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New Metrics

The new and evolving metrics that are helping expand the way businesses create, quantify, manage and report their impacts – and the value they deliver

Ford Cuts Water Use 30% Two Years Ahead of Schedule

Ford has reached its goal to cut the amount of water used to make each vehicle by 30 percent worldwide two years ahead of schedule, according to the company’s 2013-2014 Sustainability Report.Ford says it is furthering its commitment to aggressively step up water conservation programs at its global facilities and among its suppliers. Plans are underway to further cut water use by another 2 percent this year and to set new long-term goals. Read More...

MillerCoors Reduces Water Usage by 9.1%, Energy Usage 15.6%

MillerCoors now uses an average of 3.48 barrels of water to brew one barrel of beer, a 9.1 percent decrease from 2012, according to the brewer’s latest sustainability report. For comparison, some U.S. breweries use more than 6 barrels of water to produce a single barrel of beer. Read More...

#SB14sd: Can Social Impact Help You Grow Your Brand? Use the Social Value Index™ to Know Before You Invest.

It’s the same old story: Consumers say they care about social impact but their behavior just doesn’t match their statements. So marketers and brand managers have rightfully begun to doubt this claim. Why does this happen? Because the traditional approach to determining what social impact to fund has been more like guesswork than the rigorous consumer research approaches used for other marketing decisions. The result is that brands and companies spend literally billions of dollars on causes and issues in hopes their consumers will care. There must be a better way. And now there is... Read More...

#SB14sd: PRé Offering Free Sustainability Metrics Assessments for Innovative, Sustainable Startups

PRé has long been the metrics solutions partner for first-movers in a variety of industries aiming to create business value from sustainable products. Perhaps best known for its industry-standard SimaPro LCA software, PRé profoundly believes in the possibility and viability of a sustainable future and the crucial role metrics can play in that transformation.So in the interest of furthering business’ positive impacts from the ground up, PRé has announced that, through the end of the year, it will provide complimentary sustainability metrics assessments to promising mission-driven startups, in order to accelerate their expansion. Read More...

How Postmodernism Can Help Your Company’s Sustainability Metrics. Really.

Resources for grappling when “all perspectives seem true,” and long-established categories are crumblingIn 10 earlier parts of this series, we discussed 20 pitfalls in the sustainable business metrics field. (Find the first 7 articles here and the last three here.)Think you have it bad trying to accurately measure and report on your company’s carbon footprint and supply chain impacts? Read More...

Materiality and Integrated Reporting: A Context-Based Perspective (Part 2 of 2)

In part 1, the Center for Sustainable Organizations’ Mark McElroy provided a refresher on the thinking behind context-based sustainability (CBS) and materiality. Here, he elaborates on ways companies can define and use materiality for themselves.The Context-Based View Read More...

Materiality and Integrated Reporting: A Context-Based Perspective (Part 1)

With all of the airtime being given to materiality and integrated reporting these days, I am increasingly asked to explain what the context-based sustainability (CBS) perspective might be for each. Indeed, the implications of CBS are quite profound on both fronts. But before I explain them, let me first take a moment to remind readers of what CBS is and how it is defined. Read More...

EPA Power Plant Carbon Rules Could Drastically Reduce Harmful Air Pollution

Setting strong standards for climate-changing carbon emissions from power plants would also result in reductions in more than 750,000 tons of other air pollutants that can make people sick; damage forests, crops, and lakes; and harm fish and wildlife, according to a new study by scientists at Syracuse University and Harvard. Read More...

Urban Emissions: Autodesk's Emma Stewart on Science-Based GHG Goals for Cities (#SustyGoals 10)

Autodesk helped pioneer the corporate practice of setting science-based greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction goals with its open-source methodology, C-FACT, or Corporate Finance Approach to Climate-Stabilizing Targets. The effectiveness of this approach was validated late last year when Autodesk topped the ranking in the Climate Counts report Assessing Corporate Emissions Performance Through the Lens of Climate Science. Read More...

Big, Science-Based PivotGoals: A Dialogue with Jeff Gowdy (#SustyGoals 9)

In conjunction with the publication of his new book, The Big Pivot, Andrew Winston partnered with sustainability consultant and Vanderbilt University business professor Jeff Gowdy to create the PivotGoals website, a database tracking thousands of corporate sustainability goals and targets. Read More...

Footprints and Handprints: Harper on Intel's New Science-Based Climate Policy (Part 2)

In this latest installment of the #SustyGoals series, Bill Baue speaks with Stephen Harper, Global Director of Environment and Energy Policy at Intel, about the tech giant’s new science-based climate policy, released last month. In part one of this two-part interview, Harper explained the impetus for the policy and the mechanics of making it work. Here, Harper examines the micro and macro elements of the policy and what it means for Intel’s products. Read More...

Footprints and Handprints: Stephen Harper on Intel's New Science-Based Climate Policy (Part 1)

At SB's third annual #NewMetrics Conference last September, the need for next-generation sustainability goals — which measure progress toward real-world goal-lines such as carbon budgets, water tables, and living wages — emerged as a key theme. Read More...

Integration Is Key – SAP’s Thomas Odenwald on Natural Capital Accounting (Part Two)

The prospects of Natural Capital Accounting (NCA) are capturing the attention of the sustainability community at large, and with good reason. In part one of our two-part interview with Thomas Odenwald, SAP's Senior Vice President of Sustainability, he explained the three angles from which the company is approaching NCA; here, he offers steps for implementation.Dimitar Vlahov: This all sounds both promising and practical to me. What would you recommend the Sustainable Brands community to focus on in terms of specific next steps? Read More...

Let’s Make It More Relevant and Systemic: SAP’s Thomas Odenwald on Natural Capital Accounting (Part One)

The prospects of Natural Capital Accounting are capturing the attention of the sustainability community at large, and with good reason. Keen to drill down into the topic with key players in the SB community, we sat down with Thomas Odenwald, SAP's Senior Vice President of Sustainability, to get his perspective on the implications and applications of this crucial movement. Dimitar Vlahov: There is a lot of buzz these days in sustainability circles about Natural Capital Valuation and Accounting. To what extent are you following this conversation and what do you think about emerging case studies? Read More...

Measuring the Social Footprint of Products — Why Bother?

For over 20 years, PRé has been the metrics solutions partner for first-movers in a variety of industries aiming to create business value from sustainable products. Perhaps best known for their pioneering SimaPRO LCA software, PRé has recently shifted its focus to examine the social impacts of products. We spoke with Renée Morin, president of PRé North America, to find out more about the company’s new direction and what it has learned so far. Read More...

Ceres Conference and Report Ask: Is Corporate Sustainability Gaining Ground or Losing Pace?

“We're screwed,” agreed authors Andrew Winston and Paul Gilding in the opening plenary of last week's Ceres Conference.“But we've got huge opportunities to solve mega-challenges profitably,” Winston added. Read More...

PRé and SupplyShift Join Forces to Tackle Challenges of LCA, Supply Chain Sustainability

Sustainability software and consulting firm PRé has announced a partnership with supply chain software company SupplyShift to tackle the challenges inherent in the twin fields of life cycle assessment (LCA) and supply chain sustainability, and to use the strengths of each field to support the other. These challenges involve (1) dealing with the lack of primary supplier data in LCA inventories, (2) streamlining complex data collection and management issues in supply chain efforts, (3) circumventing inefficient duplicate data requests, and (4) facilitating the use of sustainable sourcing to reduce the environmental impacts LCA identifies. Read More...

Social Impact Measurement: A Key Business Management Tool

As companies obtain greater understanding of the social and environmental implications of their operations and products, the need to implement measurement methodologies to understand the impact of these business activities becomes more evident. Social impact measurement aids companies in identifying opportunities and risks associated with a project. It is a valuable ally to highlight the positive aspects of a given process or product. It is an even more useful tool to understand the important negative effects that must be managed and minimized. Read More...

RILA Seeking Industry Input on New Retail Energy Management Maturity Matrix

Last week, the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) officially launched its Retail Energy Management Program by releasing the Retail Energy Management Maturity Matrix (REMMM), a new tool designed to help retailers optimize their energy management programs. Read More...

Environmental Profit & Loss Accounting: Can We Make It Work?

In November 2013 the first World Forum on Natural Capital took place in Scotland, signaling that the concept of natural capital accounting (NCA) as pioneered through emerging tools such as the Environmental Profit & Loss (EP&L) account is starting to pick up pace. Even more recent is the establishment of the Natural Capital Business Hub in February, showcasing a broad range of promising natural capital case studies that have yielded a positive return on investment. Read More...

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