Over twenty years ago, I was talking to a pharma VP who was in charge of their medicine donation programs in Africa. He was lamenting that he couldn’t quantify the value of his work. “Too bad,” he said, “that it’s impossible to measure the impact we create, on our business and on the world, by…
Intelligence, Issue #19.
A laser focus on what works: that’s what we need in our sustainability leaders. There’s no time for low-value actions. The powerful forces determined to hold the status quo on climate have found what works for them. We are the white hats and we must do the same.
To win we need leaders using scientific rigor and method to find what is most likely to actually work, then to drive only those actions forward. We’re the posse and they have a head start. Finding what works is possible and nothing less will do.
Here’s my take on approaching sustainability projects and problems with rigor. Please let me know what you think.
The New Jersey Palisades, magnificent cliffs along the lower Hudson river, in Autumn. In 1976, I stood about here and watched the Tall Ships tack up the river for the U.S. bicentennial celebration. Known as the Parade of Ships, 16 three- and-four-masted vessels sailed the river, returning to dock in New York Harbor at the…
From Valutus Sustainability R.O.I. #18 Rigor: Part 1 Consider that the first Econ laureates, in 1969, were recognized for “applied dynamic models for the analysis of economic processes.” In 1970 it was for, “static and dynamic economic theory.” A year later came, “empirically founded interpretation of economic growth,” followed closely by ‘economic equilibrium theory,’ ‘input-output’ method, the…
The air in the developing world is worsening, while the United States atmosphere – once very dangerous – is as clean as it’s been in a long time. Can the Clean Air Act and the EPA be models for action in less developed countries? Let’s hope so.
By Dan Kempner, Managing Editor, Valutus Sustainability R.O.I. Speeding along the pre-dawn Mass Pike en route to Logan Airport, my brother-in-law stretched languorously in the passenger seat, laughed and said, “how about those losers who spent all day at the Apple store for the new iPhone launch. Who would use a vacation day just for…
Antoine de Saint-Exupery, legendary pilot and author of such books as Night Flight and Flight to Arras (French: Pilote de guerre), wrote of his forced landing in a Saharan desert, and of his chance meeting with a Little Prince there among the dunes. It is to be hoped that we are not forced down so,…
This morning I had breakfast in Manhattan with my oldest friend, a man I met in middle school in 1971. I’ve been travelling in The States the past few weeks to see friends and family and managed to find him through social media. He’s not a Luddite but he doesn’t have the usual Instagram presence,…
By Dan Kempner, Managing Editor, Valutus Sustainability R.O.I. Last week I met a microbiologist, a former Vietnam War medic who has travelled the world meeting with other scientists, doing research, and working tirelessly to understand and manage infectious diseases. His dissertation focused on Alexandre Yersin, who developed an anti-plague vaccine at the Pasteur Institute in…
…and Pangolins An article this week in The Los Angeles Times details the culling of the Pangolin, an armored anteater rather like a tropical aardvark. The thousand-or-so scales that protect the animal from its natural predators – big cats: lions, tigers, and leopards — are no match for poachers. “…Because their meat is considered a…