As The New York Times pointed out last year, organic cotton isn’t the up-and-coming fabric for denim that it once seemed to be — but that doesn’t mean your eco jean options have disappeared.

Here are 10 denim options that take sustainability beyond organic by looking at the entire process from start to finish.

Vintage

The most sustainable pair of jeans you can buy, of course, is the kind that have already been worn: Scouting vintage stores, eBay, or even your parents’ closets for classic styles, washes, and cuts can save you money while cutting down on the resources you’ll use when buying new.

But as with other vintage buying habits, you’ll want to have a good tailor on hand to get a custom fit; ask them specifically to keep the original hem (if you’re getting the jeans shortened) and you’ll never know they weren’t made just for you. (Vintage Levis, $40)

Loomstate

Loomstate is one of the most popular go-to brands for men’s and women’s denim, and they do still offer organic options, like the 99 percent organic Kharma women’s jeans: A modern five-pocket dark wash option in a bootcut shape.

The men’s Revival style is a five-pocket bootcut made from 100 percent organic cotton and finished with a lightly tinted wash. (Kharma, $158; Revival, $178)

Nau

Outdoor clothier Nau also offers sustainable denim options for women — including the slim straight jean with neatly tailored back pockets and a waistband lined with poplin.

The pants are made from 97 percent organic cotton and finished with 3 percent spandex for a comfy stretch — and they come without distressing, so production doesn’t require any chemical sprays or resins. (Slim Straight Jean, $90)

Patagonia

Technorati Tags cotton denim, Loomstate, pair of jeans, Patagonia, revival style, vintage levis

Wrath’s 2010 Ex Vite Pinot Noir is complete, with lots of black cherry and red raspberry. A bit fuller than your typical Pinot, this wine is as drinkable as it is food friendly. It’s also vegan. It retails for $38 and can be purchased at Wrath’s website.

If it were a sunny 75 degrees here in San Francisco, this is the wine I’d have right next to the BBQ. Its earthy undertones are perfect for almost anything you’d throw on. I am thinking fava beans.

Wrath is SIP certified like a few of the other wineries we have interviewed, such as Halter Ranch and Ancient Peaks. In fact, one of SIP’s founders–Steve McIntyre–is actually Wrath’s viticultural consultant. Stay tuned for our feature on Wrath in the coming months.

Visit the Green Wine Guide for more eco wineries and vegetarian recipes.

Follow us on Twitter @GreenWineGuide or meet our wine guru @JerryJamesStone.

Fan us on Facebook for daily wine recommendations.

Offered by our myBIGearth friends at Tree Hugger

Technorati Tags green wine, red raspberry, wine guide, wine guru, wine recommendations

Last week, just after I put up my article asking if you are using your soul’s energy to expand or contract, I was given the gift of meeting with Chan Luu, the world-renowned fashion jewelry designer. After sharing with Chan Luu the work we are doing to create our GPS for the Soul app and go-to-guide for getting back on course when stress overtakes us, I asked her to share how she manages to keep herself in balance.

She began immediately by focusing on one of life’s biggest rocks, the day-to-day choices we make to lead an authentic, balanced and fulfilling life. She told me that after spending considerable time doing some soul searching following her divorce, she came up with a formula that works for her. She emphasized that it took considerable time and commitment to retrain herself so that she would consistently make choices that matter.

How Much Toxicity Will You Allow Into Your Life?

She quickly reframed the question of leading an authentic life into one of how much toxicity we are willing to live with and allow into our daily experience. What an incredible question and reminder that soul-centered guidance is all around, if only we choose to receive it when it shows up.

Chan Luu told me that we need “skill in self-nurturing,” that we need to learn to set and maintain boundaries around our personal and professional lives. A world-class designer with an amazingly-successful business, she added that she had to learn “to make her business work around time for herself” instead of the other way around. She defined time for herself as having “self-love and respect for self,” explaining that just as companies have good infrastructures to support their work, we need to apply the same principles to our own personal lives.

A Formula For Well-Being

She then led the way into this profound insight of self-discovery: You must develop and exhibit a commitment to yourself and take time to nurture yourself, every day. Successful businesses pay attention to their customers, to their employees, to their processes, and to their quality every day. What is the equivalent for paying attention to your life?

When I asked her how she managed this herself, knowing that she travels the world, running her very successful business across multiple time zones with all manner of people to support and nurture, she took me into what she called her own personal formula for living “a life that works well.” In the lexicon of our soon-to-be-released GPS for the Soul app, she gave me her “playlist” and navigation guidelines for leading a successful, balanced, and fulfilling life.

Invest your personal and business time in people you love: Only invest your time with those people who nurture you and with whom you enjoy spending time. Get rid of your friends or business associates who are toxic, who complain, or who bring negativity to you. Spend time with people on the same path, people who are uplifting, with whom you can laugh easily, people with whom you can solve life’s crises jointly, in a spirit of love and caring. The others may still be “friends,” just not the friends you spend much time with.

Invest your time in things you love to do: If you don’t love what you are doing, why are you doing it? Just as you surround yourself with people on the same path, so too surround yourself with the kinds of tasks or things to do that bring you joy. Easier said than done, to be sure, but if you don’t start with the question in mind, how will you ever get there?

Your happiness is your responsibility: If you aren’t happy in your own skin, what experience will you bring to your friends? Chan Luu never raises her voice to another: “Upset hurts me as much or more than it hurts the other person. Why bring upset to another let alone to myself?”

Develop a routine that works for you: Chan Luu has a regular routine that may seem enviable, but as she noted, it took her a long time to develop the commitment and the practice that she shares here. While this may seem daunting at first, can you find at least one of these practices that you can adopt yourself, and get yourself moving? Remember, your GPS will help you recalculate your route if you get off course, but it can’t provide any help at all if you don’t get yourself out of park and start moving.

• Focus on your health first: Go for a walk, do some yoga, exercise, go to the gym, meditate — take care of yourself or you won’t have anything to share with others. (I have found this one to be particularly important myself, and won’t let the day start without quality time meditating. Next up, I need to add back some daily yoga and exercise.)
• Get your priorities clear: Review email, calendar and projects and then assign priorities for where you will spend your day.
• Thank God It’s Monday! Go to work, loving what you do and then bring passion to your job and allow your creativity to spark. Every day. (If you don’t love it now, what can you change, either about the job itself or about the attitude you bring to the job every day? Even a small shift can help — remember that GPS needs you to be moving in order to help guide you.)
• Your home is your sanctuary: Make a purposeful point to slow down and take good care of who you are and your environment when you return home each day. Make your space something you find beautiful, relaxing and inviting. Plants, flowers, and art help switch gears; set a beautiful table even if you are dining alone. Savor your food, listen to music you enjoy, make your surroundings peaceful.
• Be with your friends: Your BlackBerry is not allowed at the table — if you are going to be with your friends, be with them. BlackBerrying at the table is just plain rude. If your friends insist that they can’t be without the constant electronic tether, perhaps these aren’t your real friends.
• Friday night slumber parties: Chan Luu has something unique she does every Friday — she has a stay-at-home slumber party for herself and her dog. She simply hunkers down to enjoy her sanctuary, to let go of the world, and to restore herself to her inner peace.

Take time for yourself every day: Every evening — EVERY EVENING — do something that brings you joy. That could mean listening to your favorite music, playing an instrument, engaging with your hobbies, preparing your own food, spending time with your nurturing friends, etc. In Chan Luu’s case, she makes certain that she plays the piano at least one hour every evening and reads some poetry. She also makes certain that she takes time to enjoy her painting. (For me, this means bringing my music back into my daily practice.)

Turn off the world every night: Chan Luu told me she used to wake up every night around 3 a.m. troubled by anything from tasks not yet done to news of the day. She now turns off everything electronic, including the television, computer, email, BlackBerry, etc. at least two hours before she goes to bed. (Electronic stimulation can stay with you as you try to sleep. Even one email or news story about the latest tragedy can get your mind going like crazy. My personal commitment here is to turn off the email by 10 p.m. Hopefully, the world will somehow manage if I’m not perpetually “connected.”)

What about you? If you paid more attention to the quality of experience you would prefer, what small changes could you make that could help you move more into that balanced, fulfilling life you would prefer?

Offered by our myBIGearth friends at The Huffington Post

Technorati Tags chan luu, gps, stress, toxicity

“Whenever you do a thing, act as if all the world were watching.” — Thomas Jefferson

Yikes. Is that a solution, or the DSM-IV definition of social anxiety disorder?

The house lights dim, the stage is dark save for one spotlight, the kind that follows your every move. You stand up to your moment — your big moment — to make a difference. OK, so maybe you’re just standing up to order your morning coffee. But the words fail you, your tongue ties, and in a fury you find that your jumbled mind has just ordered the nonexistent: double decaf lafté… No! No!, I mean, I meant latté! Double decaf latté! The crowd laughs wildly (in your head). Zap! That made a mistake feeling stays with you for hours. Meanwhile, the imagined audience, who never really noticed in the first place, has moved on to other business of the day, in which, shockingly, you do not play a starring role.

This is good news.

The humble and highly reassuring fact that we should be brushing our teeth with three times a day is that no one cares. Not in that way. Now, if you instead had stumbled and dropped that double decaf “lafté,” people would have swooped in to help. Fact is, once you make it past middle school, people mostly care in good ways, in the ways we need. People aren’t on the sidelines judging our lives with the clipboard and whistle, and neither should we. Mistakes, hiccups, guffaws, even awkward silences are the order of the day. At any given moment they are happening to millions across the globe. It’s not personal, not a deep, permanent flaw: it’s just part of being alive.

So, with apologies to Mr. Jefferson: We are the ones who perpetuate the unhelpful view that we are on display and that all the world is watching. But we don’t have to. We can instead choose to duck out from under the stage lights and realize that the idea that life is a high-stakes performance exists only in our own heads. And nota bene, if we do insist on focusing on what the audience is seeing rather than focusing on what we’re doing, well, chances are we might actually not do as well. You can’t be on stage and in the audience at the same time, time travel being what it is these days.

Whether it’s “order panic” that beleaguers you, or performances with a higher degree of difficulty, maybe even those with actual audiences who have bought tickets or are missing episodes of Mad Men to see you, know two things: First, you are not alone. Public speaking tops the charts from every fear survey since the beginning of number-crunching time. Second: These moments don’t have to be terrible, and could even be enjoyable if you heed one important detail. From athletes to virtuosos, making peace with your audience inevitably comes down to one thing: forgetting they are there. Except at the end, with the applause, at which point, your eyes and your heart should open wide.

Public speaking and other performance situations can breed fear in the hearts of the most decorated men and women, and can set those decorated hearts racing. But the moments that we dread are usually ones that we are supremely qualified to handle, if only the amygdala (the hub of the brain’s fight-or-flight system) in an effort to protect us from threat, wasn’t actually creating more of it by holding our minds and tongues hostage.

It’s not the situation that’s the problem — the task is easily in your range. The problem is your overzealous worry system that has you gearing up for an attack.

How do we turn off the alarms and do our best work? Whether we are asking where the bananas are at the supermarket, asking someone out on a date, or singing Puccini, remember that this isn’t about performing and being judged, it’s an opportunity to connect on the most basic level. And that’s what we all want. And that’s what we all do.

Here are five strategies to not let your amygdala ruin your day.

Stay in Your Time Zone: The Present: What’s the best use of your time, 15 minutes of catastrophizing or 15 minutes of planning to succeed? When you have an upcoming event, don’t project into the future doing the preview and cringe of worst case scenarios that aren’t likely to happen, stay in the here and now and do your job. Try something novel, focus on what you actually need to do right now to make things turn out better: practice, get advice, get sleep. This is what athletes do. Putting on their game face doesn’t mean focusing on winning or losing, it’s warming up, concentrating on their feet, their swing, or their form. So stay in the present and give yourself the gift of being prepared, not scared.

Think Process Not Perfect: When we do an event-in-review in our minds, we freeze frame on what we wish we’d done better or differently, and completely overlook the overall impression we’ve made based on all those (forgettable to us) moments that worked out just fine. Not every moment is a standalone spot-check of our self-worth. Lower the stakes, not the standards. We aren’t judged by single snapshots; we all have those moments that are less than flattering, but we are more than that. The feature-length films of our lives contain the good, the bad, and the ugly, and that total package adds up to something pretty great.

What’s Your Mission? How do we forget about the critic? Refocus on why you’re there in that moment. So you’re going to your first Al-Anon meeting and dreading the introduction. Remember, big picture is that you’re there to get support. And the people you’re talking to want to give it. Or, at a job interview, anchor yourself with truly what you can see draws you to the job and what you’d have to offer. Giving a fundraising presentation to a parent group? Don’t get hung up on the particular choice of words, focus on the meaning — that’s the message. Nothing burns through panic like purpose.

Think the Best of Your Audience and Focus on the Best, Too: OK, let’s say you can’t forget that your audience is there. Fine. But if that’s the case, then remember who they really are. Chances are they are not hungry wolves waiting to attack you, given the fact that they want or need to hear what you have to say. Yes, there will always be the grumpy person here and there, but not every bell tolls for thee. The guy snoring in the front row is tired. The cranky, know-it-all guy in the fourth row was that way before you came along, and will continue to be that way long after you pack up and head home. So as you are looking out at the sea of faces, make good choices. Fix your gaze on the smiling faces who are nodding their heads in agreement or tapping their feet to your beat, rather than the ones that are shaking their heads or busying themselves with their Blackberries.

Finesse the Flaws: I’m OK, You’re OK: A grade-school music teacher conveyed one of the most basic lessons of life, as often happens in those tender years: If you make a mistake during a performance, as long as you don’t jump up and down pointing to yourself accusingly and have your facial expression or gestures say in so many words “That was me!” then the audience will not even notice. Beyond that, as adults, we can learn how to finesse a mistake to our advantage: Find a humorous excuse and join with your audience rather than seeing them as the madding crowd, say: “Let’s try that again,” or, “Oh — this could be a very unfortunate moment, let’s all pretend that didn’t happen, OK?” Then keep going, and people will see what a cool, well-adjusted person you are who knows full well that a small glitch or stumble over words barely scratches the surface of your vast, limitless self-worth. Or, if you’re not quite up for that interpretation, know that you will have totally faked them out. Bravo! Well done.

This concept of leading the way through a mistake was demonstrated to me, unforgettably, a few years ago at a rock concert. Russian-born singer-songwriter Regina Spektor was performing at the Electric Factory, a gritty venue for diehard fans in Philadelphia. In the middle of an amazing show, Regina suddenly forgot the words to the song she was singing. Without missing a beat, she gestured the microphone out to the audience and we were more than happy to fill in. No one was judging Regina at that moment, I’m pretty sure we all felt like her new best friend. Not wanting to merely leave it at Wow, that was a close call!, Regina took that moment to a new destination. At the end of the song, she said, “This is so exciting! I made the biggest mistake of my tour… in PHILADELPHIA!!” The crowd went wild. Yes we were watching, and by dint of a few forgotten lyrics, we all connected in that moment, and it was even more sublime.

Offered by our myBIGearth friends at The Huffington Post

Technorati Tags emotional intelligence, happiness, performance anxiety, psychology

For many solar power projects, a permanent installation and a custom design makes complete sense. But it’s a complex process, and the entire project needs to be set up before you can get any power from it – it’s not exactly plug ‘n play. However, if you need temporary power on a jobsite, or a renewable energy install at a location which doesn’t lend itself to most solar array mounting methods, SunPods might be the answer.

SunPods are factory-built solar arrays, pre-assembled and wired and ready to go almost from the moment it hits the ground on your location.

“Unlike conventional solar arrays which rely upon custom system designs that are assembled in the field, SunPods manufactures and delivers standardized solar arrays that are fully assembled, tested, and pre-wired in our factory – ready to power-up on delivery to the project site.”

SunPods can be run as a single, standalone system, but because these solar arrays are modular, they can also easily be connected together in multi-unit arrays to scale up power generation to as big as a solar farm.

“Why is this different? Traditional ground-mount solar systems require custom engineering and design, site preparation, construction, and on-site assembly. These processes are inefficient, add unnecessary costs to finished systems, slow implementation times, and make solar more expensive than it needs to be. SunPods’ standardized, factory-assembled solar arrays yield higher quality, more reliable solar systems that cost less to install and can be installed in a fraction of the time.”

Offered by our myBIGearth friends at Tree Hugger

Technorati Tags power generation, renewable energy, solar array, solar power, standalone system, temporary power

This project first caught my eye as a fairly dumb reuse of electronic components — after all, in what world would a bikini like this be considered practical or even safe to wear? We’ve seen our share of shoes, bras and even boxers made out of old computer parts but they’re sculptures, not actually wearable. But when I looked a little closer, I realize the brilliance of it.

Created by Jennifer Shannon and Andi Cheung, the bikini calls in to question the role of women in the technology industry. This project hits home for me; considering my role as Technology editor on TreeHugger and the women in my life leading careers in the tech sector, it’s never been a question to me that women can be perfectly successful in and important to the industry. And yet, there just aren’t that many women taking part. Why? It’s a question that has been asked by many for years with no answer that really satisfies the inquiry.

EarthTechling points out, “We know that diversity in the workplace, especially fields of scientific research and technology, breeds faster, more quality innovation. So why is it so hard to find women in these fields? Some say that societal gender roles, either implicitly or explicitly expressed, teach girls to downplay or ignore their abilities when it comes to math and science.”

So what might bring them back? Some say make it fashionable. Literally.

Shannon and Cheung created this bikini to make a statement about what some think is the bright idea for getting more women involved in the tech industry, by making it about crafts and fashion.

The artists state: “The bikini is adorned with bulky and out-dated components from old ITP projects and is both technology useless and painful to wear, exaggerating our interpretation of many of the wearable fashions and craft that have been heralded as paving the way for more women in technology.

“Mimicking the layout from a light, mainstream women’s magazine, actual quotes from well-known technologists promoting the ability of wearable technology to bridge the gap for women in STEM overshadow research stats from the National Science Foundation, The Anita Borg Institute, and the American Association of University Women on the negative impact of gender and stereotype threats.”

Okay, okay. I’m a craft nut and I openly admit thinking that wearable electronics like a bike turn signal jacket is really, really cool (and, um, yes, that was created by a woman). But is leaning on fashion not a damaging way to get women interested in technology, a strategy that perpetuates roles and stereotypes as much as ever? I don’t claim to know the solutions for engaging women in tech, but I have a feeling we can start with sexism in classrooms first and move on to sexism on a broad scale second, rather than latching on to a stereotype and running with it.

DesignBuzz states, “As far as the project being a response representative of gender stereotypes faced by women when technology is concerned, the piece does more to reinforce them rather than educating us otherwise. Bits of old computer parts on what appears to be a very prickly bikini isn’t very thought provoking or stereotype breaking or even functional by any stretch of the imagination is it?”

Well, it is, if you stop and think about what’s being said. How many people will actually do that is up for debate. It is, after all, a little bit like the PETA ads with hot naked people saying they’d rather go bare than wear fur. Honestly, if you look like the folks in the ads then not a lot of people will complain if you do walk around naked. So is it really effective? Probably not. Will people do more than look at a zzzexy woman in a geeked out bikini with this project? Maybe not. But I sure hope they bother to. The piece itself is thought provoking, but you have to be open to the work that comes with interpretation.

The importance of women in the environmental movement is obvious — I won’t go into a rant about the studies, theories, and actions that have proven women play a vital role in keeping our earth inhabitable, but they’re there if you do a search — and with technology as an overarching driver to human civilization and how we interact with the planet, incorporating women in the industry would be a very good thing.

There is far more to technology than the (admittedly up-and-coming) wearable electronics sector. So, let’s figure out a way to bring in girls and women to science, math and technology fields that doesn’t begin with including them in a Susie Homemaker capacity.

So what are your thoughts?

Offered by our myBIGearth friends at Tree Hugger

Technorati Tags diversity in the workplace, electronic components, mainstream women, treehugger, wearable fashions, women in technology

Philadelphia-based multifamily property management firm Korman Residential has converted hundreds of apartments into KindSpace earth-friendly apartments in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and Florida. These KindSpace apartments incorporate renewable materials, energy efficiency, water conservation, and a reduced carbon footprint thanks to locally sourced materials.

“The KindSpace program has greatly outperformed our projections. Customer demand for sustainable, earth-friendly apartments is growing stronger every day,” explains John Korman, CEO of Korman Residential.

Each of the KindSpace apartments save over 4,000 gallons of water annually, the paint contains 0% volatile organic compounds to reduce smog, and even the tiles, counters, carpets, and stainless steel backsplashes contain recycled material.

Every KindSpace apartment features a sustainable Modernista Kitchen, designed to provide residents with the best in-home culinary experience possible by bringing together natural, renewable materials in an imaginative way. The Modernista Kitchen has stainless steel Energy Star Rated appliances, pre-consumer recycled custom engineered maple flooring and natural maple cabinets from regionally sourced FSC Certified wood with 100% recycled pre-consumer material.

Industry expert Kate Good adds, “We are now seeing renters make their decision to rent based on an apartment community’s commitment to living green.”

“We are eager to share this earth-friendly business model that has proven successful across our portfolio,” states James Korman, President of Korman Residential.

Korman Residential owns and manages multi-family property portfolios in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and Florida, and currently provides third party property management services to select clients. To find out more, contact Director of Marketing Aaron Helfman at 215-284-4791 and visit www.LiveKorman.com.

Offered by our myBIGearth friends at PRNewswire

Technorati Tags apartment community, friendly apartments, korman residential, multifamily property management, sustainable earth

Acciona, a big renewable energy company based in Spain, says it is naming its new 32-megawatt wind farm in Oklahoma “Big Smile.” The name is an oblique reference to an Acciona employee who died last year, the company says.

That makes the wind farm one of the few in the United States not named for its location or a nearby geographic feature. Google lists 102 operating wind farms of 120 megawatts or more in this country, plus two under construction and 24 proposed, none of which are named after anyone, although some bear the name of a town that was named after a person long ago.

From the Buffalo Ridge wind farm in Minnesota to the Grand Ridge wind farm in Illinois, from Crow Lake in South Dakota to White Creek in Washington State, from Bent Tree in Minnesota to Leaning Juniper in Oregon, the naming convention for wind farms is clear.

Other kinds of generation stations are named after people, however. The Hoover Dam on the Colorado River is named after the country’s 31st president, although Hoover initially opposed it; the Chief Joseph Dam on the Columbia is named for the legendary Nez Perce leader. Then there are nuclear plants like Robert E. Ginna, near Rochester, N.Y., and H.B. Robinson, near Hartsville, S.C., both named after executives of area utilities, as are coal plants like Dean Mitchell in Indiana, Philip Sporn in West Virginia and W.S. Lee in South Carolina.

The Alvin W. Vogtle nuclear complex in Georgia, which will be the largest in the country if the Southern Company’s construction program is completed as planned, is named for a former company chairman who was a World War II aviator and the model for the character played by Steve McQueen in “The Great Escape.” (He never jumped a fence with a motorcycle, according to plant executives.)

Ronald Reagan has airports, buildings and bridges named after him, but not a wind farm.

Why aren’t wind farms named after people? Perhaps because they are built by companies that are not old enough to have retired executives they wish to lionize. Or maybe the builders think the geographic names will make them more popular than other kinds of names. (The nuclear industry has plants named Millstone and Turkey Point, names possibly not chosen with likability in mind.)

Readers are invited to suggest someone whose name might grace a wind farm, or to ruminate on these naming conventions in general.

Offered by our myBIGearth friends at the New York Times

Technorati Tags buildings and bridges, megawatt wind farm, renewable energy company, wind farms

Last week Honest Tea launched a Facebook app that may just encourage you and your peers to recycle. The company is working with an ad agency to embed more sustainability thinking by bringing up your old Facebook postings.

The Great Recycle is part of Honest Tea’s campaign to recycle every bottle the company produces by 2020. This new campaign will kick off publicly tomorrow, when a 30-foot-tall bin in New York’s Time Square will arise in an attempt to collect over 45,000 beverage containers in one day–which is the company’s average daily sales in New York City.

Here is how the social media campaign works. First users have to join the Great Recycle app on Facebook. Users, of course, have to allow Honest Tea and its partners to access your information. Assuming you are comfortable with that, the app will then file through your old posts and suggest past postings that received a bevy of “likes” and comments. To avoid the embarrassment of the dredging up of posts complaining of hangovers or expletive filled tirades while you were placed on hold by a customer service representative, the user has the option to select which post he or she wants “recycled.” That app is then reposted to your timeline, and, viola! Your post from the past is re-posted with a message that promotes recycling.

But wait, there’s more! Recyclebank fiends will score points that they can redeem towards their favorite products.

Cutting edge or creepy? Innovative or invasive? Watch the video for yourself and decide if this is a worthy effort. Honest Tea has a history of tacking sustainability issues–even with Coca-Cola as a part-owner, a transaction that at first worried some of its fans. From  fair trade commitment to the planting of trees in regions affected by wildfires and programs that fund state parks during an era of budget cuts, the company has plenty of fans who admire the company for its activism.

My guess is that this sustainability campaign will succeed and score some recycling converts.

Leon Kaye, based in California, is a sustainability consultant and the editor of GreenGoPost.com. He also contributes to Guardian Sustainable Business and Inhabitat. You can follow him on Twitter.

Offered by our myBIGearth friends at Triple Pundit

Technorati Tags facebook, honest tea, partnership, recyclebank

With nations around the world vying for clean energy leadership, India has taken a bold step toward becoming a leader in solar development. In only two years under India’s ambitious national solar policies, prices for solar energy in India have dropped dramatically, approaching the price of traditional energy from fossil fuels. While the Indian government has a long way to go to reach its goals of 20 gigawatts of solar energy by 2022, India’s experience is a strong example of how national and state policies can unleash the potential of clean energy.

Just last week, NRDC and our partner, the New Delhi-based Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW), released a new report showing how — in just two years — India’s National Solar Mission has transformed the solar market in India. The report, Laying the Foundation for a Bright Future, is the first independent, external analysis that’s been done on the strengths and hurdles faced by India’s solar efforts.

India’s solar numbers are nothing short of impressive: Under the first phase of the project, India’s installed solar capacity jumped from only 17.8 MW to over 500 MW. During that time, solar energy prices dropped to as low as Rs. 7.49/kWh, or $0.15 USD/kWh, faster than most anticipated, as we discuss at the U.S.-India Energy Summit hosted by TERI and Yale University.

Why are those prices significant? In India, solar energy is approaching grid parity, or the point where it can compete with energy from traditional sources like coal and natural gas — a fairly remarkable feat for such a young market. In order to make the transition to clean, safe sources of energy around the world, we need these new technologies to be able to compete with long-standing, dirtier sources of fuel, which have dominated the market for centuries. India is providing a strong example for other countries of how we might get there.

As India enters Phase 2 of the National Solar Mission, we know there are significant opportunities to grow the Indian solar market even more. As part of our report, NRDC and CEEW outlined concrete and feasible steps the central government, private sector and other stakeholders can take to work toward the Mission’s goal of 20 GW of installed solar capacity by 2022.

Here are a few of our recommendations. See them all here.

Benchmarks, Transparency and Monitoring: The Indian government urgently needs to increase the level of information available on the Mission’s progress, by enforcing period updates on the progress of each project, and making the commissioning system more consistent and transparent. Moreover, to increase confidence among investors in the solar market, project technology choices should be transparent and data on available sunlight (known as irradiance data) should be made publicly available.

Strategic Financing: Central and state government agencies, with the leadership of India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), should develop a strategy to optimize the role of different funding sources and financial institutions. Some institutions are better suited for project financing, while others are needed to increase information, offer payment guarantees, support R&D, or boost skills development. Only when a comprehensive financing strategy is in place, will different financial interventions succeed in scaling solar energy investments.

Technology-Neutral Manufacturing: The Indian government can further grow domestic manufacturing by making policies technology-neutral and market-enabling. Options include: (a) a domestic content requirement (DCR) that all photovoltaic modules are manufactured in India, uniformly enforced across all PV technologies (currently, certain technologies are exempt and are therefore imported at a lower cost from other countries); (b) a DCR specifying that a certain percentage of the solar PV components be manufactured in India; or (c) consider a different form of incentive to promote domestic manufacturing without being restrictive to foreign-manufactured technologies.

With clean energy investments reaching a record $263 billion worldwide in 2011, it’s no secret that nations around the world are closely following the progress of the National Solar Mission. As other governments try to replicate the successes and learn from the hurdles encountered under India’s program, the Indian government has a huge opportunity to encourage growth in solar energy at a global level.

At NRDC, we’re excited to see India’s bold leadership on solar, and look forward to working with all stakeholders as they embrace the next phase of solar development, including more comissioned grid-connected projects as well as off-grid and rooftop solar projects.

Offered by our myBIGearth friends at Green Biz

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