Gore lends heft to sustainable-business campaign launched by Prince Charles We were so excited when we saw that Prince was recruiting Al Gore for a green campaign. We loved thinking about the velveteen rocker and the ex-veep partying like it was 1999 again. But alas, it was gently pointed out to us that it's Prince Charles who's brought Gore on board, convincing him to join a project called Accounting for Sustainability that will encourage businesses to assess their eco-impacts. Launching Wednesday, the effort also involves BP head Lord John Browne. Prince Charles is apparently eager to be a model with …

Today's Wall Street Journal printed a letter from Senators Snowe and Rockefeller to ExxonMobil (here) along with an editorial about the letter (here). In the letter, Snowe and Rockefeller ask ExxonMobil to stop perpetuating the uncertainty agenda (which they refer to as the "obfuscation agenda"). The letter is similar in many respects to a letter sent to Exxon by the British Royal Society. The editorial is a broadside against the Senators. How dare they write that letter! You can feel the anger in it -- I'm quite certain the first draft was written in all caps. Here are a few …

Ron Steenblik. What work do you do? I am the director of research for the Global Subsidies Initiative, an ambitious new project under the auspices of the International Institute for Sustainable Development. What does your organization do? The GSI was created to measure, analyze, and illuminate subsidies that are undermining sustainability, through targeted research and communications. We are also trying to improve the amount and quality of information on subsidies that are reported to the World Trade Organization, and generally to support subsidy reform. What are you working on at the moment? Don't try to grease this palm. In October …

I've always been a bit appalled by the polite applause with which some enviros greet Wal-Mart's "green" initiatives. Seems to me that the only way the company could really "go green" would be to stop selling cheap plastic crap shipped in from halfway around the world in vast suburban megastores. In other words, completely change it's business model -- not, say, adopt "green" building techniques for its appalling superstores, or haul mass-produced "organic" food from California, Mexico, and China to stores nationwide, thus burning lots of fossil fuel and potentially squeezing profits for farmers and sparking consolidation and industrialization in …

The view from the Panoche Cotton Gin outside Firebaugh, Calif., reveals a great deal about the state of the cotton industry in the U.S. A generation ago, fields of cotton surrounded the gin as far as the eye could see. Today, the gin -- a warehouse-sized plant that can clean and bundle dozens of tons of cotton a day -- is flanked on all sides by almond orchards, groves upon groves of the tall trees. An endangered species? Photo: iStockphoto "Cotton used to be king -- it was our No. 1 crop," Joseph Maron, the operations supervisor for the gin, …

As serious governments shift the climate-change debate from whether the phenomenon exists to the best means to combat it, one of the first things officials want to know is how much economic damage it will cause -- and how much measures to fight it might cost. It is the trillion-dollar question, and figures are flying everywhere. But what do these numbers really mean? And how can people who space out at the sight of so many zeroes make any sense of them? It's hard to make sense of climate estimates. Photo: iStockphoto The dwindling do-nothing crowd likes to cite the …

French prime minister proposes an import tax on Kyoto-averse countries We'd like to preface this story on French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin with an amuse bouche: his name always makes us think of that Singing Nun tune from the '60s, which led us to a lyrics site today, which featured the offer, "Send the Singing Nun ringtones to your cell phone." What a world we live in. OK, on to the news: the French PM has proposed a European tax on imports from countries that don't play along with the Kyoto Protocol. Some see the idea -- which would …

Swoosh, for those not hopelessly entrenched in American consumer culture, refers to Nike, and is not to be confused with the enviably-young-and-far-more-talented-than-I-will-ever-be Smoosh. My point being: Nike has made the U.S. EPA's Top 20 Best Workplaces for Commuters from the Fortune 500 Companies list for the third year in a row, and was recently named among the top 10 companies for transparent corporate sustainability reporting by SustainAbility's Global Reporters program. Nike's commuter program, cleverly acronymed TRAC (Traveling Responsibly? Accept the Challenge), offers prizes and incentives to commuters who eschew the gasoline- or diesel-powered vehicle. Since 1992, it has reduced the …

Wal-Mart issues a progress report on its experimental eco-store The company greens hate to love is releasing a report today on progress at its year-old, experimental eco-store in Aurora, Colo. Wal-Mart is trumpeting its successes, from waterless urinals to LED lights in its freezers, and acknowledging its, uh, challenges, such as wind turbines that have short-circuited and recycled rubber sidewalks that have warped and faded. The mega-behemoth has also met with Target, Costco, and other competitors to try to gain allies (and drive costs down) as it seeks to green its other stores. While progressives shiver at the company's labor …

The Prius may soon be more than just one oh-so-stereotyped hybrid motor vehicle. Toyota's talking about starting a family of the cars, and in this case I'd have to support wanton reproduction. The automaker announced this week that they are considering creating a line of the gasoline-electric cars. It could include a wagon and a smaller, Smart-Car-esque inner-city model. U.S. sales of the Prius fell in the first quarter of 2006 simply because Toyota couldn't keep up with demand. Which probably means that folks who wanted a hybrid turned to other, less pleasant new cars. Which means news of increased …