In a questionable economy, when everyone is turning to new avenues for employment, it’s not surprising that environmental awareness has opened some fantastic opportunities. One of the hottest trends has been consultants that specialize in advising companies on the various aspects and choices of sustainability. More and more companies are going green but typically just don’t have a clue where to start. Sustainability consultants step in and not only offer guidelines but show corporate America how they can save money in the process. When a company decides that they want to go down the path of sustainability, they quickly realize that there are all kinds of compliancy and regulatory requirement hoops that they have to jump through. Making the right sustainability choices for the company also involves some financial investment with the requirement for either a long term or short term return-on-investment goal.
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If there is one place that exemplifies waste, it is in a typical office. I have worked in a variety of lines of business in many states and was always astounded at how much waste actually occurs in the business office. In the early days, trying to coordinate even a recycling program was literally like pulling-teeth! Thankfully, now there are a number of ways that we can have a green office and actually save the company some money!

In the past number of years a majority of companies have jumped on the bandwagon of going green, but with less fervor and more focus on the bottom line. Those that misrepresented themselves were quickly tagged and marked as ‘green washing’ and they received rather nasty names in the process. As corporations have learned their lessons, they seem to have shifted the focus to a more serious mode, realizing that sustainability not only gives them a more favorable public image but can actually offer a better bottom line. Some of the more recent sustainability trends may be a little surprising, but, they are making excellent strides of success.

As the world becomes more conscientious about the amount of waste we produce, the focus of going green and recycling has come to the forefront in job about every area of life. It is therefore not surprising that the topic of weddings has been included in the methods of keeping our planet healthy. Magazines all over the country, including some of the topic bridal magazines are offering hints, ideas, success stories and wedding companies that involve making a happy day for the bride and groom just as happy for the earth.

The migration of the Monarch butterfly is an absolutely breathtaking event of nature. Generations of these butterflies migrate to and from Canada and Mexico, often taking years to complete the migration process. Somehow, each generation knows the journey it must take to arrive and then send other generations back to Mexico. But a problem has been seen in the last couple of years when the population of Monarch butterflies arriving in Mexico for their winter season dropped seventy five percent.

The arrival of the Monarch butterfly to Mexico is something to behold. Millions and millions of the butterflies cover the pine and fir trees. These are the trees that the Monarchs prefer. If you are witness to this miracle, you realize that the trees themselves are almost not visible but are instead covered by the glorious colors of the Monarchs themselves. The Monarchs are affixed to the trees, gently moving, so that the trees seem to have an additional rustle of life.

In the last twenty years, the content of GMO (genetically modified organisms) in foods has increased to almost eighty percent of the packaged foods that we consume. Most of these GMO’s have not been examined for long term affects in the human body. Dr. Oz, famed physician, along with other scientific experts examines what we are doing and how Monsanto is making a big killing at our expense.

Genetically modified foods involve an alteration in the genetic DNA makeup to create a food type that can grow faster or is resistant to disease or insects, as compared to the standard product. This process can involve a combination of breed types as well as a change in the specific DNA structure. It has come to such an alarm that six European countries have banned GMO’s so that they cannot enter their country and potentially contaminate their own food sources.

It has been a long time since the first Earth Day, but finally both the general public and businesses are stepping up to the plate to realize that we must take care of the only home that we have ever had. Global awareness on the topic of ‘going green’ has seen resurgence in the business world as they realize that it means better profit margins. While this is the major reason for a business to make the transition to a green outlook, it isn’t the only reason.

The term ‘going green’ can mean a lot of things to a lot of people. Overall, the general description translates to making changes to incorporate every aspect of business and life to have little or no impact on the ecology as well as contribute to sustainable energy policies. Quite a topic and a large undertaking when you are talking about the business world. You see, they simply don’t adopt change easily. Transitioning does take time and many businesses are seeing small savings to start out with as they make internal changes to more energy efficient systems. This can include everything from the energy savings light bulb to encouraging email instead of standard paper mailing. Email alone has been shown to save around $2 million per year.

Those that do not believe in global warming and hide their heads in the sand, are being given yet another group of reports on the now high risk of flooding in the world’s coastal areas. The floods that were once believed to be once in a century are predicted to be a common occurrence and approximately forty eight of the contiguous states in the United States will be affected by rising tides and storm surges.

Three reports were done on the global warming effect on low lying areas of the United States due to rising water. The first was a non-profit organization called Climate Central. The other two reports were submitted and published in the Environmental Research letters. All of the studies and their results dictated that the low lying coastal areas of the United States will have a devastating effect from the rising waters due to global warming. Global warming has been caused by the greenhouse effect due to high pollution emissions into the atmosphere.

A United Nations report in January, 2012 is point blank and honest: we are running out of time to ensure that the world has enough food and fuel to accommodate the anticipated nine billion people by the year 2040. At this rate, it is estimated that over three billion people will be thrown in the frays of total poverty without appropriate supplies of food, water and fuel.

At the current rate, the human population growth is anticipated to require at least a fifty percent increase in food, forty five percent increase in energy and thirty percent increase in water by the year 2030. The growth model that exists today is not based on any sustainable reality and a majority of the contributing factors lean towards placing global natural resources in a strained situation. Another contributing factor is based on global warming, which will add to the devastation through flooding.

The topic of turning waste water into renewable energy has been controversial at best; with diverse opinions on both sides of the spectrum. The typical resource intensive process has been less than attractive, with high costs and a major carbon footprint that negated the process entirely. One Israeli company, however, has discovered a way to offer waste water treatment combined as a renewable energy source; with the use of a little bacteria that eats sewage.

Emefcy is a well known and established company in Israel for bio-energy systems. Starting in 2008, they set out to change the face of energy wastewater treatment so that it would be embraced by companies around the world. They have developed microbial fuel cells that not only convert waste water to potable water but offer a byproduct that is pure energy. The bacteria actually degrade organic compounds in the water and, with the use of their technology create a bio-electric chemical reaction that gives power generation.