A business case for corporate sustainbility

The sustainability forum, part of the Corporate Executive Board [EXBD] has recently posted a PowerPoint presentation that provides a case study for sustainability.

The jury is still out when it comes to finding the silver bullet, but the presentation shows some tangible results from early movers. This presentation is divided into two broad sections

Planning and Structuring

1. Painting the urgency and need for sustainable practices
2. Structuring for sustainability
3. Returns on sustainable investment

Tactical Deployment

5. Reducing greenhouse gas (GHG)
6. Managing energy
7. Procurement
8. Product Development

It's definitely worth checking out. There are a couple key slides:

Perform a introspective sustainability risk assessment


Start with low-hanging fruit like energy efficiency:

Clothing arbitrage

Over the summer, I spent a couple days visiting my family in Vancouver. As we visited the area, K and I were surprised how expensive things were (and this was before the loonie caught up with the greenback). My aunt mentioned that it wasn't unusual that people would come down to the US to do their shopping.

According to a news article, its so prevalent that

At the Fashion Outlets mall just outside the city of Niagara Falls, managers have placed collection bins near the exits where Canadians customers can deposit their unwanted items.

Business is booming for a lot of border towns as our friends up north are cashing out at parity!