More Environmental Legal Woes for JinkoSolar

Posted on November 26, 2011 by quest

It had to be within days of announcing it’s sponsorship of the San Francisco 49ers in September that JinkoSolar was feeling some environmental heat. The Huffington Post reported in mid September,“Police detained at least 20 people after hundreds of villagers protested last week, some storming the factory compound and overturning vehicles. Authorities said the factory had failed to address earlier environmental complaints and that the protests followed mass fish deaths in late August due to runoff from heavy rains.” Then in early October the company reported it was in the process of completion of its phase I environment safety upgrade at its facility in Haining City west of Shanghai in the Zhejiang Province of China.

Since then Los Angeles based law firm Glancy Binkow & Goldberg LLP has just filed a class action lawsuit on behalf of investors who purchased or otherwise acquired Jinko stock on the open market between May 13, 2010 and September 21, 2011. The securities fraud class action lawsuit was filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.

The Complaint alleges that in the Prospectus and Registration Statement issued in connection with the Company’s IPO, and in subsequent filings with Securities and Exchange Commission, JinkoSolar represented that the Company was in full compliance will all environmental regulations in the People’s Republic of China. The Complaint further alleges that last month, after a massive die-off of fish in a river adjacent to JinkoSolar’s primary manufacturing facility in Haining, China, hundreds of local residents protested and eventually ransacked the facility, 31 people were detained by police, and the facility was shut for several weeks.

Solar Megawatt Step

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Environmental Disaster Halted With XL Pipeline Review

Posted on November 10, 2011 by quest

By Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins - CEO Green for All. It’s breathtaking. Stunning. It’s absolutely the right thing to do, of course, to further assess the potential damage the pipeline could do – to the land it runs across if the oil were to spill; to the planet, once its burned. But somehow I don’t think we expected this to happen.   It was your leadership that got this done. It was the leadership of the thousands who protested last weekend in Washington, of the hundreds who went to jail to draw attention to the cause. It was the leadership of young people and indigenous people and retirees and communities of color. It was the leadership of our allies at 350.org.

But it was also the leadership of President Barack Obama. Make no mistake: without his intervention, this outcome may not have happened. We thank him for doing the right thing – and we remind him that the fight for a cleaner environment isn’t over.  Thank you for your engagement and your commitment. It’s been a generally bleak few months. So let’s take a moment today to celebrate a substantial victory.

SRI Listening To Tech and Clean Energy Innovations

Posted on November 6, 2011 by quest

SRI International celebrates 65 years of transformational innovations on Nov. 7. Since 1946, when SRI (then named Stanford Research Institute) was established to conduct research and development and stimulate the post-World War II economy, SRI has been pioneering solutions that are part of our daily lives. From the introduction of interactive computing and the computer mouse in the 1960s to recent advances such as the Siri virtual personal assistant, minimally invasive telerobotic surgery, and electroactive polymer “artificial muscle,” SRI researchers and technologists continue to build on a rich legacy and push the boundaries of what is possible. Over the years, SRI’s innovations have been meeting important customer and market needs and have created new industries and billions of dollars in market value. To date, SRI has launched more than 40 new ventures. Four spin-offs are now publicly traded and have a combined market capitalization of more than $20 billion. SRI spun off Siri, Inc. in 2007 to bring the technology to consumers. In April 2010, Apple acquired Siri, and in October 2011, Siri was unveiled as an integrated feature of the Apple iPhone 4S.

When you talk Siri listens

“In today’s innovation-based economy, the world is limited only by people with the skills that allow development of the abundant opportunities before us,” said Curtis R. Carlson, Ph.D., SRI’s president and chief executive officer. “SRI’s many R&D successes are the result of terrific staff members with the passion to deliver on our founding mission: discovery and the application of science and technology for knowledge, commerce, prosperity, and peace. Our approach, which we call the Five Disciplines of Innovation, is designed to create high-value solutions for our clients and partners.”

Today, SRI’s 2,100-plus staff members in Silicon Valley, Washington, D.C., Princeton, NJ, and around the world work in multidisciplinary teams to address some of the most challenging problems of our time such as the need for life-saving drugs and renewable clean energy, security of physical and Internet infrastructures, and new educational methods that will develop the next generation of scientists and engineers.

LED Street Greening

A Smart Way to Start Rebuilding America

Aquamantra On Greenwashing Environmental Lawsuit

Posted on October 29, 2011 by quest

In response to California’s greenwashing lawsuit against its Balance and Aquamantra brands, Danny Clark, President of ENSO, states, “Our industry is young, and we are still improving standards and dispelling false beliefs. Our products perform as we claim, and we have the data to prove it. The situation in California is a lack of education and misunderstanding new technologies; this is not an issue of false claims. We will take this opportunity to bring legislators up to speed with ENSO technologies and the value they bring to the environment.”
“The citizens of California and the environment deserve better,” stated Del Andrus, VP of ENSO. “History is full of examples where science has provided the facts to overcome false beliefs, a principle that ENSO will continue through the pioneering of new information, technology and education.”

At ENSO, we stand behind our claims and our mission to solve the world’s plastic pollution. Every one of us has contributed to this global problem, and it will take each of us, working together, to solve it. Companies like Aquamantra and Balance should be recognized for rising above status quo and implementing environmentally sound solutions.We do not claim that biodegradability is a silver bullet, but it is a huge step in the right direction. Consumers should be educated on the true impact of the products they are buying and have the opportunity to take that step. The lawsuit filed by Attorney General Kamala D. Harris was a first-of-its-kind “greenwashing” lawsuit against three companies that allegedly made false and misleading claims by marketing plastic water bottles as “100 percent biodegradable and recyclable.” Under California law, it is illegal to label a plastic food or beverage container as biodegradable. Plastic takes thousands of years to biodegrade and may never do so in a landfill.

California Leading America In Solar Technology

Surround the White House to Stop Keystone XL

Sustainable Environment Key To Greater Paris Project

Posted on October 28, 2011 by quest

When it was officially unveiled in 2009 by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, the 10-year, major urban renewal project included a euro 35 billion transport plan to build a 140-kilometre, driverless subway system around the exterior of Paris, 70,000 new homes per year and a complete redevelopment of the Seine river to turn it into a major transport link with the Channel, via the port of Le Havre. Projects were submitted by 10 top international architects and President Sarkozy said he wanted work on the transport system to begin in 2012. French Minister for Urban Affairs, Maurice Leroy, will update MIPIM Asia delegates on the gigantic Greater Paris project during a keynote address in Hong Kong, on November 16. At MIPIM Asia, Minister of Urban Affairs, Maurice Leroy, who oversees the Great Paris programme, will give delegates the latest news on what is the most ambitious redevelopment project in the French capital since Baron Haussmann redesigned the city some 150 years ago.

La Vie en Rose

Maurice Leroy‘s keynote address is part of MIPIM Asia’s conference programme targeting urban development, liveable cities and the use of eco-friendly infrastructure to ensure sustainable urban development. “The Greater Paris project offers truly exciting investment possibilities for the public and private sector and we are honoured that the French Minister of Urban Affairs will provide MIPIM Asia delegates with a unique opportunity to learn more about this huge development programme,” noted MIPIM Asia Director, Filippo Rean. “Sustainable urban development is a major concern for urban administrators around the world and the Greater Paris development provides a fascinating insight into the future of city planning,” he added.

Marrying urban environmental and commercial requirements while also responding to the evolving needs of citizens, will be discussed during the MIPIM Asia conference programme by two high-profile speakers: Jason Hu, Mayor of Taichung City Government (Taiwan) and Amy Cho, Director General of Business Opportunity Bureau of the Incheon Free Economic Zone (South Korea). MIPIM Asia delegates will also discover some of the ground-breaking construction projects from across the region which will be on display as winners of the 2011 MIPIM Asia Awards. Frank Krueger, Creative Director of logon urban.architecture.design (Berlin/Shanghai) which designed the Shanghai Museum of Glass – one of the winners in the “urban regeneration” category, explained why he’s looking forward to this year’s event: “MIPIM Asia does provide a unique opportunity for us as it stimulates the exchange of knowledge and latest trends in urban development, planning and sustainable design. We did not only established new business relations (and acquired new project opportunities), but we were also able to boost the quality and competitiveness of our work through the gain of knowledge at MIPIM Asia.”

Green The New Black

White House Looks Deeper Into Solyndra

Politicians Helping U.S. Lose Global Renewable Energy War

Posted on October 24, 2011 by quest

“America needs to learn from the example for future growth and long-term sustainability being set by China, and build the infrastructure and invest in the education and development of talent in growth industries, such as renewable energy and electronics, to achieve long-term growth and the continuation of the whole American experience,” according to Dr. Stephen Leeb, a recognized authority on finance, investing and economic trends. Leeb spoke with Peter Clayton, producer/host of TotalPicture Radio, a popular career and leadership development podcast.

Realizing the tremendous career and growth opportunities in “green” industries and technology, Clayton regularly features experts in the field on his program. However, the picture Dr. Leeb paints in his interview is troubling. China is gaining ground as a superpower and attaining competitive advantage over other developed countries, especially the United States, by using its profits to globally invest in and control mineral commodities such as coal, oil, zinc, silver, and gold. In his latest book Red Alert: How China’s Growing Prosperity Threatens the American Way of Life, Leeb argues that access to rare earth resources will determine the standard of living for future generations.

Leeb discusses how “U.S. officials and politicians engage in short-term myopic planning, endless legal maneuvering, scandals, and wartime investing that are crippling America’s economic viability.” Contrast this with China’s government, led by politicians with backgrounds in hard sciences. “China is spending enormous amounts of money planning for, and analyzing, the long-term consequences of global warming,” Leeb asserts. “The Chinese, I don’t think, hate Americans, by no means, but the Chinese are all for China. They would like to come off as the heroes in the environmental revolution.” “There’s a war going on