Group D Skype Meeting report (9/26 Mon 7:45PM)

Group D Skype Meeting report (9/26 Mon 7:45PM)

We had very good discussion under excellent leadership of Jamie Williams who is the meeting organizer for Sept 26th. We went through the topics as ULearn suggested with A-G steps. (See ULearn BUS600 site). One of the accomplishments is that we could have a consensus with mission statement of our small business.

Mission Statement: Our business helps customers make wise purchasing decisions that influence corporations to make products and business operations choices that are socially equitable, non-environmentally damaging and support the communication in which they operate.

Grope Name: We had discussed but I believe we did not have finalized idea of our group name yet. There are some proposals in the past (via email exchange): InSight, Society Trust, Wise Choice, We Trust. My proposal here is “goForIt.com”. 

My Feedback: In today’s market, there are many kinds of rating companies for various fields and some of them are very powerful (means that has strong influence for decision making of people).  For example, financial, environmental (sometimes called green), human rights, operation transparency etc. Our group is probably more focusing on environmental side such as sustainability of products, grading of carbon emission for companies. Speaking of carbon emission, it is controversial because some can reduce carbon emission by increasing dependency on Nuclear Power Generation which generates more toxic to the earth for long term.  See the documentary movie preview: “Into Eternity”  http://www.intoeternitythemovie.com/ 

The following is a memorandum of research links group members presented recently.

1. Carbonpig
Website: http://carbonpig.com/
Submitted by: Daniel
Business segment:  products sustainability
Over view:
This site maintains a list (database) of eco-safe products for consumers. The intention is to help customers to make a decision, find a product to buy. Evaluation standard is not clearly described in the site while it said it gives a certain rating for consumers. This is an Non-profit organization (NPO).

2. Terrapass
Website: http://www.terrapass.com/business/
Submitted by: Chiori
Business segment: Carbon emission calculation and reduction
Overview:
TerraPass helps companies to demonstrate their environmental leadership by measuring, reducing and offsetting the carbon footprint of their business. TerraPass carbon offsets fund clean energy and carbon reduction projects in North America and are verified to the highest standards.(from website) It sells clean energy as "carbon offsets" in online shop: http://store.terrapass.com/store/p/53-TerraPass-carbon-offsets-1mT.html
This is not an NPO, it actually has products.

3. Energy Watch Group
Website: http://www.energywatchgroup.org/Mission.11+M5d637b1e38d.0.html
Submitted by: Kerry
Business segment: promotion for renewable clean energy
Overview:
This is an organization (NPO) run by scientists to review and evaluate various issues of current and future energy generation.

4. Corporate Responsibility Group (CRG)
Website: http://www.crguk.org/?id=8&ob=1
Submitted by: Kerry
Business segment: Ethical and Environmental responsibility for business
Overview:
Probably they provide consultation to business.
CRG is a not-for-profit company limited by guarantee and run cost-effectively by a volunteer Board of experienced members. A small contracted secretariat team and a consultant programme adviser put the Board's plans into effect.(from website)