Could your local guy-dominated watering hole be getting a femme makeover?

Proving yet again how well beer companies know women, Molson Coors is launching a line of lemony, citrusy and rosé sparkly bevs for girls called Animée. Some flavors will be clear like Diet Sprite, others hued like Crystal Light.

Apparently, the reason 79% of women avoid drinking sudsy lagers is due to fears of bloating, weight gain, and the perceived notion that beer is for boys.

That’s according to expensive company research; a design collective out of Denmark begs to differ. Bars are the problem.

“A pub full of men is not a place we would normally go for ourselves,” explains Mie Nielsen, Managing Director of a progressive design collective called Femmes Regionales. The same goes for a cocktail bar full of women.

In the interest of creating a chicer and brighter coed drinking establishment, Femmes Regionales recently set about renovating the microbrewery Mikkeller pub in Copenhagen, a perky place where no one expects a phone number with your name. It’s a hang out that some are calling downright femme because of its refreshingly pretty aesthetic sprinkled with vintage and bespoke furniture, delicate chests of drawers with golden knobs, whitewashed walls. From the looks of it, even the lighting is flattering.

Nevertheless, Nielsen says, “we didn’t have a specific female audience in mind when designing this, but rather a place that would appeal to both men and women. A mix of both genders is always much more fun.”

True. But we can’t help but notice just how lovely it is, combining the best of traditional Danish pub-ery – lots of wood and brass, rooted in a “storytelling” aesthetic – with Femmes’ unique vantage – combining heavy and light expressions, mixing vintage and modern, interspersing handmade and pre-produced.

“We approach the concept of sustainability with the quality of [objects] in mind, which will ensure a long life.”

Maybe we’re just trend-spotting here or making like Molson Coors with sweeping gender stereotypes, but the Femmes’ touch of lightness and airiness is far more refreshing than an Animée could ever be.

Our prediction is that rather than downing cases of daintified beer before abandoning our bras and ponytail holders in dark watering holes that bear a striking resemblance to Superbowl commercials, the bar scene will fare far better with pubs like these. Go ahead and order us a Guinness.

Surely you’ve got a pretty lady bar near you. Where is it? We could sure use a cold one.

Go from messy minimalist to functional bohemian with these back to the floorboard styles.

To the angsty teen, eschewing the bed frame and taking the whole sleeping operation to the floor is a bold interior design statement. Call it the messy minimalist movement. While parents the world over continue to be confounded by the décor habits of their teens and threadbare twenty-somethings, it’s a style that deserves a more grown up look.

With a few adult touches, taking it to the floorboards is a look that’s a little bit harem with a dash of rock ‘n’ roll.

If you’re going for a decidedly Copenhagen look, keep it neutral with sharp blacks and whitest whites. Clean floors and a blanket of natural light do the rest.

A knitted throw adds texture and casual sophistication.

This eyelet touch – with a potpourri of pillows and Chinese-style lantern overhead – adds a whimsy evocative of Molly Ringwald’s Andie in Pretty in Pink.

The floor is very much a part of the furniture. As such, to get away with this look you need a really fantastic one. Think along the lines of quality wood, Japanese minimalist stone like marble or granite, or the Moorish-style tiles seen here.

Full length, fabulous windows don’t hurt either.

Taking it to the floor can feel like a tree-house adventure….

…or a cozy stay away from home.

It’s romantic snuggling close to the floorboards, particularly when surrounded by opulent fabrics in rich jewel tones.

Low lying bedframes are also a practical solution for adding the illusion of height and paring down clutter.

With the addition of some vintage pieces, like this teak chair from the 1950′s and lamp from the 1960′s, you’ve got a look that transcends the messy minimal and evolves into something much more functional bohemian.

Images: Chanel Bags and Cigarettes; LaMaison d’Anna G; Design Manifest; Camilla Hylleberg; girard312; Stagetecture; MissuzBee; jedersonlobo; and Elle Italia

Conscious themes in mainstream performance art.

Two recent London plays have had audiences grappling with environmental issues. The National Theater’s production of Greenland, slammed as partisan, dull and rotten theater by the critics, dealt with sea levels rising in the Maldives and the failed UN talks in Copenhagen. Another show, The Heretic, a black comedy by stand-up Richard Bean, drew raves over its comedic approach to atmospheric doom and gloom, focusing on an earth scientist at York University. When her studies on rising sea levels fail to yield a major grant, she appears on BBS’s Newsnight and is fired, only to end up with a column in the Daily Telegraph. Both shows feature what else? A polar bear as symbol of our shame. As one Guardian critic put it, “Climate change drama is the new growth industry.”

As green creeps into art and seeps subliminally into our global consciousness, we wonder if it makes a dent in our behavior, the true test of a shift. While New York Times reviewer, Matt Wolf, dismissed Greenland as a “falsely stitched patchwork quilt” of worse case scenarios alongside a few facts, he also admitted muttering “Recycle, recycle, recycle,” all the way home. Easily distracted as we tend to be in bad theater, his review says he also became painfully aware of the mundane activities of audience members as they crumpled packets of snacks and popped plastic water bottles. “Hang on!” I wanted to call out,” he shares. “Is no one paying this show any heed?”

It is a good question, one posed in 1971 when The Lorax was first published, Dr. Seuss’s post-Sixties warning not to fool with Mother Nature and her magical Truffula Trees, Swomee-Swans, brown Bar-Ba-Loots and Humming-Fishes. The yellow Lorax, who spoke on behalf of the trees, convinces the Once-ler to resist chopping them down to mass produce Thneeds. The lesson of greed leading to environmental destruction is being reintroduced to a new audience four decades later as an animated 3-D feature to be released March of 2012.

Arguably catering to the adult brain, the same way the irony in Shrek went past young viewers, the Lorax’s undeniable message comes at a better time now than its dawn in the 70′s, when many people still thought it was okay to throw potato chip bags out the window, run sprinklers with no end in sight, and were watching blockbuster movies like The Graduate, where a young Dustin Hoffman looked at “plastics” as his future. Nowadays, film and theater goers are much more sensitized to these underlying messages, young and old alike, thanks to the groundwork of environmentalists who act as stewards of the planet and creative writers relying on entertainment as their hybrid vehicle of transformation.

Fine art also relies on subtle interpretations of symbolism in producing change, and like many theaters, the conscious mission means process as well as product. At Eco-Logical in Los Angeles, the emphasis is on exhibiting the work of a community which uses repurposed and recycled materials.

The gallery provides salvaged billboard vinyl as canvases to artists in exchange for exposure, sparing an estimated 450 million square feet of toxic, non-biodegradable billboard vinyl tossed into landfills each year. The fine art, billboard art viewed by thousands weekly, and functional art naturally deals with eco themes, such as works premiered in its highly successful EartH exhibit, visited by more than 400 art goers.

The notion of urban blight reborn as art and theater crafted to spare trees and polar bears offers hope at a time when green as a popular movement has neared the saturation point, risking the chance of making us immune to the message.  In this way, playwright Bean’s brand of humor in The Heretic and Seuss’s quirky metaphorical verse in The Lorax might be the tonic for the catatonic, and even those resisting the green bandwagon’s cultural hold will be muttering “recycle, recycle, recycle,” all the way home.

Images: More Intelligent Life; The Royal Court Theater; Papahere; Eco-Logical

New waste-to-energy plant wrapped in a ski slope by BIG.

When Kim Derby first introduced me to Bjarke Ingels, I was smitten. I still am.

BIG (the Bjarke Ingels Group) keeps flirting with design, architecture, and earth lovers through innovative projects and BIG ideas (pun intended). Here’s the latest vision from Bjarke Ingels (a collaboration between BIG, realities:united, AKT, Topotek 1, Man Made Land, and Glessner Group). And, fair warning, it’s so delicious you may want to move to Copenhagen.

Amagerforbraending is a new waste treatment plant; it shatters all pre-conceived notions you may have about waste treatment plants. The project straddles the line between two districts, industrial and recreational, in Copenhagen and was designed to link the two neighboring areas through a functional duality: a waste treatment plant all wrapped up in a ski slope. Yes, a ski slope. Fifteen hundred meters (almost five thousand feet) of ski runs to be exact. The slopes will be accessed through an elevator complete with a glass wall, allowing skiers a glimpse into the plant and a subtle reminder of the functional building.

“Most of the recently built power plants are merely functional boxes wrapped in an expensive gift paper. The main ‘function’ of the façade is to hide the fact that factories have a serious image and branding problem. We want to do more than just create a beautiful skin around the factory. We want to add functionality. The ambition of creating added value in terms of added functionality does not stand in contrast to the ambition to create beauty. It does not have to be either/or, it can be both. We propose a new breed of waste-to-energy plant, one that is economically, environmentally, and socially profitable.”

BIG is even changing the way carbon is emitted. The smokestack at Amagerforbraending will release puffs of smoke rings (how did BIG manage to make a contribution to global warming sexy?). The hope is to draw awareness to consumption. The cylindrical rings will even be illuminated by lasers at night, projecting a pie chart onto the smoke, allowing the actual quota of fossil carbon dioxide to be read.

“The new plant is an example of what we at BIG call Hedonistic Sustainability – the idea that sustainability is not a burden, but that a sustainable city in fact can improve our quality of life.  The Waste-to-Energy plant with a ski slope is the best example of a city and a building which is both ecologically, economically, and socially sustainable.” Bjarke Ingels, Founder and Partner, BIG

So who’s moving to Copenhagen with me?  If you still need coaxing, devour the entire project slideshow.

(Images from BIG, spotted here.)

The 36-year-old Danish architect Bjarke Ingels is the hottest topic on the tip of every avant-garde’s tongue. I’m glad he’s here, mostly because he uses words like symbiosis and spontaneous interaction; hybrid typology and harvest resources. There’s nothing sexier than a voracious vocabulary. And an architect.

Ingels and his Copenhagen-based firm, BIG (the Bjarke Ingels Group), have been busy in Denmark for years, although his foray into the U.S. has only just begun. On West 57th between 11th and 12th Avenues, New York, New York, to be exact. Or at least that’s the rumor.

Why am I so intrigued by a NY skyscraper, you ask? I’m pretty confident this building will be nothing remotely similar to anything we’ve seen before.

I can make such a courageous claim because I took a look at Ingel’s incredible 8 House (top image and below), his third housing project in Ørestad, a newer neighborhood in Copenhagen. To describe such a thing that almost surpasses words seems impossible, but I shall try.

Let’s start at the bottom, and stroll up. Easy enough via a sidewalk that loops from the street up to the 10th floor in the shape of an eight. Ingels says of the slope:

“…it lets you walk and bicycle along the row-house gardens all the way to the 10th-floor penthouse so you get this intimate, spontaneous social interaction on all levels – just like a public street.”

The 8 House is a mix of private and communal space, with office and retail making up the ground floor and almost 500 residential units on the remaining nine floors above. Inside the two courtyards (created by the loops of the figure eight), there are at least 5,300 square feet of public space including gardens and pathways. And two of the 8 House’s sloping roofs are green (image below).

Forward-thinking and boundary-pushing, the architect waxes poetic on his sloping buildings and design purpose and what it all means for New York:

“They’re buildings that look different because they perform differently. They harvest resources – daylight, views – in different ways. What we try to do is maximize possibilities. Before, you could choose a life in the city, and that would give you certain advantages, but it would be at the expense of parks and green spaces, fresh air and bicycle rides, or a private garden. And I think – with projects like the Mountain and 8 House we did in Copenhagen – we’re trying to offer some of the suburban advantages, like a house with a garden where your kids can go outside and hang around, and combine that with the services of a dense urban space.”

The plan for New York is an 80/20 mixed-income high-rise residential building. The rumors floating around describe it as an “…unusual, green-roofed triangle” with “terrace cut-outs and an interior courtyard.” The project caught my attention when I heard the terms sloping mountain, more rooms with views, and hybrid typology.

Hybrid typology? Again, the architect explains:

“I can vaguely say that what we’re trying to do in New York is to follow up the general trajectory the city has taken, integrating parks and recreation spaces, rejuvenating the waterfront, planting trees and creating bicycle paths. We’re trying to see if you can create a hybrid typology. What happens if you crossbreed the Copenhagen courtyard with the New York high-rise?”

Seems brilliant enough, no? I’m sufficiently intrigued by his pragmatic, practical approach and smitten by the edge he brings to such a sensible philosophy.

Plans for West 57th Street (image above) are still being finalized, but Ingels seems confident his high-rise will happen. So much so that he now calls New York his home, part-time, and has opened an office in the city.

We’ll keep you posted.

Images: Dwell, Fast Company, Curbed NY

When I was in high school a few buddies and I finagled our way from Detroit to D.C. to represent Somalia at the Model United Nations. I won’t go into all the sordid details; it’s enough say that the trip is affectionately known in our historical canon as “Fear and Loathing in Washington.”

It was the Year of the Refugee, so we had scored big with our randomly assigned country as Somalia was the unfortunate host of millions of displaced persons. During the first day’s plenary session, we thought it would be a good idea to break the ice by sending a note via floor page to our nemesis, Ethiopia, a country we were at war with and in real life had severed all ties: “Party in our hotel room tonight! Go OAS!” Yes, that refers to the Organization of African States, and no, the hostile delegation did not think this funny.

Within moments of reading our missive, one of our adversaries rose to his feet shrieking to the Chairman: “Point of order! Calling for the immediate censure [or whatever] of Somalia for attempting to initiate contact!” Evidently, we were not allowed to even pass a note to our (c’mon, not really) enemy and we were embarrassingly taken to task in front of the session. We immediately struck back by pointing out to the same Chair the “Ethiopians” failure to wear neckties. This breach of decorum was, it turned out, as grave an error on their part as was our failure to not communicate. Needless to say, we Somalis learned our lesson and avoided our fellows from the Horn of Africa – and co-creators of the world’s largest refugee problem – for the rest of our time in Washington.

No meaningful resolutions were passed.

I recall this story in the light of WikiLeaks’ recent release (to five major news outlets) of a large number of United States diplomatic cables between the State Department and its operations around the world. The “leaks” are the beginning of the third in a series, following the exposure of Afghan War and Iraq War documents earlier this year. The incident has become a global sensation, bringing to light the way in which diplomatic activity is conducted – and calling into question the security of intra- and international communications surrounding that activity. (Adding to the drama was WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange’s recent surrender to British authorities as a result of a sexual assault investigation in Sweden.)

High school memories aside, I do recognize the gravity of the situation here, and I, for one, am as dazzled as anyone by the savage behind-the-scenes elicit interactions, horse trading, strong-arming and bribery that seems to be the norm when it comes to what our American delegations – from the United Nations in New York to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change conferences in Copenhagen and Cancun – like to call “delicate negotiations” or “meetings of the minds.”

Of course, we at EcoSalon are concerned about the diplomacy around climate change negotiations – and as the data comes in regarding what went down in Copenhagen, for example, we’re seeing quite a troubling picture. By way of background, the accord, which allows each nation to choose a target for greenhouse gas cuts, was designed in part to make it easy to get countries likes China and rapidly developing nations on board, though many feel it falls way short of needed measures. Moreover, opponents said it would get in the way of extending the binding provisions of the Kyoto Protocol – placed on richer nations – and it was thus opposed by many poorer countries.

Here’s what we know from the Guardian (guardian.co.uk), one of the five news organizations that has access to the leaks: The United States began “a diplomatic offensive” to get the accord signed and cables show that the U.S. sought “dirt on nations opposed to its approach to tackling global warming.” This included going after “human intelligence” from UN diplomats. One cable “names specific countries of interest, including China, France, Japan, Mexico, Russia and the European Union, and seeks biographical details of individuals such as credit card and frequent-flyer numbers. It also seeks compromising intelligence on the officials running the climate negotiations, such as ‘efforts by treaty secretariats to influence treaty negotiations or compliance.’”

Meanwhile, the “Basic” nations (Brazil, South Africa, India and China) mounted their opposition. Says another cable: “It is remarkable how closely coordinated the Basic group has become in international fora, taking turns to impede US/EU initiatives and playing the US and EU off against each other. Basic countries have widely differing interests, but have subordinated these to their common short-term goals.”

And then there was another huge player, Saudi Arabia. A cable from Ambassador James Smith says, interestingly, that officials from the oil-producing giant “have suggested that they need to find a way to climb down gracefully from the country’s tough negotiating position. … Saudi officials are very eager to obtain investment credits for carbon capture and storage (CCS) and other technology transfer projects.”

The bottom line is that everyone was maneuvering hard. Some nations were even willing to sell their vote to the highest bidder.

Ugly, huh?

But here’s the rub, and the question on the street in Cancun, where this year’s conference is currently underway. With the fear that back-room dealings might be exposed to the public – including the benign, the ugly muscling and the sometimes uglier beddings among those who don’t want anyone to know that they’re engaged in any contact – could progress be slowed to crawl, or even doomed?

What role could secret talks play in allowing an obstructionist country to “climb down gracefully,” or the U.S. and the E.U. to work together to prevent a China from killing a (more comprehensive than Copenhagen) deal? Or who’s to say that less-developed nations (perhaps even outwardly adversarial ones) ought not to be able to secretly gather in their own smoke-filled rooms to circumvent the agendas of richer nations? After all, from the Middle East to Middle America, anyone familiar with diplomatic negotiations knows that a lot of trees are often quietly felled in very private forests before breakthroughs occur.

This is not to say that exposure of dirty deals and powerful countries abusing less-powerful ones isn’t a good thing. In fact, the WikiLeaks witch-hunt and censorship effort is somewhere between abhorrent and Orwellian.  But some players would tell you this: If next year’s dealings in Durban – where real, binding breakthroughs are not out of the question – were to be conducted with the presumption of complete transparency, progress might be no more than an elusive dream.

So here is the essential quandary of the Wikileaks phenomenon. Says Julian Assange in yesterday’s The Australian: “The truth will always win.” Nice sentiment. Will it? So much of what has been revealed is opening the world’s eyes to the gruesome underbelly of how nations deal with each other to manipulate people and populations to the benefit of the greedy and the powerful. Yet the question remains, without the ability for nations to conduct business in private, would certain essential bridges never be built, subterranean ties never be made, diplomatic infrastructure never exist that could open doors to change and allow for conflict resolution?

There’s a lot of support for WikiLeaks out there. And there are a lot of critics. But there are a lot of mixed feelings, as well. “What ifs” are easy, but I have to ask these questions: If every Soviet constituency knew of Mikhail Gorbachev’s interactions with Washington, would he have made it to the finish line? If certain Republicans knew of Richard Nixon’s interactions with Mao Tse-Tung, would relations with China have opened? How much sooner might Anwar Sadat have been murdered had his back-room dealings with Menachem Begin been revealed? There are no easy answers, but there’s a lot to consider, as well as a lot of trust going on that publications like the The New York Times, Der Spiegel and the Guardian will be making some wise decisions.

In the meantime, in the world’s diplomatic circles the question continues to be asked, often in secret: “Can we talk?” The answer:  “Maybe. Depends who’s listening.”

Image: p373

Underneath a typical Danish grey sky with a VIP press pass in hand, I take my strong curiosity and board the 80′s geometric print decorated Copenhagen Fashion Week media bus. I can’t wait to find out how green and sustainable fashion is faring in the vibrant Scandinavian fashion scene.

Copenhagen Fashion Week consists of four separate fair venues including CIFF (Copenhagen International Fashion Fair), CPH Vision, Gallery and Terminal-2 – a slew of trend fashion forecast press conferences and a large variety of Scandinavia’s most creative and luxurious parties and events.

The trend forecast by Parisian color and fashion trend agency Nelly Rodi predicts – among other trends – an added emphasis on “sharing.” Eco-terminology like new zen, slow life, daily intimacies, ecology, eco-clean, respectful materials, city gardens and humanized urbanization were among the buzz words describing the Spring/Summer 2011 fashion trends at Copenhagen Fashion Week.

Is eco and sustainable fashion on the radar screens of attendees at Copenhagen Fashion Week? I asked a handful of Scandinavian fashionistas.

Editor’s note: This is a guest post written by Sandja Brügmann. Sandja is managing partner of Refresh Agency, a leading specialist PR and communications agency focusing on the green lifestyle market [LOHAS - lifestyles of health and sustainability]. She has served leading brands at the cutting edge of the LOHAS phenomenon such as GoodBelly, Crocs, Sterling Rice Group, Addis Creson, Clementine Art, FASHIONmeGREEN, SNAP gathering, Vickerey, Neve Designs and Chocolove. Sandja was born and raised in the fashion-centric and sustainability-minded Denmark. She grew up in a household run mostly on solar power by an entrepreneurial mother and an eco-conscientious father. Her career began, after receiving top honors at University of Colorado, Boulder, as a Scandinavian-focused renewable energy researcher for Financial Times, before she served as Marketing Manager for lifestyle company Gaiam. Sandja’s vibrant and passionate commitment to inspiring positive planetary change, without compromising on style, is visible throughout her work. “My passion is to bring fun, adventure, style and sex appeal to living a greener and more sustainable lifestyle,” she explains. Sandja’s aw-inspiring sense of style and her global “˜finger on the pulse’ has made her a sought after eco trend spotter. Her written work has been featured in Scandinavian PURE Magazine, IN Magazine, USA-based leading green lifestyle media EcoSalon, LOHAS Journal and Elephant Journal. Sandja is a certified yogini, a Danish national team Olympic hopeful archery champion and she adores her daily lessons as a parent. Follow Sandja
on Twitter!

Green travel isn’t just about buying carbon offsets and choosing resorts that serve local, organic fare, it’s about crafting an itinerary that’s built around more sustainable options. That’s especially true when it comes to transportation. Buzzing around a city and racking up cab fare certainly isn’t the most environmentally friendly option, but it also doesn’t allow you the ability to truly explore a place.

Conscious travel is about respecting the places that you’re venturing, and that means taking the time to truly enjoy them. That doesn’t mean you need to commit to three-week long stints in an Italian villa a la Slow Travel, but thinking about how you can better connect with a place on your next extended weekend is a great place to start. And what better way to explore a place than by bike?

Plenty of cosmopolitan cities offer excellent bike share programs, and with them, the opportunity to get to know a city just like a local while at the same time opting for a smarter, more sustainable method of travel.

Here’s a short list of cities with great bike share programs to get you started:

Montreal

The French Canadian metropolis is home to the much loved Bixi, a cutting-edge bike share system that incorporates a bunch of cool technologies including solar power and wifi-enabled stations. You can get everything from a 24-hour to a year-long pass, and the Bixi website helps you easily navigate between the many stations located around the city.

Paris

Maybe the most well-known of bike share systems, Vélib has been putting cyclists on the streets of Paris since 2007. And let’s be honest, what’s more French than a leisurely bike ride along the Seine with a baguette and round of Camembert in your basket all set for an afternoon picnic?

Washington D.C.

A couple of years ago, the U.S. capital unveiled the country’s first fully automated touch-and-go rental program. SmartBike DC has been so popular that now the city is planning to expand, replacing the program with a bigger and better version based on Montreal’s Bixi system. The new system will have 1,100 bikes at 114 different stations.

Copenhagen

The ultimate of cycling capitals, it’s no surprise that Copenhagen offers up its city bikes practically for free. Through the ByCyklen program you can get a bike for a mere 20 DKK deposit, approximately $3.30. The city has 2,000 bikes and 110 city bike racks, meaning you can pretty much explore just about any part of this Scandinavian capital on two wheels.

Melbourne

Melbourne just recently launched its bike-share program, and so far so good for the Australian city. A daily subscription will only cost you $2.50 (plus a little extra depending on how long you use the bike), and if you’re unsure of your cycling skills, you can even take brush up course offered specifically for bike share riders by the local program Bikes@Work. In conjunction with the program’s launch, a third party site, bikeshare.tel, was also set up, letting you identify station locations from your mobile phone.

Taipei

European capitals aren’t the only ones boasting bike share programs. In Taipei you can take advantage of U-Bike, which rolled out in 2009.

Big on bike sharing? Check out the Bike-sharing Blog which has a wealth of content and information on cities around the world that are incorporating programs like these.

Happy travels and safe riding!

Images: solylunafamilia, LWY, M. V. Jantzen, umebike, jon_lin, davidreid

“Get real! This is the biggest crisis humanity has faced,” warns Annie Leonard in her latest environmental education video, The Story of Cap & Trade. It is getting mixed reviews as the dust settles since its recent release.

A follow up to her widely popular animated eco tutorial, The Story of Stuff, it offers a pureed breakdown of how energy traders (greedy corporations and industries) and Wall Street financiers hope to get rich off of pretending to save the planet. The method to the madness: capping carbon emissions by giving permits to the polluters, who will in turn have the free license to pollute, especially in the third world where lax standards pose disastrous consequences for farmers and villagers.

Leonard’s release of the video comes on the heels of what many considered the failed talks for climate change solutions at Copenhagen, and identified the devils in the existing caps and trade proposals. These include issuing free permits to major polluters rather than selling the permits instead and allotting dividends to citizens and paying back ecological debt.  She also cites fake offsets which let polluters make false claims about what they will do the cut emissions, as well as the most dangerous devil of the plan – distraction.

Leonard tells us relying on the scheme weakens our ability to make strong laws away from fossil fuels.

While climate talks in Europe or on Capitol Hill have yet to scratch the surface on global caps on carbon emissions, the video illustrates (with charming, monochromatic animated stick figures) that education of the masses is crucial for curbing any crisis, as witnessed with the AIDS public information campaigns of the early 80s.

Leonard is adept at making sense of it all with her wholesome, kindergarten teacher approach to feeding our overwhelmed brains one truth at a time. In the end, she basically throws up her arms to declare about the process, “It’s protecting business as usual.”

Not all agree. “Just colossally ignorant,” is how one Grist writer sums up the video’s treatment of the trade entities, such as Enron, and how Europe has botched its attempts at handing out permits to cut emissions. Of course, many of the critics calling the critique of cap and trade deceptive also lump Leonard with the rest of the “Left” making up all of this hogwash about fossil fuels contributing to climate change.

Meanwhile, eco activist Michael Gaworecki, writing for Change.org, agrees with the video’s arguments, but says he isn’t sure the cap-and-trade plan isn’t the best mechanism for lowering carbon emissions that we can put in place  in enough time to make a difference.

“America needs to take the lead on stopping global warming if we’re to stand a chance, and anything perceived to interfere with unfettered capitalism is unlikely to fly in the good ol’ US of A,” he says.

Gaworecki adds that the few alternatives, such as a straight-up tax on carbon pollution, could be simple and effective, but “would never make it out of the American Congress alive.”

Image: Telegraph

All eyes are on Copenhagen this month as the drama events of the UN Climate Change Conference play out. But those eyes aren’t just the ones of climate change activists and greenies. Multinationals are just as involved – even global beverage giant, Coca Cola, is descending on the Danish capital.

Working with other media, marketing, tech and creative partners, including DuPont and Gap Inc., Coca Cola was instrumental in launching the Hopenhagen campaign. The result? An interactive online campaign as well as lots of exposure on the ground in Copenhagen. Known for its creative advertising and branding, Coca Cola released a special Hopenhagen set of posters, seen all over town for the duration of the conference.

On Coca Cola’s Hopenhagen website, the company encourages visitors to take action against climate change and learn more about recycling and water as well as Coca Cola’s plant bottle, a soda bottle made form 30% plant-based materials (that means it’s still 70% plastic!). But supporting a good cause shouldn’t come without questions.

Although the company now supports several sustainability initiatives, most notably a partnership with the WWF that promotes water conservation, Coca Cola certainly has its flaws.

Earlier this year, Coca Cola found itself on a list of companies with factories causing major water pollution in the Chinese capital of Beijing. This summer, the Environmental Working Group called upon Coca Cola to protect consumers from the hazards of BPA, after a Coca Cola representative joined a group of lobbyists in a meeting to talk about the “fear tactics” used in the market in regards to BPA. Some have questioned the company’s tactics in India, and then there are the alleged murders, kidnappings and torture at bottling plants in Colombia, for which The United Steelworkers of America and the International Labor Rights Fund have filed a lawsuit against Coca Cola.

Beyond environmental and humanitarian complaints, Coca Cola also uses high fructose corn syrup to sweeten its US beverages, another minus point on the sustainability list.

So what should we think about Coca Cola and Hopenhagen? Yes, the campaign is a conglomerate of big business, but in a world where business is often a driver of change, multinationals are needed to step up to the plate, and this is a good example. However, it’s equally important to ask whether the support companies are giving is genuine or simply an attempt at the kind of marketing that will benefit them (aka greenwash).

At the end of the day, Coca Cola is a business and businesses want to make money. But, if Coca Cola achieves its goals of doubling serving sales to 3 billion per day in 2020, how and where the beverage is produced, how much water it takes and what it’s bottled in will be even more crucial in terms of the company’s footprint, no matter how much positive marketing goes into making the company look green.

Image credits: Coca Cola