Dialing Up Sustainability Dials Up Returns: Trillium’s “Sustainable Opportunities” Turns Three
In early 2008, nearly a dozen Trillium clients asked us to develop a new investment approach – one that seeks companies providing solutions to growing global sustainability challenges. Evolving from “do no harm,” their mantra became “invest in the innovators,” … Read more…
2011 Proxy Season Wrap-up
In August, we bade farewell to the 2010–2011 “proxy season,” the inside lingo for the annual cycle of filing resolutions, negotiating their withdrawal, and getting out the vote for the remainder that will appear on the spring proxy ballots. “A … Read more…
United Nations Releases Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights
Susan Baker Good news came out of the United Nations this summer that has positive implications for shareholder advocates and activists working to promote and protect human rights. The UN Human Rights Council (formerly the UN Commission on Human Rights) … Read more…
Of Climate Change and Cost Curves
Natasha Lamb As communities around the globe strive to meet ever-increasing energy demand and produce sustainable jobs and investments, we are at a crossroads where we must either aggressively adopt non-fossil fuel energy sources or risk exceeding the 2°C temperature … Read more…
Economic Impact of Japanese Earthquake Will Be Felt For Some Time
Cheryl Smith, Ph.D., CFA As we watched the awesome power and devastation of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami, our attention bounced between concern for the more than 18,000 people either dead or missing, horrified fascination with the evolving control issues … Read more…
Financial Reform Hits the Skids
Jonas Kron In March of this year, in the depths of the market sell-off, Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner appeared before the House Financial Services Committee to discuss the need to fix the nation’s financial regulatory system. Geithner told the … Read more…
The “Cleaner” Fossil Fuel? Not Quite Yet
Natural gas is widely recognized as the least environmentally damaging fossil fuel, one that will play a key role in bridging our transition to a greener energy future. Although reserves of conventional natural gas have been steadily decreasing in recent … Read more…
Indecent Exposure
Over the past year, the chemical bisphenol A (BPA) has received increasing scrutiny from consumers, scientists, regulators, the media and investors. You may have heard about it when Canada declared it unsafe. Or maybe when the water bottle manufacturer Nalgene … Read more…
The (R)evolution Will Be Computerized: Web 2.0 Technologies Will Make “Shareholder Democracy” a Reality
Just as doctors at dinner parties hear about fellow guests’ medical dilemmas, people tend to confess to me that they throw out their shareholder proxy ballots. They’re too jargon-filled and arcane, and who’s got the time to evaluate whether the … Read more…
Betting on the Farm: Sustainability Reporting Reaches the Ag Sector
Susan Baker Martin with Jonas Kron Twenty years after the launch of Ceres catalyzed sustainability reporting in the industrial sector, several efforts are underway to bring sustainability measures and reporting to agriculture and food production, and not a moment too … Read more…