Every year around this time, the father in me starts thinking deep thoughts about why I’ve dedicated my career to environmental awareness and, in particular, helping people who don’t consider themselves activists understand why environmental issues should matter to them. In more recent years, it’s morphed into an almost singular focus for me on why global climate change should matter to all of us.

For me, it’s simple. It’s the kids.

As a parent, I am firmly in the camp of those who want to do everything they can to make sure their kids are exposed to fewer potential hazards than they were. I always laugh when my own mom says, “Well, we fed you [some processed food I could never imagine giving my kids] and you turned out OK,” or “We didn’t even have carseats when you were growing up and you’re just fine.” Yeah, yeah, yeah – I for one feel completely free of nostalgia for the “good old days” of the polluted 1970s or blissfully ignorant 1950s. We’ve evolved in many ways, and that’s a good thing.

What’s not evolving is the point of view of many of the companies that are making the products we parents are buying to protect our kids. In many ways, companies that make children’s safety equipment are incessantly frightening us into an upgrade: “Hey concerned parent, remember that carseat you used for your newborn in 2006? Well, nothing could be more dangerous for your newborn with a 2009 birthday. You’ve got to buy this year’s model in order to keep you kid safe!” Most of us hear the call and do just as we’re told, stretching our own wallets way too often to support a business model fueled by planned obsolescence.

Look, I’m not really out to pick apart a business model, regardless of whether it relegates lightly-used carseats to landfills. Indeed, we parents – we consumers – have to make our own choices. If it boosts the revenues the companies we buy from, I guess that is what it is.

But here’s the problem I do have – and it all gets back to climate change.

Children’s equipment companies know we want to keep our kids safe. And that’s not just today or this week or this year. I think about the safety of my kids long after they’ll have left my house, long after I’m gone. I want their entire lives to be safe and secure. I want to take every precaution possible in the way I treat the world I leave them. I’m not trying to anticipate what could result from global climate change. I don’t want to know – and not because I’m trying to avoid thinking about it. I don’t want to know because I don’t want it to happen.

So that affects the way I think about the products I buy ostensibly to keep my kids safe. I think those choices have to extend far beyond the catastrophic car accident I hope will never happen, far beyond the tiny fingers that might get slammed in the bedroom door (which has happened, despite my precautions), far beyond the potential toxic chemicals that may be in the food we feed them. They have to extend to climate change.

It concerns me as a parent and as an advocate for climate change that many of the most well-known companies making children’s equipment are not actively involved in reducing their global warming pollution. When Climate Counts (which I direct) announced scores on the climate action of the toys and children’s equipment sector a couple of months back, results were dismal. At the request of consumers who were interested in this sector, we scored 13 of the biggest companies – companies who make familiar family brands like Graco, Safety 1st, Instep, Evenflo, Chicco, One Step Ahead, Britax, Peg Perego, and more – and TEN scored less than five points out of a possible 100 on climate. No understanding of the overall impact of their companies’ energy use, waste, distribution, and sales on climate. No evidence of any efforts to reduce energy use or greenhouse gas emissions. No support for good climate policy. And no conversation at all with the legions of parents who buy from these companies because they help to ensure the safety of their kids – no conversation about climate change, something that could have a greater impact on the safety and well- being of the current generation of children than maybe anything else.

Sure, the toys and children’s equipment sector has a tiny impact on climate change when compared to the oil industry or the automobile industry. But that’s shouldn’t matter. Each of our families and our communities is thinking about how we can have a smaller footprint. Every company should be trying to do the same thing – and doing it in such a way, frankly, that not only creates real value for the consumer but also results in the long-term viability – and credibility – of the company itself. We parents have demonstrated our consumer power by greatly expanding the market for organic food in recent years. We can also shape the market in favor of those companies that care as much about climate change – and the long-term safety of our kids – as we do. To not to be thinking in these terms is to be completely diminishing our parental role as protectors and nurturers of our kids.

Some of the deniers out there will say, maybe not. Maybe, just maybe there will be no measurable negative impact on our children’s lives because of climate change. You know what? I don’t believe in maybe. I simply don’t want to know what will happen if we don’t demand more from the companies we trust.

That’s quite a mixed bag–what does it all mean?

Profits and Climate Action are (of course) Compatible

14 of 16 pharmaceutical companies we scored fell into our “striding” class—the highest level in the Climate Counts ranking system (typically at least 50 points out of a possible 100)—and two companies (AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson) scored over 75 points. These are all companies from an industry (pending mergers notwithstanding) that is one of the most profitable in the world. So the good news is we have yet more proof that climate action is compatible with good business. 

Why Not Do More?

We evaluate climate performance in terms of impact measurement, reductions achieved (including management accountability for reductions); public policy engagement; and openness and transparency in reporting. Pharmaceutical companies are proving to be consistently good at getting their houses in order; greenhouse emissions tracking is a sector strength, as is acknowledging and showing public support for a collective societal approach to addressing climate change.

The majority of companies in the sector, however, have not set aggressive or specific goals to reduce their emissions. They are also falling short at taking real steps to cut emissions. Many pharmaceutical companies rely on lengthy and antiquated supply chains, so logistical efficiency improvements could be a priority that would result in reductions (some, like GlaxoSmithKline, seem to recognize this opportunity). Additionally, those big pharma companies that don’t actually manufacture their products could play a market-leading role in encouraging climate action and climate leadership throughout the value chain.

Invest in Climate

The prescription drug business is overflowing with profits. Despite a widely held perception that companies sacrifice much profit to drug research and development costs, the margin they enjoy on most drugs is on the order of 91-95%. The industry has the added economic benefit of having a locked-in market (the government represents the three largest purchasers of pharmaceuticals: Medicare, the VA, and Medicaid) and limited competition between companies since most are highly specialized. The upshot? The industry can afford to be – and by many accounts, is – notoriously inefficient at manufacturing.

The pharmaceutical giants could be investing significant amounts of money in the kinds of renewable energy and energy-efficiency technology that most companies and sectors can only dream about right now. In other words, the kind of ROI evidence that less profitable, less successful companies say they need in order to truly prioritize climate protection? Big pharma could really be the test case.

Speak-Up in Congress

Notably, the pharmaceutical sector–which pays big dollars for lobbying support in Washington DC on issues related to healthcare–is conspicuously absent (or obscured) when it comes to advocating for strong legislation to fight climate change. Johnson & Johnson, a member of the US Climate Action Partnership, is an exception, but what if the sector presented a coordinated voice to lawmakers? It’s time to move behind a small and select group of companies willing to speak out on climate change. It’s time for entire sectors to step forward, armed with a compelling narrative about how climate action and energy-efficiency investments have changed their businesses in extraordinarily positive ways.

Actually, the overarching question really is, why isn’t the sector demonstrating explicitly that strong, voluntary corporate climate action is consistent with good business? That’s the message the marketplace needs, now more than ever with a possible climate law on the horizon that many have argued wouldn’t in its current form go far enough to address the scientific realities of climate change.

Regardless of their high scores, there is much more that the pharma industry could and should be doing on climate, and that’s true of every company and every major company we’ve scored so far.  To be perfectly clear, though, big pharma is better than most industry sectors in embracing corporate climate responsibility. Better, though, is not good enough. If money is what’s needed to address climate change with the kind of technology and logistical improvements worthy of 21^st-century, future-friendly companies, then the pharmaceutical companies certainly have it to spend. Whether they will show they’re serious about being climate innovators depends on whether we hold them to a standard worthy of the profits they’ve earned in the name of innovating for our health.

More articles: [UPDATED June 3, 2009]

The Memphis Flyer

The Renewable Planet

Nashville Scene

Ecological Intelligence — by Daniel Goleman
“Revealing the hidden environmental consequences of what we make and buy, and how with that knowledge we can drive the essential changes we all must make to save our planet and ourselves.”

The Lazy Environmentalist — by Josh Dorfman
“Josh Dorfman takes you inside the latest developments in green living to demonstrate how you can easily and affordably have your designer jeans and your planet too. From raising eco-conscious kids to greening your daily commute, Dorfman provides insights into the next wave of green innovation and the products and services that will lighten your planetary impact and lower your expenses.”

Return on Sustainability — by Kevin Wilhelm
“Return on Sustainability is a market-based call to action for companies to stop global warming by articulating the business case and addressing the business community in their language; profit and brand value. It details how climate change impacts companies, and how they can turn this risk into an opportunity to improve their financial, brand, and sustainability (environmental, social, climate) performance.”

Yet, as this article points out, it’s a heavy task weighing tech companies climate actions up against each other since its up to companies how they go about measuring their footprint. While recent policy proposals, like that of the EPA to mandate corporate GHG reporting, may change this; it is clear that Google and many of its competitors are paying serious attention to the issue of climate change. And as tech companies continue to set and meet reduction goals, the marketplace needs to continue to hear that this issue matters to consumers.

I believe there is no greater threat to my children’s future than the climate crisis, and I shudder to think about what their lives will be like if we all don’t start doing all we can to reducing the impact we have on carbon pollution now.  We’ve been evaluating corporate action on climate change for over two years now, and we simply haven’t seen the kind of widespread consumer awakening on this issue that’s going to be necessary to move companies to take urgent action.

Since our launch in 2007, we have scored 106 companies across 13 different sectors, and the sector we released yesterday — the toy and children’s equipment sector — scored the absolute lowest. None of this sector’s companies scored greater than 40 (out of 100), and eight companies scored zero.

Certainly, the moms, dads, aunts, uncles and grandparents who purchase most of the toys and kids equipment aren’t going to stand idly by and let their choices continue to support companies that are turning a blind eye to this issue. Perhaps some of these low scoring companies are tackling other issues that parents are concerned about. Shouldn’t they be able to also address the climate crisis?

As a parent, I’m constantly being targeted by child equipment companies with new and safer models to buy (And I must say I’m always shocked by news that the car seats I comfortably used four years ago for my older kids are no longer safe today for my youngest! The steady flow of parents’ dollars to these companies is mind-boggling.). Safety is the primary selling point for the companies that make things like car seats, strollers, high chairs, and the like—with good reason, safety comes first when it comes to your kids. But the fact that these companies seem so concerned about some of the issues that consumers have raised is exactly the reason why I was so surprised when it became clear that the climate actions for the sector were so limited and, as a result, the climate scores for the sector’s companies were so dismal.

Shouldn’t solving the climate crisis be considered a safety issue for our kids?

At Climate Counts we look at, and score, what companies themselves are doing to address the climate crisis. The companies are scored on a 0-to-100 point scale based on 22 criteria that measure companies’ efforts to assess their own climate footprint, reduce their emissions, support (or block) progress on major climate legislation, and communicate their efforts clearly and comprehensively to consumers.  You can view the detailed scores [http://www.climatecounts.org/scorecard_sectors.php?id=28].

We found that most of the big companies in the sector weren’t taking even the most basic step of measuring their own climate impact—but we do know there is innovation in the sector. Scores of smaller toy and children’s equipment makers are investing in green advances. Imagine if the largest companies – Mattel, Hasbro, Lego, Rubbermaid, Evenflo, Chicco, and more – were doing the same. There would be an extraordinary opportunity to educate consumers on the issue and build a long-term and lucrative relationship with the families who recognize that they must support companies that care about climate change.

As parents and consumers, we have the power to do something about the climate crisis. Most consumers by now understand that there are simple things we can do to reduce our own carbon footprint, many of us also understand our power to influence elected officials to pass strong climate policy—but we also have the power to influence companies to take action to reduce their climate impact.

We’ve found that companies are very responsive to consumers and I have no doubt that if these companies hear from parents and consumers that climate is a safety issue—they will respond by taking action.  Each of the toy and children’s equipment companies we have scored has its own page on our site, and each of those pages has a way that you can send e-mail directly to the company to let them know how you feel – positively or negatively – about their Climate Counts score. Make your voice heard. It makes a difference.

This was our first time scoring this sector, so they deserve some time to get their act together and the time to hear from consumers. We’ll score them next year again and expect to see some real improvement.

And go here for the companies full scorecards!

Mark Vasu reports on the steps, motivations, and benefits of tackling your company’s supply chain and implementing sustainable measures. In his discussion of the increasing rate of corporate climate responsibility across industry sectors, Vasu spotlights Climate Counts supporter Stonyfield Farm’s 25-year history and work to reduce its climate impact, as well as the story behind Climate Counts.

- Shop consciously. Vote with your dollars. Use your purchasing power to demand corporate climate responsibility.
- Look at ways you can permanently reduce you footprint in your home, office, and throughout your community. (Our friends at Together.com and No Impact Man can give you a few ideas to get started.)
- Raise your voice. Start petitions; email company executives; contact your elected officials and local utilities; and tap expanding social networks like Twitter to demand industry action and government policy on climate. Make sure meaningful climate action doesn’t get overlooked amidst the current economic crisis.
- And finally, make what you’re doing known. By talking, blogging, and communicating about your actions to fight climate change, you can set a real example for your fellow citizens to make changes in their lives.