Achieving Carbon Neutrality for a Nickel; Federal Agencies to Plan Road to Sustainability

Can you spare a nickel? Everytime you use UPS to send a package, you can now add a nickel to the price if you'd like them to buy carbon offsets on your behalf to offset CO2 emissions generated by the transport of your package. It's that simple. UPS will match all contributions through 2009-2010, for the first $1 million. While this service has initially been offered only to registered internet users, it will become available to all users next year.

Why is this important for you? Because it is a glimpse into the future for how all companies will soon be parading to begin their sustainability efforts. Remember a few weeks ago when Wal-mart announced that it would soon start rating all the products it sells based on their carbon footprints and ecological damage ratio?

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In other interesting news, President Obama signed a federal order today mandating all federal agencies to draw up a plan to reduce their greenhouse emissions by 2020. They have 90 days to submit their proposals. What is especially noteworthy is that they are required to set targets for waste reduction, water and energy efficiency, sustainable buildings and investing in green technologies. This will translate into government purchasing green products and a rise in the popularity of niche green technologies. And we all know what means, more purchasing power = moe demand = more hiring = more jobs = growth.

So if you are continuing to studiously ignore all calls to become up-to-date in sustainability and the many fields it offers for a career with growth potential, I would stop and hit "green jobs" in your Google taskbar. You might be a tad surprised.