How many light bulbs does it take to change a supply chain? In the case of Baxter Healthcare Corp., just three. When Jenni Cawein, manager of corporate environmental health and safety engineering at the Illinois-based $9.8 billion health-care giant, arrived six years ago, she saw that the company was losing ground on waste. "I asked my boss, 'Who's working with purchasing?' It turned out it was nobody," she says. Cawein set out to build a case for integrating environmental criteria into the company's procurement process. Show them the money. Photo: iStockphoto. "I asked what the purchasing department cared about the …

I write from a quarterly meeting of Wal-Mart managers and execs, focused on implementing CEO H. Lee Scott's eco-friendly vision. (For more on that vision, see my interview with Scott.)   I never dreamed I'd find myself feeling anything but depressed after a day of immersive conference activities at Wal-Mart headquarters in Bentonville, Ark. But now that I'm here, I'm feeling decidedly optimistic. Granted, I was a tad creeped out when the 800-plus members of the audience erupted in a Wal-Mart chant that involved much gesticulating, grunting, sky-punching, and the like. ("Give me a W ... A ... L ... …

A nifty PBS show called California Connected recently did a special on organic food, focusing on Wal-Mart's decision to get into the organic-food market. It's unusually substantive and thoughtful (at least relative to cable tv fare). Check it out.

Several blogs have noted this item about Al Gore addressing the upcoming quarterly meeting on sustainability at Wal-Mart. Apparently Rich Cizik, Adam Werbach, and some other eco-luminaries will be there as well, and some fairly significant stuff is going to be announced. Our very own Amanda Griscom Little will be reporting from the scene. In the meantime, read her interview with Wal-Mart CEO H. Lee Scott, and to wash that corporate taste right out of your pristine progressive mouth, follow it up with this InterActivist with anti-Wal-Mart activist Al Norman.

Over the last few weeks, much of the world has clustered around TVs, watching World Cup rivals fight for the right to hoist what may be the ugliest trophy in sport. Inevitable arguments have broken out over who ought to win, and who invented "the beautiful game." As we head toward the final match this weekend, it's all made us wonder: could humankind ever apply that same energy and enthusiasm to the distinctly less exciting pursuit of sustainability? At some point along the way, whether you peg soccer's origins to soldiers in China's Han Dynasty, the Greeks and Romans, or …

Big banks sign on to stricter environmental and social guidelines Big financial institutions are increasingly talking green -- and some of them might even mean it. Forty-one lenders from around the world, including Citigroup and J. P. Morgan Chase, have signed on to the three-year-old Equator Principles, which call for investment projects to avoid harming the environment or local populations. Today the lenders unveiled a new, more rigorous version of those principles, which includes labor standards, calls for vetting of projects' environmental and social impacts earlier in the process, and applies to all projects costing at least $10 million, down …

As Google continues its march towards global domination with the launch of Google Checkout, Gristmillers can sleep soundly tonight knowing that the following prohibited items can't be sold/bought via the new service: Endangered species: Plants, animals or other organisms (including product derivatives) in danger of extinction Precious metals: Bulk sales of rare, scarce, or valuable metals The fact the former has to be listed is depressing. Luckily it will be a four-day weekend for Grist to lift the spirits!

Ford backs out on hybrid pledge, plans more alt-fuel vehicles Remember Ford's much-hyped commitment to produce 250,000 hybrid vehicles by 2010? Er, about that: CEO Bill Ford Jr. backpedaled on the promise Wednesday. While not abandoning hybrids altogether, he said Ford's focus (ha) is shifting (ha ha) to cars that can run on alternative fuels like ethanol, clean diesel, and biodiesel. In an email to employees, the CEO said the quarter-million-hybrids objective was "too narrow to achieve our larger goals of substantially improving fuel economy and CO2 performance." (Of course, ethanol substantially improves neither, so, uh, WTF?) Also on Wednesday, …

Whole Foods unveils initiatives to boost local and compassionate farming Whole Foods Market, the fast-growing natural-foods purveyor, has announced a series of initiatives that would support small, local farms and improve treatment of animals. In an open letter to food writer Michael Pollan, who has criticized Whole Foods for relying on "industrial organic" farms, CEO John Mackey described the chain's coming efforts to build a network of "animal-compassionate" farms, purchase more local food for its distribution centers, and even allow local farmers to sell food directly to customers in store parking lots.

Seismic movement could assist in oil production Like so much else in this crazy world, earthquakes are bad for you but potentially good for oil companies. Seismic shaking appears to increase permeability of underground rocks, leading to easier oil flow. "[T]his has practical implications for oil extraction," says University of California scientist Emily Brodsky, who with two other researchers published findings in Nature. Artificially shaking the ground, the researchers believe, could help extractors obtain oil from natural reservoirs; scientists already use vibroseis trucks (trucks that shake the ground) to take a sort of X-ray of the earth, determining the structure …