The words green and guilt go well together.  In a 2007 nationwide poll sponsored by the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, 81 percent of Americans said they felt a personal responsibility to do something about global warming.  For them, and for you, we offer this gide to guilt-free environmentalism.   • Illustration by Christopher Silas Neal                   

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Everyday Choices

Being green tends to cost green. And oftentimes, the environmental responsibility that individuals tend to take on seems closely tied to their ability — and their willingness — to spend. Thus, you may see that dual-income, no-kids couple down the street commuting to work in their $25,000 hybrid car or read about celebrities writing checks for carbon credits to cover their energy- hogging mansions. But there are moves you can make that don’t cost much — or even anything — and that will help reduce greenhouse gases, keep recyclable materials out of landfills, and otherwise help the earth continue to support life.

Conservation International, a nonprofit headquartered near Washington, D.C., recommends that anyone wanting a greener lifestyle to do without a car or, failing that, to drive less. Walk, bicycle, or take public transit, which doesn’t cost much at all. And if you do have a car, keeping the engine tuned and the tires properly inflated will reduce pollution and save you gas money.

Next, green your home with Energy Star–rated appliances and windows, high efficiency showerheads, and plenty of insulation and caulking, which will help reduce heating and cooling needs. None of these options is all that expensive, and most of them will put money in your pocket because you’ll be using less energy and water.

Reusing items and recycling are both easy ways to be green. Repair and reuse household items instead of replacing them; when you do buy new products, select ones that incorporate recycled materials.

The average citizen of a developed country produces anywhere from six to 23 tons of carbon per year.  The cost of buying credits to mitigate those emissions varies widely, starting as low as $1 per ton and going as high as $30 per ton.

What you eat can also have an impact on the environment. Choosing organic, locally produced foods decreases the need for chemical pesticides and fertilizers, which are pollutants, and also cuts down on the negative effects of transportation. Conservation International also urges would-be eco-warriors to select green products when you’re shopping and green candidates when you’re voting, and to purchase carbon credits (more on this in a moment). If it all sounds like a bit much, remember that nobody can completely eliminate the impact that living has on the environment — but we can all do better.

Clean-Tech Investing

Now that you’ve been exposed to the idea that saving the planet can also save you money, try on the concept of actually making money off environmentalism by investing in businesses in the “clean-tech” arena. Clean-tech companies supply products and services that support energy conservation, generation, and management, as well as water and wastewater treatment, eco-friendly agriculture, and other areas relating to the protection and sustainment of the natural environment. They also make money — sometimes a lot of it. The Cleantech Index, a group of stocks assembled by the Cleantech Group in Brighton, Michigan, returned nearly 20 percent of capital invested in the fi rst half of 2007, doing twice as well as the Standard & Poor 500, NASDAQ, and other broader indexes.

“This isn’t socially responsible investing,” stresses Ron Pernick, coauthor of The Clean Tech Revolution and cofounder of Clean Edge, a clean-tech consulting fi rm in Portland, Oregon. “This is technology driven.” Pernick identifies six main factors that are propelling people’s investment in cleantech businesses. Among them are higher and more-volatile prices of fossil fuels, falling costs of energy from alternative sources (such as the sun and the wind), and a wild card called China. Pernick expects that China will start becoming much greener — and when that happens, it will significantly affect the clean-tech industry.

One of the easiest ways to get on the clean-tech bandwagon is through an exchange-traded fund. For instance, First Trust Portfolios, a Lisle, Illinois, investmentmanagement firm, introduced in February the NASDAQ Clean Edge U.S. Liquid Series Index Fund, an exchange-traded fund that tracks the NASDAQ Clean Edge U.S. Index from Pernick’s firm. The fund’s biggest holding is First Solar, a solar-module maker in Phoenix that reported a net income of $44 million on sales of $72 million for the second quarter of 2007.

The small size and relative newness of companies like First Solar, which is a fairly typical fi rm in the world of clean-tech pureplay stocks, can make it tricky for a person to invest in shares of individual companies in the sector. Pernick says that clearly not all the clean-tech start-ups will prosper longterm, but some will likely do very well. “Last year, solar, wind, biofuels, and fuel cells were a $55 billion global industry,” he says. “We see that expanding to greater than $225 billion in the next 10 years. That’s why investor interest is being piqued.”

Carbon Offsets

Of all the odd concepts to come out of the green movement, carbon offsets have to be near the top of the list. The idea is that you pay someone else to plant a tree, invest in a solar-energy start-up, or otherwise help reduce the amount of carbon you emit into the atmosphere. Then, you can just go about your business more or less as usual, confident that you have offset whatever carbon you may be emitting.

Carbon offsetting has won the backing of sustainability champions. “Offsetting is a common solution,” says Brian Mullis, president of Sustainable Travel International, a Hood River, Oregon, nonprofit education organization. “Investing in renewable energy is a good thing, as is preserving ancient forests and investing in replanting areas where deforesting has occurred.”

The average citizen of a developed country produces anywhere from six to 23 tons of carbon per year. The cost of buying credits to mitigate those emissions varies widely, starting as low as $1 per ton and going as high as $30 per ton. At San Francisco– based TerraPass, a leading carbon-offsets retailer, credits cost about $10 per ton. So canceling out all the carbon your car emits during a year costs between $30 and $80, depending on the vehicle, according to Tom Arnold, TerraPass’s chief environmental offi cer. Offsetting your entire house would run anywhere from $30 to $400, depending on size, location, and other factors.

One of the biggest draws to carbon offsetting is the convenience of it. You can fi nd TerraPasses and other carbon-offset options on the shelves at many retailers as well as through the Internet. In fact, most of the 67,000 TerraPasses that have been sold so far have been purchased online, Arnold says. “Business is very good,” he adds. “It’s been roughly doubling every year.”

TerraPass takes the revenues from its sales and invests in wind-energy projects, projects that upgrade municipal landfi lls in order to reduce the landfills’ emissions, and biomass projects that aim to create energy from cow manure. Those investments add up to a lot of carbon offsets. Last year, Arnold says, the carbon-credit industry offset about 30 million tons of carbon emissions.

If you want to play the carbon offset credit game, start by checking out an online carbon calculator. The one on the TerraPass website (www.terrapass.com) calculates the amount of carbon that needs to be offset for a car, home, dorm room, and even a wedding. Enter a few tidbits of information such as your home’s zip code and recent monthly energy bills and you’ll be told approximately how much carbon you’re emitting and what it will cost to counteract it.

The trading of carbon-offset credits has survived controversy, some of which has stemmed from questions about whether certain credit sellers are offering offsets of little or no value. Today, companies like TerraPass engage third-party auditors to verify the quality of the offsets. In the future, says Arnold, big changes will come in the way consumers buy carbon offsets. “Just think about how easy it is to buy travel insurance,” he says. “You can buy from the airline, at the airport — wherever you want. We have to make carbon credits mainstream — a quick, easy, check-the-box thing.” And, it’s already happening. General Electric recently announced a new credit card that lets cardholders earn not shopping or travel rewards — or even cash back, for that matter — but carbon-offset credits.


Green Travel

Getting there is half the fun, but it’s also part of the conundrum facing modern travelers. Namely, how can you get to the places you need or want to go without having an undue negative impact on the environment? The answer is green travel, which, according to Mullis, “means to focus on limiting your negative impact and improving your positive impact.”

Green Rooms Cost-to-coast and downtown to uptown, you can find a place to rest your head that will support your green ideals.  These hotels are among hundreds that belong to the Green Hotels Association, a Houston, Texas organization that recogizes lodgings that have made efforts to conserve water, energy, and solid waste. The Colony Hotel & Cabaña Club 525 East Atlantic Avenue Delray Beach, Florida (561) 276-4123 thecolonyhotel.com/florida Habitat Suites 500 East Highland Mall Boulevard Austin, Texas (800) 535-4663 www.habitatsuites.com Hotel Bel-Air 701 Stone Canyon Road Los Angeles, California (800) 648-409 www.hotelbelair.com Lake Powell Resort 100 Lakeshore Drive Page, Arizona (928) 645-2433 www.lakepowell.com The Moderne Hotel 243 West 55th Street New York, New York (212) 397-6767 www.nychotels.com Southfork Ranch 3700 Hogge Road Parker, Texas (972) 442-7800 www.southforkranch.com Valu Inn SeaTac 22246 Pacific Highway South Des Moines, Washington (866) 498-2489 www.valuinnseatac.com Source: Green Hotels Association, www.greenhotels.com

In the old sense, green travel means visiting locales noted for environmental charm. Ecotourism may take you to a tent resort in the rain forest, or to a floating hotel that has been towed to a summertime location on a Canadian lake to avoid affecting the environment to the same degree that a permanent, year-round facility does. This kind of green travel is enjoyable and in demand, and while it helps remind travelers of the beauty and pleasure of un- spoiled locations, it doesn’t necessarily help reduce the browning impact of our non-vacation, day-to-day living.

The new green travel tackles that issue. Basically, the new take on the concept is to travel in a way that minimizes your environmental impact. Organizations such as Sustainable Travel International offer a lot of guidance on how to do that; for example, you can stay at hotels that recycle wastewater, and you can use public transportation when it’s available in the cities you’re visiting. Mullis suggests asking whether an organization has a sustainability policy, trains its staff in sustainable travel, and practices recycling.

Carbon offsets play a big role in this kind of green travel, with some online ticket sellers offering easy ways to purchase carbon offsets at the same time you book a flight, hotel room, or car rental. But air travel probably gets more attention than it deserves, says Arnold. While flying does have an impact, especially with regard to carbon emissions, it does not have nearly the negative effect that other carbon contributors do. For instance, he considers coal-fi red electricity-generating plants a much more serious problem. “Aviation is a minor part,” Arnold says. “For certain travelers, it’s an issue, but globally, it’s only about 2 percent of the problem.”

Green Careers

In many ways, the greening of society seems to focus on restrictions by drawing lines around what we can and can’t do and by outlawing activities that we once enjoyed or profited from. But one green trend is about opening doors and expanding opportunity. That’s what is behind the rising interest in green careers and green employees. Ori Sivan knows this angle inside and out, having graduated in 2005 with a college degree in environmental engineering (a field in which he briefly pursued employment) before starting his own business, Greenmaker Supply, a Chicago-based sustainable-building-materials retailer. Today, he hires people who want to work for a green company.

In contrast to the worrisome forecasts and warnings often given by environmental observers, the green-career business is booming. “Absolutely bonkers,” is the way Sivan describes it.

'Working to Save the Environment:  The Top Three Jobs The sector of environment-related professions has begun to emerge as one of the future's fastest-growing job markets.  Granted, most of the 30 careers on the list of hottest occupations identified by the Bureau of Labor Statistics were computer- or health-related, but these three green gigs made the cut on this year's ranking byu merit of their projected percentage of growths from 2004 to 2014 Hydrologist Expected job growth: 316 percent Hazardous materials removal worker Expected job growth: 312 percent Environmental engineer Expected job growth: 30 percent Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, www.bls.gov

Green careers aren’t just for technically trained types like Sivan, either, says Marie Kerpan, a green-career consultant in Mill Valley, California. “All functions of business could be applied to a green career,” she says. “You could be a marketer working in a business in renewable energy.” Indeed, Sivan says that when he recently hired an accountant and a warehouse manager, he wasn’t
looking for green credentials but for people who knew their jobs and were interested in working for a green company like his.

Credentials can’t hurt, however, and they are increasingly available. Many community colleges offer certificates and associate’s degrees in environmental science and technology, and the trend is reaching all the way up to graduate schools. Kerpan says that “Green MBA” degrees are now offered at a handful of universities, where students with interests in the environment and business can learn how to have a positive impact on both.

Not too long ago, having a green career meant working for a nonprofit group or a research organization. Nonprofits still represent a major career path, but increasingly, businesses of all types are interested in hiring people who can help them with their sustainability initiatives, Kerpan says. And many potential employers are popping up specifically to address problems and sell sustainability solutions, particularly in the hot areas of renewable energy, green building, and transportation. “Pretty much anything can be a green career if you do it in the context of solving one of these problems,” Kerpan says. You can identify green employers by using directories such as Co-op America’s National Green Pages (www.coopamerica.org) and by schmoozing at green-business conventions and checking sources like the Sustainable Business Institute’s list of green enterprises (www.sustainablebusiness.org).

The only bad news about green careers is that pursuing one may not pay very well — yet. “Unfortunately, all too often it means taking a little lower salary,” Sivan says. “There are lots of great opportunities right now to get in on the ground floor, but generally that comes with a pay cut and some risk.”