Just Doing It
 
My favorite item in this week's news describes Nike's truly excellent and comprehensive approach to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. It is worth a careful read. Their program is notable for being both comprehensive (from product content and supply chain to operations and public policy engagement) and focused on their most material impacts in each of these areas. This is exactly the kind of corporate leadership that will help us move beyond the current political stalemate.

I am also happy to see the progress being made in developing workable standards for measuring and managing supply chain and product life cycle emissions, as this will enable many more companies to take the right kind of action.

Finally, while Nike chose not to invest in carbon offsets as part of its strategy, our feature article from Steve Zwick at Ecosystem Marketplace highlights the important contributions that offset programs can play in reducing GHG emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD).

Eric Olson is senior vice president of advisory services at BSR.

This report from the Climate Group offers successes and areas for improvement based on recommendations and case studies from the Smart 2020 report, showing how technological innovations can cut global emissions by as much as 15 percent by 2020.

This report examines the progress of forest carbon markets in during 2009 and provides historical prospective on the establishment of the markets and their growth.

Mark your calendars for two 2010 State of Green Business Forums, in San Francisco and Chicago. These one-day information-packed events coincide with the release of GreenBiz.com’s “State of Green Business 2010,” the acclaimed annual status report on corporate environmental trends and progress.