customer growth is conservatively predicted at 15,000% and the supply base cannot match the predicted growth; what’s more customer satisfaction is decreasing...

Those results would make for a pretty grim Board meeting.

He went on to prescribe the following aims for the sustainable management of the ‘business’

1. Low carbon
2. Poverty free
3. One planet economy
4. Well-being as the measure of success (not economic growth)

Amongst many other pearls of shiny wisdom he also encouraged us to stop being so nice. There will be business winners and losers as we move to a sustainable planet Earth, we should back the winners and enjoy the (intellectual) conflict and arguments.

Finally, as someone who works within the top levels of business and policy Alan is especially well placed to offer an assessment on the chances of Planet Earth Plc’s survival.

We asked him if he was optimistic. He replied.

“You’ve got to be optimistic because you’ll fail if you’re not. Why are you doing this job if you don’t feel you can succeed?”

So here’s to success and optimism and to not always being nice. grrrrr.

The Engage team love the Danes from Hamlet to my friend Peter to Tommy Seebach, good old Tommy Seebach…

We recently spotted this great little piece on positivesharing.com comparing happiness at work in Denmark and Britain. Alexander Kjerulf points out that the Danes have a term for happiness at work – arbejdsglæde – whereas we Brits don’t.

Alex goes on to explain there’s a Danish tradition of making employees happy at work and with good reason. To quote Alex:

“First reason: time. We spend more of our waking hours at work than on anything else. We spend more time at work than with our friends, families and children combined. If you’re unhappy at work, you’ll spend a large part of your life being miserable.

Second reason: health. Hating your job can make you sick. Worst case, it can kill you. Studies show that people who hate their jobs run a much higher risk of contracting serious diseases like cancer, heart disease and diabetes.

Third reason: money! Happy companies make more money, because their employees are more creative, productive, service-minded and innovative.”

The article doesn’t go into how to achieve a happy workplace but luckily Alex has written a book that you can read online here

From our own experience of working in employee engagement on sustainability issues we know one thing that makes employees happy is feeling like they’re making a difference to their organisation and the world.

Most people want to be good, they want to help, and they want to be useful. Faced with the doom and gloom and sense of impending apocalypse that often surrounds the environmental debate it can be pretty darn difficult to feel good and useful. Taking sustainability seriously as a business and effectively engaging employees on sustainability by empowering them and giving them agency to act can reinvigorate employees and the business.

Unhappiness is unsustainable. Turning up to work knowing you’re making a difference and loving your job is awesome. So Hamlet may not be the best example of happiness but if you need positive proof of arbejdsglæde I leave you with this clip of Danish legend Tommy Seebach – look how happy he is!

Having met a previous Ashden award winner in India last year I was very excited to get my hands on tickets for this year’s event. As ever it was a feast of positivity and inspiration. There were eco spies in schools that would put most of us to shame as far as commitment and engagement are concerned. There was a faceoff between eco techno masters Dulas and Kensa engineering. Arun district council and Leeds city council showed that changing attitudes to energy efficiency is possible and has created many wonderful extra benefits.

Then came the really powerful stuff, international efforts that are truly amazing. Again they all demonstrated that improvements in energy provision whether, solar panels or efficient stoves, not only provided environmentally friendly power but also improved quality of life on so many levels. It was also impressive to see how well many of these projects were scaling up, making me think that the common cop out of ,’what’s the point in us doing anything as our saving will be lost to 3^rd world emissions’, is a rubbish attitude. Witnessing such amazing entrepreneurial spirit and success was truly heart warming and inspiring.

Another interesting moment was hearing former Government Chief Scientific Advisor Sir David King talk about how vastly estimates for the melting of Arctic sea ice were changing. The early predictions said maybe by the end of the century, then the worst case scenario was mid centaury. We are now looking at 8-10 years and this estimate appears to be shortening all the time. Still the doom and gloom side was softened by the still lovely Anna Ford.

The favourite quote from the evening was one that origionaly came from the founder of Opec when asked when the age of oil would end. His reply was, 'the stone age didn't end because they ran out of stones'. 

One of my favourite quotes:
“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”
— Albert Einstein

Often, solutions to our big collective challenges (e.g. climate change) are perceived to involve sacrifice and loss – rarely, do people buy the idea that in fact, we are being presented with opportunities. This perception, this fear to embrace the unknown and unthinkable seems to only lead to inertia or at best, looking for old solutions to new problems. Rather than take a chance to dream of what could be possible, people try to milk what they have (with all of its shortcomings) because it’s familiar (though not necessarily still, if it ever was, effective).

A lot of things I have come across in the past few weeks illustrate this well. Henry lent me a copy of Seth Godin’s Purple Cow which affirms that the only way to succeed in business is to be remarkable. Professor John Wood of Goldsmiths came in the other day and talked about the transformative power of vision. And I found the Hugh Macleod illustration here, "business is … socialising with purpose".

Rather than business being about ‘work’ a term that in wide interpretation connotates dread, burden and something to get out of the way quickly, how about if work was why we got up in the morning? And I’m not just talking about finding a more enjoyable job here, what if your life’s passion was your work? What if you could be employed (or not) to do what you were going to do anyway? What if indeed, business was all about creating a space to share your work and mutually exchange ideas to help each other get closer to achieving our goals?

What if we made this possible? Happier, more productive people. Not having to work on work-life balance – it would simply just be. And everyone practicing rational self-interest could lead to a better world for all … couldn’t it?

The saga will continue.

Futerrans Emily, Helen and I had a slow day out on the River Cam thanks to ex-intern Joe, known as Westlife to his fellow punt chauffeurs because of his fresh-faced boy band looks!

If you're looking for a relaxing summer afternoon on the water, you don’t need to jet off to Italy. Instead go slow with Joe. He's got the Cambridge college chat and excellent bridge jumping skills... just make sure there's a boat of Brownies ready to collect him if he doesn't make it over the wall in time. Maybe a little more speed is needed next time you attempt that trick Joe!

Oh wow! The media have at last discovered how to save us money on the weekly shopping. Newspaper reaction to the economic downturn has produced 'definitive guides' on how to carry on indulging our obsession with shopping for branded goods whilst saving a bit of money. Elsewhere, sewing kits for people to make their own clothes have made a comeback.

It would be nice to see an article that led with the notion 'don't buy so much stuff' - that could save a few tonnes in newsprint alone. Or how about 'you don't need to throw those shoes away - get them heeled!'.

Here's a personal tip for you. Ignore any advice that encourages you to save money by investing in a breadmaker.  There are absolutely no laughs to be had in chucking the ingredients in and pressing a button. Make bread by hand - when you take that beautiful loaf out of the oven (no preservatives, added salt or other funny stuff), it tastes so much better, because you can say "I made that".

So, ethical fashion – it has become a bit of a buzz term, everywhere you look you see the words ‘Look eco-fab’ or ‘eco-chic’, ‘Dress like the stars and save the planet at the same time!’

But when I see all this, deep down I feel a little niggle inside. Is this really the case? Can you look fantastic in the hottest trends and really be saving the planet? I think that in many cases, the answer is no.  Referring to Georgina’s blog last month, ‘Apocalypse now?’ it does seem that everyone is just jumping on the bandwagon.

But I do love clothes, I can’t deny it! And since I’ve started working in a sustainable communications company I’m becoming more aware of how unethical some of these clothing brands really are.

For many of us (including myself!) often keeping up with the trends means fast fashion, and fast fashion means cheap, disposable clothes.  But with this comes a price.  You know that if you buy a top for £1.50, it is unlikely to be ethically made.  Kate Fletcher talks about this in Sandy Black’s new book ‘Eco chic’.

"Fast isn’t free – someone somewhere is paying” – p.175 Eco chic 2007, Matilda Lee.

However, in a bid to keep up with the shopper’s conscience, shops like Primark now sell organic cotton, letting shoppers breathe a sigh of relief that they can still buy their clothes at ridiculously cheap prices and without feeling guilty that some poor worker has worked 15 hours picking the cotton.

But is this the case? Or does organic just mean no pesticides have been used? Consumers are confused! And I think that it half the reason why people don’t go for more ethically sourced brands is because they don’t really know the difference it makes!

That is why I breathe a sigh of relief that in amongst the bid for the ‘ethical crown’, there are attempts to educate people.  Take the BBC’s latest venture.  Their BBC 3 programme Blood, Sweat and T-shirts documents the story of 6 young fashion addicts as they travel through India experiencing the life of a factory workers, and cotton pickers producing clothes for the British Clothing Industry. Although in places you sometimes wonder if these young people have learnt anything (losing an £800 emerald bangle whilst working in a cotton factory?!), it demonstrates the stark reality of the industry and definitely provides food for thought…

Oh yes...my airship fantasies (I am that type of geek) received a boost yesterday when I read this http://tinyurl.com/4kq4mo in the Guardian about the imminent return of Zeppelin's to our skies. they're only being used as a promotional gimmick right now but how can we resist the populist potential of their visible presence overhead and the images of a gentler age of travel that didn't ravage our atmosphere like modern aviation. With a Transatlantic journey anticipated to take around 43 hours, with the possibility of a swimming pool, ballroom and space to shake a leg how can we resist. Blimp me up indeed...

Just been drooling over this georgeous site (www.ecodazoo.com) promoting eco friendly habits. What a fantastic piece of communication! This really is the cutting edge of Flash animation with a smooth 3D engine (click and drag about to explore), I have seen only a handful of sites really making good use of the new 3D capabilities of Flash and this is by far the best.

Some of the messaging might be a little simple but if it's aimed at the younger end of the Japanese populus then I am sure McCann Erickson have a future award winner here.

Well done. 

There’s little doubt that the circles of sustainability information and development overlap. I’ve just read an article that shows why the intersection is so often shaded in grey.

It reports on one (negative) impact of internet-facilitated access to information on sustainability and human rights in Afghanistan – and it got me thinking.

In the UK, everyone from computer programmers to PR execs are lauding the sustainable development potential of the internet, and more recently its gregarious and gifted offspring, Web 2.0.

The new breed of iActivist is gobbling up Facebook groups, helping people-what-care tell the considerable populace of the e-ther about their concerns for everything from Barrack to Iraq, climate change to stock exchange…

As a way of spreading the word, this has some real benefits; mostly it facilitates quick, cheap and often extensive awareness-raising. Messages move along the web equivalent of garden paths – from one neighbour to the next – but on a scale grand enough to make them feel part of a mass movement: the social proof highway.

The article I’ve read paints a slightly gloomier picture – the result of the collision between this new fountain-like availability of information on sustainability and its stubborn and lethal suppression.

It is odd how the wunderkinds of development in one context fail their GCSEs in another.

Recently we’ve been breaking down sustainable development into its literal components; sustainability and development. It’s fascinating to contemplate the impact of ‘easy-access’ sustainability information, and to mull how as communicators (professional or otherwise) we might use our roles to negotiate these contradictions.

Went along to a sneaky preview of this new climate change movie yesterday and came out feeling as if my heart-strings had been plucked by the nimble fingers of a Spanish guitarist...it's a retrospective film starring the ever charismatic Pete Postlethwaite as the 'Archivist', a man in charge of curating the collective, creative and cultural outputs of humanity and representatives of the planet's flora and fauna in a repository off the coast of Svalbard in the late twenty-first century. The earth has been ravaged by runaway climate change and Pete takes us through the crucial years, using real news and documentary footage, to illustrate how despite knowing the challenge we failed to act in time...

The film doesn't exactly fulfil Futerra's rules on creating positive visions of the future but the animations in it explaining complex issues like contraction and convergence are absolutely superb (even Boris Johnson might understand C&C if he saw the film). The film's website is http://www.crudemovie.net/page/synopsis, it's a 'crowd-funded' project and there is still time to donate to what to me is a visceral, compelling and provocative encapsulation of our slow, collective suicide. Remember...it doesn't HAVE to be like this!

Last Friday I went on a tour of the Veolia waste processing site in Greenwich. The tour was arranged at my request by our cleaners who organise our recycling. I wanted to see where our waste went.

I do have to admit to a geeky fascination with waste (which will come as no surprise to those of you who read the worm blogs) and I’m a big fan of Bill McDonough who talks about waste as food. This not some hobo freegan bin diet kind of food but, the idea that waste is a nutrient and should be seen as a valuable resource to be used rather than a dirty end product to be dealt with and disposed of.

The big question for the day was to explore the differences between comingled and separated at source recycling. It was also my first time to see a trommel (from the Dutch word for drum), a giant spinning cylinder used to separate waste by size and weight. They also have an amazing bit of kit that uses a laser to spot plastic as small as a 50 pence piece on the conveyor belt then pin point it with a jet of air to move it to another conveyor. Amazing! To be fair though they still use humans to hand pick the final stage as all their gizmos can’t separate the streams 100%.

They say that shredded paper and plastic bags are two of their largest problems. If there were no bags in the mix the process would take 30% less energy. This brings me to my final point. How much energy does the plant use? The guy giving the tour said that they would be conducting an energy audit later in the year but that at present they had no figures. I find this hard to believe but will be chasing them at Christmas to hear what they have to say. So the debate about comingled verses source separated continues. Is the extra energy worth the ease of use for consumers and until we have more UK processing plants how much of a difference would clean waste steams make?

We had the wonderful Tim Britton of Forkbeard Fantasy (the incredibly creative, cult theatre and film company) visit the office a little while ago for lunch.

He treated us to a live narration of his film Carbon Weevils (watch it below). The film was part of a 'climate change cabaret' that Forkbeard put on last year but the film has taken on a life of its own.

I thoroughly recommend it as a skilful piece of climate change communications. It uses a storyboard/comic format to tell the story of creatures called carbon weevils. The charm and wit of the piece and the 'defamiliarisation' of the format (it's about 'carbon weevils' not humans) mean that the audience is willing to engage with the content - humanity's rapacious use of carbon - without feeling preached at or harrassed in a way which would be impossible if it was played 'straight'.

The use of humour to engage people on climate change and sustainability is crucial to us as communicators. But when was the last time you smiled or giggled about climate change or our response to it?

More to come on the subject of comedy - a bunch of us Futerrans went to see Marcus Brigstocke do a free gig about climate change for the Environment Agency at the comedy cafe on Monday. Review to follow.

All prospective Futerra interns are asked to perpare a creative piece under the title, 'Visions of a Positive Future'. Here is Suzy Huges submission.

School Report

Date: 27 May 2058

Name: Paul Pearson

Age: 6

Year 2

History Paul shows an acute interest in learning how humans used to exist in the early part of the 21^st Century. He finds it particularly amusing to learn about traffic, domestic flights, long distance transportation of live-stock, plastic bags and the activities of bin men. He also enjoys hearing about old-fashioned illnesses such as asthma and their treatments.

Science Paul is showing he has a natural affinity for biology, learning quickly the names of different variations of vegetables and the conditions suitable for their growth. He shows particular enthusiasm for the practical work in the herb garden and is inventive with ways to utilise the home’s food waste for fertiliser. He is also very caring of the chickens we are rearing and soon he should be able to use this knowledge on your allotment at home, helping also with your livestock.

Home Economics Sewing - His sewing techniques have progressed impressively, this is particularly demonstrated in his mending of the Bags for Life and altering of old clothes into the latest fashions. Cooking – His cooking is improving slowly, his fortnightly educational shift in the school kitchen will soon mean he is producing food which can be given to the other children in their reusable lunch containers.

Sport He is doing exceptionally well at his bicycle lessons, picking up the Highway Code very quickly. I feel confident that he will be able to join in on the cycle route home in the next month, meaning a younger child can take his space on the solar-powered school bus.

Geography He is really enjoying learning about the different cultures from around the world. This is more important now of course due to the reduction in flights after the Government invested all that money into transforming domestic locations.

On a personal note, I very much appreciated your attendance at the parent evening classes. As part of the lost generation it certainly helps for you as parents to be as adept in the environmental practices as the current younger generations.