NEW YORK, NY — Former President Bill Clinton wrapped up his annual meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative yesterday, netting 291 philanthropic commitments valued at roughly $6 billion. The commitments target a range of global problems, including poverty, illiteracy, human trafficking, and women's rights.

Environmental issues also played a significant role, as evidenced by commitments earlier this week to track corporate plastic use, reduce greenhouse gas emissions in corporate fleets, improve access to clean water in developing countries, expand use of cleaner cookstoves, make supply chains greener, and speed the adoption of electric vehicles.

The final days of the event brought more developments in the area of business and environmental stewardship from Cisco, Duke Energy, Ceres and the Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute. Additional pledges were also made in the areas of renewable energy, ocean conservation and green building.

Here is a look at some business and environment-related CGI commitments unveiled in the final days of the 2010 annual meeting:

• Cisco and Duke Energy announced a private-public partnership with the city of Charlotte, N.C., to make its commercial buildings more energy efficient. Dubbed "Envision: Charlotte," the project will use a range of technologies to meet its goal of reducing energy use by 20 percent and greenhouse gas emissions by 220,000 metric tons by 2016, such as smart grid meters, building automation systems and energy tracking tools.

The partners claim it won't cost commercial building owners anything to participate in the $5.3 million project, 80 percent of which will be covered by Duke Energy and the remainder coming from Cisco. The companies expect the energy savings to offset the project's cost.

Duke Energy's headquarters in Charlotte will take part in the initiative, along with Bank of America and Wells Fargo. The partners hope a total of some 60 commercial buildings spanning more than 15 million square feet will also participate.

• Investor coalition Ceres is joining forces with California Public Employees' Retirement System, the nation's largest public pension fund, Nike and the Skoll Foundation to mobilize 1,000 companies to embed sustainability into their operations, supply chains and product development. The group will hold a series of roundtables, forums and other events that revolve around a prominent Ceres report released earlier this year: "The 21st Century Corporation: Ceres Roadmap for Sustainability."

The report lays the foundation for how organizations can make social and environmental concerns a priority for virtually every aspect of its business, such as focused energy efficiency and green power efforts and engaging a majority of major suppliers on sustainability.

• The Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute committed to training more than 100 assessors and certifying 1,000 products by 2015. According to the Institute's website, there are currently more than 300 products that have been certified.  

Products certified to the Cradle to Cradle standard adhere to five design principles: the materials are safe, can be reused, social fairness, efficient water consumption, and use of renewable energy.

Image courtesy of Clinton Global Initiative.