Oil & Gas Spills in North America Since 2010

A question I sometimes ask of people who think that fossil fuels are here forever more and that electrification of everything will never happen... 

Has there ever been an oil spill in Yellowstone National Park? If so, how many?

Innovative Countries -- Global Innovation Index

This is a great summary of innovation by country from Visual Capitalist. See the Global Innovation Index (GII) map here:https://www.visualcapitalist.com/most-innovative-countries-2022/

First Published on IntellZine.com. Note the sustainability implications from innovation, and the lack of innovation.

We, at Strategic Business Planning Company, www.SBP.com, are always interesting in all aspects of innovation. Sometimes we hear from a layperson or an executive that the most innovative country in the work is ...  

Israel and Ireland were mentioned in recent years.  One executive said that "all innovation comes from Israel". All right, admittedly, Israel is a great source of innovation and invention, but it is a very small country (population, GDP). In absolute terms, Israel is not even close, but in relative terms (adjusted for size of country), Israel is a very respectable #16 in the world (GII score of 50.2).

Giving Season and a Sustainable Earth

It is giving season, with Giving Tuesday coming up after the long Thanksgiving weekend. Now is the best time of the year to reach out to your Donors and make sure that they are thinking of you as they give thanks for the year and give donations into the end of the tax year.  GivingTuesday.org  #GivingTuesday

Black Friday is named such as a target date for companies to move from losing money for the year into profits: out of the red and into the black. Basically, if you paid all your expenses at the beginning of the year, all future sales after the break-even point would be pure profits. Thanksgiving Day, at the end of November is a wonderful target, that leaves one month of pure profits. Plus, if the last month of the year is disproportionate – like Christmas sales – that is pure gravy!

Renewable Energy and IRA 2022

Quick take for Inflation Reduction Act 2022

The Inflation Reduction Act is a huge legislation act passed in 2022. It includes increases in taxes (mostly corporate related), limits to some spending (like drugs), and a lot toward energy efficiency and renewable energy. See the overview on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation_Reduction_Act_of_2022

Renewable Energy Incentives. The IRA has raised and extended the 30% investment tax credit to qualified renewable energy investments. There are many limitations and additions. Look for updated blogs here and get informed from the IRS and Treasury. 

Ryder CSR reporting. Easy(ier) then BIG initiatives

Ryder corporation has released its Corporate Sustainability Report for last 2021. They seem to be making more progress than many organizations, especially in the transportation industry. But their environment is one of the hardest to move to zero emissions. Long-haul trucking will be around for a long time and switching from diesel is difficult. All of the reporting creates fodder for anyone on the left, right or center to hammer on endlessly. See the Ryder Corporate Sustainability Report here: https://www.ryder.com/about-us/sustainability

Earth Day 2022 Who Killed the Electric Car?

 Earth Day 2022 (April 22, ’22) Who Killed the Electric Car?

The statistics and the forecasts for Global Warming and Climate Change are increasingly dire. The decision – and it is a decision – to do business as usual (buy big gas guzzlers) is becoming increasingly costly to the world. And the window to avoid the worst warming scenarios is closing. The CO2 and methane that we have been pumping into the atmosphere will persist for decades (centuries really) continuing to heat a warming world.

Planting trees and getting reforestation right

Reforestastion in order to bring back something similar to native forest, and to draw down carbon dioxide levers, is actually rather tricky. You can't plant a monosystem of, say, pine tries, especially if they are not native. 

One cool approach is to take acorns from an anchient native oak tree as one of 27+ natives in a reforestation areas. Check out this detailed article on BBC, 1,000-year-old oaks used to create 'super forest', by Hellen Briggs.

The EV Hurricane Disaster: a 1-sided scenario, part 2

Read  The EV Hurricane Disaster: a 1-sided scenario on our sister blog ScenarioPlans.com (also DelphiPlan.com). The EV disaster article analyzes a viral email that talks about how horrible it will be when a hurricane is storming into a population center and the electric vehicles are all stuck on the road with no possibility for charging.

The unauthored and undated email makes the implied conclusion that we shouldn’t go to EVs because they could be problematic in a disaster, stuck in a mass exodus from a hurricane with dying batteries and no place to charge.

When are Bird Feeders Bad Feeders?

The unintended consequences of helping out where help may not be needed: your fav garden birds.

(Along the same line is humming birds, if you don't keep the feeder water clean and safe, you might be endangering all those hummers you were trying to encourage.)

Sustainability means doing the right thing, as well as making sure that you watch to see if things that you do, don't do what you thought they were designed to.

BBC - Does feeding garden birds do more harm than good?

World Bee Day, May 20

 It's World Bee Day, May 20th. 

There are lots of people worried about bees, and rightly so. To mix a metaphor, bees are the canaries in the coal mine.