Author name: Scott Cooney

Scott Cooney (twitter: scottcooney) is an adjunct professor of Sustainability in the MBA program at the University of Hawai'i, green business startup coach, author of Build a Green Small Business: Profitable Ways to Become an Ecopreneur (McGraw-Hill), and developer of the sustainability board game GBO Hawai'i. Scott has started, grown and sold two mission-driven businesses, failed miserably at a third, and is currently in his fourth. Scott's current company has three divisions: a sustainability blog network that includes the world's biggest clean energy website and reached over 5 million readers in December 2013 alone; Pono Home, a turnkey and franchiseable green home consulting service that won entrance into the clean tech incubator known as Energy Excelerator; and Cost of Solar, a solar lead generation service to connect interested homeowners and solar contractors. In his spare time, Scott surfs, plays ultimate frisbee and enjoys a good, long bike ride.

Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness: a Model for other countries?

Most economies around the world measure their prosperity and progress using a metric economists call the Gross Domestic Product, or GDP. It is measured by tracking economic activity on, well, everything. GDP is equal to the sum of the price of all goods and services sold in the country at any given time. We’ve argued

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University endowment divestment from fossil fuel stocks: effective?

A growing movement called “Go Fossil Free” at colleges across America is pushing University Endowment managers to divest from fossil fuel stocks. Currently, over 300 colleges, 74 cities and states, and several religious institutions are participating, meaning that they’ve moved their investment portfolios that support their endowments entirely away from coal, natural gas, petroleum, and

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Monsanto Patents the “No Cry BabyTM”: Inserted Rabbit Genes Eliminate Tear Duct

Monsanto today announced their latest innovation in genetic modification: a human baby that will never cry. Investors on Wall Street cheered the news, moving shares higher by 4.2% to close at $105.22 (NYSE: MON). According to the press release, the company got regulatory approval today after a 2 week public comment period closedΒ last week. It

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What is a carbon tax? And could it work?

It seems a perfect storm of events has lined itself up to create a political environment that *should* push forward a carbon tax. Will it happen, what would it do, and could it work? Let’s start with a quick definition. A carbon tax, in its simplest form, is simply a tax on polluting carbon emissions.

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Turtle Bay Resort: a sustainable place to host an event?

Oahu’s recent Wanderlust Festival provided yoginis the opportunity to mix and mingle with some of the yoga world’s biggest names: Shiva Rae, Baron Baptiste, Shakti Sunfire, Eion Finn and Michael Franti were fixtures in the festivities. Given the yoga crowd’s penchant for mindfulness, organic foods, and all things green, the choice of location for such

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Green, New York Style: A Sustainability Tour of the Big Apple

The Big Apple has moved decisively in the direction of being the green apple in recent years. Here’s the coolest green happenings in the big city. Transportation The city has moved aggressively to create an infrastructure that encourages cycling as a form of commuting, both to alleviate traffic and air quality issues and to facilitate

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Lyfe Kitchens cuts into Lean Cuisine’s market share with wholesome quick meals

LYFE Kitchens founder Steve Sidwell knew nothing about the grocery retail market, but he knew what demand was. Sidwell, who said he’d struggled with finding healthy, quick meals for years and battled weight issues as a result, was looking for a good tasting, healthy, quick meal plan that he could stock up in his fridge.

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Titans of eco-friendly industry, 2013 edition

The environment has become an increasingly big concern for companies around the world. While many companies are begrudgingly forced to abide by local environmental regulations, the are other companies that are constantly looking for new and more efficient ways to be green. In addition to our recent America-centric article about corporate social responsibility in the

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Buying Jewelry for Valentine’s Day? Avoid Conflict Diamonds

The trend for men spending more than women in preparation for Valentines Day is a global one, as early figures released in the U.S. seem to confirm. According to the study cited above, male consumers are planning to spend an estimated 75% more than their female companions on gifts and events this year. On the

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With the failure of big money, is it really important to overturn Citizens United?

Last week on our sister site Red Green and Blue, editor Jeremy Bloom argued that we people of all political stripes should rally around Senator Al Franken (D-MN), in his quest to overturn Citizens United. Last week was the third anniversary of Citizens United, the landmark Supreme Court ruling that opened the floodgates allowing secret

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Effects of the Fiscal Cliff deal on green energy and investment

Investors reacted lukewarmly to the passage of the “beyond midnight” fiscal cliff compromise that left Democrats unhappy and Republicans, well, unhappy. When investors react with a mere “meh” to a bipartisan deal that averted what we were told was the potential end of the world as we know it, that might mean one of two

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Options for investing in sustainability and the clean tech economy

While working in the green economy is an option for many people nowadays, there are many folks who, for one reason or another, do not, but would still like to support the growth of sustainability and clean tech. Good news–there are many ways that you can invest your money to help make a better world…and

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The effect of walkability and bikeability on real estate value

The housing boom and subsequent bust that caused the financial meltdown of 2008 in the U.S. had many origins. I’d argue that a main cause that has not received much attention was America’s commitment to accommodating the car. Urban planning changed radically when, after World War II, cars became the norm in America. No longer

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The UK’s Green Deal program set to help millions of Britons deal with rising energy prices

Worry sweeps across Britain as five of the β€œBig 6” energy companies declare their gas and electricity prices will have significantly risen by the end of 2012. With Christmas approaching and temperatures dropping in the UK, this news is hitting families and property-owners hard. The UK government, however, is set to launch its scheme, The

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How much will it cost for Europe to go entirely green?

The European Union has long been ahead of the curve in terms of sustainability efforts and legislative action around carbon emissions, cleaner energy, toxins in consumer products, and the like. The journey for the EU is well underway and looks to be picking up speed. For instance, pervasive GMO labeling laws across EU member states

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Crowdfunding strategies for social entrepreneurs

This is a great panel discussion about crowdfunding strategies in order to get a social-mission-driven company started (or a project developed). Jeff from Sustainablog hosted Tinia from Re-Nuble and Jen & Nick from TriplePundit, both of whom are doing crowdfunding campaigns at the moment, to talk about what’s going right, and what’s going wrong, with

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