Jennifer Giles, Center for Resource Solutions | 12/15/2009

The use of clean energy is essential to reducing the impacts of climate change. Businesses like Timberland can influence the use of more clean energy by choosing to use renewable energy in manufacturing and business operations. When businesses voluntarily choose clean energy options through utility green pricing programs, renewable energy certificates and on-site generation, it sends a signal for more clean generation supply. Timberland played a key role in influencing a Kentucky utility to provide a clean energy option. The utility now offers a certified, low impact hydro option to customers and Timberland can choose clean energy for its distribution center in Kentucky. This type of proactive approach can spur other businesses and power generators to action.

Brian Colvin | 12/12/2009

Up until the early 1800's, corporations produced goods and needed to do so in a socially acceptable and responsible way. When they did not, their corporate charter was revoked or not renewed. The founders of America tried to make sure corporations were kept under control, the reason for the Boston Tea Party was the East India Company's power over the colonies granted by the Royal Crown.

In the mid 1800's, corporations brought the argument of corporate personhood in front of the US Supreme Court hundreds of times. Some of the people who wrote the amendments that gave rights to freed slaves, were former and future rail road employees. They made sure certain words were put in to afford corporations personhood. When amendments were passed that afforded freed slaves the rights of (all other) persons, corporations (previously known as artificial persons) again brought their argument in front of the Supreme Court countless times. The argument of the rights of freed slaves was put before the Supreme court less than 1% of the number of times corporations presented their arguments on personhood.

In 1886, court clerk and former rail road employee J.C. Bancroft Davis placed side notes in the case documents that were left unnoticed for years until he later published a book and pointed to those notes. Those notes (which were unsubstantiated due to the death of the Justice who reportedly made the remarks) included the following:
"The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of the opinion that it does."
Since then, corporations have fought for and won, limited liability (protecting CEOs and employees from criminal prosecution or loss of personal assets in the case of wrong doing), freedom of speech where they can lobby with hundreds of millions of dollars, freedom from search and seizure (freedom from EPA or health or workplace safety inspections).

Today, Corporations have one sole purpose, to make a profit for it's owners. And this is what they do, they make profits at the expense of their workers, the environment and the taxpayers. Prior to corporate personhood, corporations were only allowed to operate if they contributed to society in a positive manner. When they dabbled in politics, their corporate charter was revoked or not renewed. Essentially it is a corporate death sentence.

Today, corporate responsibility is a fad and little more than PR. Energy companies were under pressure in the mid 1900's about their pollution. Under the constitution, anything not covered under the constitution is covered by the state. Energy companies and pollution making industries lobbied the government to get regulation as to how much pollution they could dump. This, in effect made pollution legal. Had the people known what was going on, they would have most likely voted to not allow any pollution, and forced the companies to come up with alternative energies and pollution control back then. However it was touted as a way to put a collar on the corporations.

Want to know what corporations get away with? While they might like to tout themselves as the keepers of the American Dream, if you go to http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/twenty061207.htm and view the statistics, it's rather sobering.

Companies can and will pollute and destroy our environment as much as they need to in order to make higher profits. In order to put them in their place, the people need to come first, and corporations need to be treated not as people, but corporations. They need to act responsibly not because it is a fad, but because they have no other choice. Because you see, when it is a fad, you get CSR departments and PR campaigns that say they are doing the right thing, but they usually are not. When it may cost 5 million dollars to run that CSR and PR campaign, it would cost 50 million to actually do the responsible thing. And when they consider cutting their profits from 500m to 450m, well their purpose is to make a profit at any cost....... So they would rather spend a few million to say they are doing the right thing, rather than cut into their profits and actually DO the right thing. I mean if they are sitting around talking about it, that is as good as doing it.

Beth Holzman, CSR Strategy & Reporting Manager at Timberland | 12/3/2009

Don't tell us it can't be done! Check out Timberland's new petition that will be delivered in Copenhagen. Our message is that businesses will find a way to make environmentally conscious products and profits at the same time - and government needs to act now too by agreeing to a global deal on climate. Your voice can be heard by signing the petition at www.donttellusitcantbedone.com.

Ramsey | 11/30/2009

Global warming needs to be addressed by businesses in a more transparent way. Work together.

Betsy Blaisdell - Environmental Stewardship @Timberland | 11/13/2009

Thanks for your comment Adityajit. We do report inbound emissions. Unfortunately, we still struggle to get data on outbound emissions from our carriers. We hope to be able to receive and report this information in 2010. In the meantime, we use emission estimator tools internally to choose modes and routes based in part on those that produce the fewest emissions.

Interesting question about product returns. Quality assurance is our top priority independent of environmental concerns. The experience I have with returns was during a trial we did a couple of years ago. We collected boots that did not pass our QA test, were returned, or were brought back to us through a retail coupon incentive. We only got about 2000 boots back, which is a tiny amount for us. The feedback we received was that folks didn't want to give up perfectly good boots. The reason why we took the returns in the first place was to try recycling leather. From life cycle analysis we knew that if we could recycle old leather as uppers for new shoes, we could produce GHG savings much greater than those associated with shipping. We were successful in recycling the leather. The experiment inspired our Earthkeeper 2.0 line ( http://earthkeepers.timberland.com/index_ek_us.html ), which are boots whose leather and rubber can be recycled. So to get back to your question about returns, regardless of green we will always strive to produce the highest quality product (meaning 0 returns for quality issues). If we are not successful on that front, or if a consumer decides to upgrade their boots, we hope to have a viable closed loop recycling stream for our products that reduces the overall carbon footprint associated with the current, typical footwear supply chain.

Alli Hannon, Midwest Regional Manager, The Climate Group | 11/9/2009

Collaboration is easy to say but hard to do. It takes determination and focus to do the often tedious work of finding out 'what works now?', 'what are we missing', 'what policies do we need' and 'how are we going to pay for it?' Because climate change moves quickly and business moves quickly, collaboration from business with government and NGOs to answer these questions is critical, especially where the biggest greenhouse gas reductions can be made in buildings, vehicles, electricity and manufacturing. The answers are mostly there, they need to be communicated to the world and implemented at the speed of business.

Peter Holzaepfel, Member Engagement Manager @ The Climate Group | 10/30/2009

While it may seem a bit premature, I think that it’s essential to consider the challenges of implementing climate policy and meeting or exceeding the reduction targets. Timberland can be a key player in further collaboration between business, government, and the NGO community to demonstrate the viability of emerging low carbon technologies and build confidence for widespread implementation.

Adityajit Singh Tiwana, student, Bentley University | 10/28/2009

I just went through one of the "dig deeper" pdf files and saw that timberland does not include emissions from inbound/outbound transport of finished goods, etc. Perhaps I misunderstood this statement, but the way I see it, if Timberland were to include these emissions, especially ones originating from "return of shoes due to quality issues"; it would highly impact the global warming because, despite the fact that Timberland produces one of the best quality shoes in the world, there are always some products that slip through the cracks and are returned. The reduction of the transport emissions caused from such problems may not only impact Timberland positively, but will also impact the carbon emissions caused by Timberland.

Bruce Schlein; Citigroup Corporate Sustainability | 10/27/2009

I remember about a year ago a number of conversations about all of the energy efficiency $100 bills lying around that nobody was picking up; the low-hanging fruit. Those conversations touched on policy and incentive barriers - like the gap between ROI tenors and the time horizon typical homeowners plan to stay in their homes. And today we have a number of communities and firms successfully piloting solutions to these very problems - like property assessed clean energy (PACE) in Berkeley, Boulder and elsewhere, and now supported by broad coalitions of Federal agencies, labor unions and organizations like Ceres, EDF and NRDC. With clarity and certainty around problem definition we'll continue to see more innovative solutions.

Kimie Matsuo | 10/24/2009

I think the first step is definitely increasing public awareness in terms of the degree of urgency of this issue; Timberland is headed in the right direction through its participation in forums like this one. The U.S. is driven by business, so it's important for individual companies to make environmental issues a priority. Companies currently can use the fragile state of the economy as a scapegoat for not going green - after all, the implementation of new policies or technology is almost always costly. However, it's crucial to remember that the state of the economy is a temporary setback, but the state of the environment is something that we'll have to deal with forever.

Emily Barbeau | 10/21/2009

I dont think recycling is the answer because most of our things are going into landfills. So I think we need to come up with something a little better than that :)

Mariah Wallace | 10/21/2009

PAPER BAGS.

Kazuoki Tokuno | 10/20/2009

I definitely think that reducing our influences on "global warming" is very important, but in order to do that we have to make some investments in solutions. For instance investing in solar panels or wind turbines might save some trouble for the future (of course to have these you might need a lot of sun and wind). MacDonald also had a good idea of installing MotionPower speed bumps to use the customers tendency to go through drive thrus, and use that to produce energy (but this idea uses CARS driving through, so it may not be the greatest solution but it still works a little. . .? It's kinda like turning on a fan so you get the effect of the fan but it also pushes wind to a wind turbine so it makes energy). So to make a contribution to fighting "global warming" we should think of new unique ways of producing/saving energy. Immediate contributions would be to order products in bulk to reduce car traffic (there may be actually something wrong with this one), support car pooling (this may improve employee relations. . . or make it worse?), switching to energy conserving equipment. . . and that's all I have so far. We should also support fighting "global warming" publicly and say "Yes we can" (not meant for a political reference, just popped into my head).

This is from the top of my head, please don't judge me.

Jay Lancaster | 10/20/2009

As Tyle said, a sort of 'global collaboration' needs to take place in order to create awareness of climate change. As of right now, we already have worldwide movements going on, such as Earth Hour and Blackle (the 'environmentally friendly' version of google). But I think that where we need to improve awareness of climate change the most is in the business world. We need car companies to develop greener cars that go beyond just having better MPG. Electric cars are just starting to take off, and solar-powered cars seem to still be in the prototype phase from what I've seen. On top of this, we need factories to work on minimizing the amount of waste they produce. Once we can get awareness on the business level as well as the people level, that's when progress will start to be made.

Kristina | 10/20/2009

Reduce, reuse and recycle!

Matt Drew | 10/20/2009

Support Renewable Energy

Hannah Chadwick | 10/20/2009

reduce, re-use, recycle. Create a group that meets monthly to come up with better ways to stay green.

Kaylee G | 10/20/2009

recycle.

Tyle | 10/20/2009

Global Collaboration

Tom | 10/19/2009

Corporate america will be the deciding voice for reducing our collective carbon foot print. As business leaders we have a unique opportunity to influence both political policy and public opinion.

Jon Jacoby, Senior Policy Advisor, Private Sector Dept, Oxfam America | 10/17/2009

Combating catastrophic climate change will require systemic shifts guided by strong public policies and institutions. The high-value collaboration we need is thus the very kind that Timberland has undertaken as part of Business for Innovative Climate & Energy Policy (or BICEP - as clever an acronym as we get here in Washington). In particular, BICEP companies have done a superb job of showing that they have "skin in the game" when it comes to climate policy. Namely, they are making the business case for helping developing countries adapt and build resilience to climate change, what with droughts, floods, and storms putting the companies' supply chains at risk.
The emergence of BICEP and other business coalitions - coupled with the recent shifts and defections from the US Chamber of Commerce over climate/energy policy - open a very important space to talk about creating a long-term alternative to the Chamber (think of a multi-issue BICEP) that enables progressive companies to align their CSR commitments, public policy positions, and policy-related memberships.

Betsy Blaisdell - Environmental Stewardship @ Timberland | 10/16/2009

Fox News criticizes progressive businesses (ours included) for partnering with non profits to see climate legislation passed @ http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2009/10/15/tom-borelli-cap-trade-apollo-ceres/ . Why is it such a huge leap of faith to conceive that real climate action (reductions in energy demand and investments in renewable energy) makes business sense?

Christine Arena | 10/14/2009

In order to climb mount sustainability as quickly as possible we need to unleash the full forces of human inspiration and social media at the same time. We must recognize that part of what has been holding industry back is not a lack of solutions, technologies or innovation – but a plenitude of politics, policy and fear mongering. Mega corporations with lobbyists on capital hill have rigged a game that works to their short term advantage, but to the disadvantage of the planet and all of its inhabitants. This needs to change right now.

The fight against global warming is exactly that – a fight. We need radical companies, radical business leaders and radical citizens to take their gloves off, join forces via the Internet and move the needle together. That means calling companies out on their corrupt activities, protesting publicly (and virtually), and refusing to buy or invest whatever they are selling. This is the time for populist revolts against the corporate machine. It is also the time for overwhelming support of sustainable businesses that are legitimately investing in positive solutions. It is critical for our economy, our future and the global warming fight that companies like Timberland survive and thrive.

Jon L | 10/14/2009

Global warming is real. Why can't governments create incentives for corporations to focus on Enviromnetally friendly technologies. We should create a new economy based upon environmentally firendly businesses. This includes using environmentally friendly products and energy throughout the supply chain.

Instead of giving tax breaks and incentives to oil companies, give breaks to businesses that are working towards new technolgies, creating jobs and focusing on clean energy.

Oil companies make too much money and put relatively little back into new technologies primarily because they still make too much money off oil.

Ramsey | 10/7/2009

Companies do need to make more of an effort when it comes to just doing their part to put in place usage of eco-concious materials when manufacturing products.