The Business Leader's Guide to the Low-carbon Economy

The Business Leader's Guide to the Low-carbon Economy
Author: Larry Reynolds
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 206
Release: 2016-04-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1317039602

Rising energy prices and concerns about climate change are driving us towards a new kind of economy - a low-carbon economy. What will this low-carbon economy be like, and what does your business have to do to prosper in this new business environment? Larry Reynolds shows how successful organisations are already learning to be more energy efficient, manage their carbon footprint, adapt to climate change and become truly sustainable. As well as explaining how to future-proof your organisation against possible threats, The Business Leader’s Guide to the Low-carbon Economy, tells you how to make the most of the many opportunities that the low-carbon economy will bring, especially in growing profits from new products and services. It is your guide to creating an organisation that will thrive in the twenty-first century. While there are plenty of published books about 'going green', there are none which explain the low-carbon economy and how to thrive in it. This book will fill that important gap. Drawing on examples from across industries, including businesses such as Asda, BT, Cargill, Coca Cola, Co-operative Group, Eurostar, Marks and Spencer, Tesco, Tesla, Walker's Crisps, Walmart and ZipCar, Larry Reynolds shows how today’s successful organisations are already benefiting from the coming low-carbon economy.

The Green Executive

The Green Executive
Author: Gareth Kane
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 290
Release: 2012-08-21
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1136529209

Over the last five years, the corporate sustainability debate has shifted from one of compliance to one of strategic competitive advantage. Accordingly, responsibility for environmental and sustainability issues has risen from management functions to director level executives. The Green Executive provides everything you need to know to develop a winning sustainability strategy and the leadership skills you require to implement that strategy. The first part of the book explores the business case for action taking into consideration opportunities, threats of inaction, risks of action and the ethical dimension. This is followed by an overview of global environmental problems, including the big three: climate change, resource depletion and toxic materials, and global solutions - including eco-efficiency and industrial ecology. The third part translates these large scale solutions into practical actions for a single business ranging from simple housekeeping measures through to innovative business models. The final, crucial part introduces the sustainability maturity model and provides an insight into how the highest level of that model can be achieved. A range of personal views is provided in the form of 18 exclusive interviews with senior level executives from a wide range of sectors including retail, transport, manufacturing, logistics and the service sector, from small businesses through to international giants like Canon, BT, Marks & Spencer, National Express and GlaxoSmithKline.

Designing Climate Solutions

Designing Climate Solutions
Author: Hal Harvey
Publisher: Island Press
Total Pages: 374
Release: 2018-11-01
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 1610919564

With the effects of climate change already upon us, the need to cut global greenhouse gas emissions is nothing less than urgent. It’s a daunting challenge, but the technologies and strategies to meet it exist today. A small set of energy policies, designed and implemented well, can put us on the path to a low carbon future. Energy systems are large and complex, so energy policy must be focused and cost-effective. One-size-fits-all approaches simply won’t get the job done. Policymakers need a clear, comprehensive resource that outlines the energy policies that will have the biggest impact on our climate future, and describes how to design these policies well. Designing Climate Solutions: A Policy Guide for Low-Carbon Energy is the first such guide, bringing together the latest research and analysis around low carbon energy solutions. Written by Hal Harvey, CEO of the policy firm Energy Innovation, with Robbie Orvis and Jeffrey Rissman of Energy Innovation, Designing Climate Solutions is an accessible resource on lowering carbon emissions for policymakers, activists, philanthropists, and others in the climate and energy community. In Part I, the authors deliver a roadmap for understanding which countries, sectors, and sources produce the greatest amount of greenhouse gas emissions, and give readers the tools to select and design efficient policies for each of these sectors. In Part II, they break down each type of policy, from renewable portfolio standards to carbon pricing, offering key design principles and case studies where each policy has been implemented successfully. We don’t need to wait for new technologies or strategies to create a low carbon future—and we can’t afford to. Designing Climate Solutions gives professionals the tools they need to select, design, and implement the policies that can put us on the path to a livable climate future.

Ireland's Green Opportunity

Ireland's Green Opportunity
Author: Peter Brennan
Publisher: Orpen Press
Total Pages: 379
Release: 2017-01-04
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1871305756

Ireland’s Green Opportunity: Driving Investment in a Low-Carbon Economy provides the first-ever overview of the green economy from an Irish perspective. Identifies business opportunities in all the main sub-sectors that comprise the green economy.Looks at export opportunities and trends in the UK, US and other major markets.Is an information source for project promoters, investors and employees.Covers the key policies that are driving the low-carbon agenda. For example, the science, economics and politics of climate change are covered by way of background, as are issues such as sustainability and the EU’s low-carbon strategy. Ireland will be responding to these ‘game changing’ issues over the coming period. Ireland’s Green Opportunity is therefore designed to help stimulate debate about our low-carbon strategy, while raising awareness about the business opportunities that will arise domestically and in export markets. Peer reviewed by eight of Ireland’s leading experts in climate change and the green economy, this groundbreaking book will be of interest to students, businesspeople and policymakers.

Green Innovation in China

Green Innovation in China
Author: Joanna I Lewis
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 305
Release: 2012-11-27
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0231526873

As the greatest coal-producing and consuming nation in the world, China would seem an unlikely haven for wind power. Yet the country now boasts a world-class industry that promises to make low-carbon technology more affordable and available to all. Conducting an empirical study of China's remarkable transition and the possibility of replicating their model elsewhere, Joanna I. Lewis adds greater depth to a theoretical understanding of China's technological innovation systems and its current and future role in a globalized economy. Lewis focuses on China's specific methods of international technology transfer, its forms of international cooperation and competition, and its implementation of effective policies promoting the development of a home-grown industry. Just a decade ago, China maintained only a handful of operating wind turbines—all imported from Europe and the United States. Today, the country is the largest wind power market in the world, with turbines made almost exclusively in its own factories. Following this shift reveals how China's political leaders have responded to domestic energy challenges and how they may confront encroaching climate change. The nation's escalation of its wind power use also demonstrates China's ability to leapfrog to cleaner energy technologies—an option equally viable for other developing countries hoping to bypass gradual industrialization and the "technological lock-in" of hydrocarbon-intensive energy infrastructure. Though setbacks are possible, China could one day come to dominate global wind turbine sales, becoming a hub of technological innovation and a major instigator of low-carbon economic change.

How to Live a Low-carbon Life

How to Live a Low-carbon Life
Author: Chris Goodall
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 298
Release: 2010
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1844079104

First Published in 2010. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Carbon Markets

Carbon Markets
Author: Arnaud Brohé
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2012-05-16
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1136570233

Winner of the Choice Outstanding Academic Titles of 2010 award. This book is a comprehensive and accessible guide to understanding the opportunities offered by regulated and voluntary carbon markets for tackling climate change. Coverage includes: - An overview of the problem of climate change, with a concise review of the most recent scientific evidence in different fields - A highly accessible introduction to the economic theory and different constitutive elements of a carbon allowances market - Explanation of the Kyoto Protocol and its flexibility mechanisms - Explanation of how the EU Emissions Trading Scheme works in practice - Ongoing developments in regulated carbon markets in the US - Up-to-the-minute coverage of regulated carbon markets in Australia - Developments in New Zealand and Japan - Carbon offsetting and voluntary carbon markets. Combining theoretical aspects with practical applications, this book is for business leaders, financiers, carbon traders, lawyers, bankers, researchers, policy makers and anyone interested in market mechanisms to mitigate climate change. The carbon emissions resulting from the production of this book have been calculated, reduced and offset to render the bookcarbon neutral. Published with CO2 Neutral

How to Avoid a Climate Disaster

How to Avoid a Climate Disaster
Author: Bill Gates
Publisher: Knopf Canada
Total Pages: 240
Release: 2021-02-16
Genre: Science
ISBN: 0735280452

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER NATIONAL BESTSELLER In this urgent, singularly authoritative book, Bill Gates sets out a wide-ranging, practical--and accessible--plan for how the world can get to zero greenhouse gas emissions in time to avoid an irreversible climate catastrophe. Bill Gates has spent a decade investigating the causes and effects of climate change. With the help and guidance of experts in the fields of physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, political science and finance, he has focused on exactly what must be done in order to stop the planet's slide toward certain environmental disaster. In this book, he not only gathers together all the information we need to fully grasp how important it is that we work toward net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases but also details exactly what we need to do to achieve this profoundly important goal. He gives us a clear-eyed description of the challenges we face. He describes the areas in which technology is already helping to reduce emissions; where and how the current technology can be made to function more effectively; where breakthrough technologies are needed, and who is working on these essential innovations. Finally, he lays out a concrete plan for achieving the goal of zero emissions--suggesting not only policies that governments should adopt, but what we as individuals can do to keep our government, our employers and ourselves accountable in this crucial enterprise. As Bill Gates makes clear, achieving zero emissions will not be simple or easy to do, but by following the guidelines he sets out here, it is a goal firmly within our reach.

Harnessing Farms and Forests in the Low-carbon Economy

Harnessing Farms and Forests in the Low-carbon Economy
Author: Zach Willey
Publisher: Duke University Press
Total Pages: 248
Release: 2007
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780822341680

As the United States moves to a low-carbon economy in order to combat global warming, credits for reducing carbon dioxide emissions will increasingly become a commodity that is bought and sold on the open market. Farmers and other landowners can benefit from this new economy by conducting land management practices that help sequester carbon dioxide, creating credits they can sell to industry to "offset" industrial emissions of greenhouse gases. This guide is the first comprehensive technical publication providing direction to landowners for sequestering carbon and information for traders and others who will need to verify the sequestration. It will provide invaluable direction to farmers, foresters, land managers, consultants, brokers, investors, regulators, and others interested in creating consistent, credible greenhouse gas offsets as a tradable commodity in the United States. The guide contains a non-technical section detailing methodologies for scoping of the costs and benefits of a proposed project, quantifying offsets of various sorts under a range of situations and conditions, and verifying and registering the offsets. The technical section provides specific information for quantifying, verifying, and regulating offsets from agricultural and forestry practices. Visit the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions website for audio from the press conference announcing the book. Read the press release announcing the book.