The Verdant 360 Blog

Per my previous post, I have accessed the MIT Center for collective Intelligence site to further understand their efforts in utilizing “crowdsourcing” to address the issues around Global Climate Change and sustainability. It is clear that they see the value. How and when the benefits are realized will take time to unfold. However, MIT has gone so far as to create what they have termed a Climate Collabortorium. Here is how Founder Professor Thomas Malone describes the activities of the Climate Collabotoroium.

What we’re trying to do here at the Center for Collective Intelligence with our Climate Collaboratorium is what we call radically open computer modeling to bring the spirit of systems like Wikipedia and Linux to the problem of global climate change. We want thousands of people all over the world to be able to interact with and modify the system, create real quantitative representations of plans for what we could do.

We also want them to be able to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of different plans in an organized way, and we want them to be able to collectively select the most promising plans from all the possibilities that have been proposed.

In his interview on the MIT Sloan Business School Website, All Together Now (or, Can Collective Intelligence Save the Planet?) Professor Malone outlines his belief that the potential for collective intelligence can be a very powerful tool to address the challenges raised by Global Climate Change.

To solve the climate problem, we need a huge range of expertise. We’ve got to know things about the physics of the upper atmosphere and the chemistry of the oceans and the economics of carbon taxes and the psychology of consumers who are making decisions about when to drive versus take public transportation. Collective intelligence mechanisms are ideal for bringing together those diverse kinds of knowledge.

To download a copy of the first working paper created by the Climate Collabotorium click on this-Can We Exploit Collective Intelligence for Collaborative Deliberation? The Case of the Climate Change Collaboratorium.

-FR

Sustainability, Uncategorized, climate change Center For Collective Intelligence, climate change, Climate Collabotorium, Crowdsourcing, MIT Sloan Schoolof Business, Sustainability

Just finished Jeff Howe’s Crowdsourcing-Why The Power Of The Crowd Is Driving The Future of Business and it reinforced a suspicion I had, since meeting Clay Shirky at an event this last spring. Clay Shirky is the author of Here Comes Everybody, which along with Crowdsourcing examines the internet’s ability to create communities and leverage the collective intelligence of those communities to create new and innovative ways of social and business interaction. Both books give excellent examples of the power of crowdsourcing. Describing how, by tapping into their inherent creative and technical knowledge base, thousands (and at times millions) of interconnected individuals have come together to solve problems, create new online communities and dramatically reshape business models. Here’ is  Howe’s description of the potential of crowdsourcing,

Crowdsourcing has the potential to correct a long-standing human conundrum. The amount of knowledge and talent dispersed among the numerous members of our species has always vastly outstripped our capacity to harness those invaluable quantaties. Instead, it withers on the vine for want of an outlet. Crowdsourcing is the mechanism by which such talent and knowledge is matched to those in need of it. It poses a tantalizing question: What if the solutions to our greatest problems weren’t waiting to be conceived, but already existed somewhere, just waiting to be found, in the warp and weave of this vibrant human network?”

Now here’s the interesting part in reference to this blog. When I met Clay Shirky I began to consider the possibility that there might be some way to utilize intelligence of the “crowd” to solve some of the problems presented by Climate Change and/or Global Warming. So in that spirit I picked up “Crowdsourcing.” I am reading it (finished it two days, it was that engrossing), and there on page 166, I see that the MIT Center For Collective Intelligence is attempting to “crowdsource” the viability of solutions to health care and yes…climate change. Fair enough, but what I found upon visiting the Center for Collective Intelligence is fascinating. There is an interview with Professor Thomas Malone, who launched the Center for Collective Intelligence. In the interview All Together Now (or, Can Collective Intelligence Save the Planet?), Malone outlines what the Center is doing as well as, his thoughts on sustainability in general. It will challenge how many of us view sustainability and will force us to look differently at how we approach solutions. In part 2 of this post,  I will discuss the Malone interview and describe the Center’s activities around climate change as well as sustainability in general. -FR

Sustainability, climate change Clay Shirky, climate change, Crowdsourcing, Global Warming, Here Comes Everybody, Jeff Howe, MIT Center For Collective Intelligence, Sustainability

I attended the Clinton Global Initiative event, Global Challenges Corporate Solutions: Creating Value for Business and Society, this past Monday. Co-hosted by The Economist  the event was held at the Sheraton Conference Center in New York City. The event opened with a Plenary Session, at which the 42nd President, Bill Clinton spoke as well as participated in a panel discussion on the importance of cross-sector engagement in addressing global financial, social and environmental challenges.  The discussion was centered on the role that corporations and foundations can play in addressing these challenges given the new realities of the economic crisis. One thing that was clear from the discussion was that sustainability is fundamentally important to both the industrial and developing world, and that is critically important that we look at a sustainable future that addresses the needs on the world’s entire population.  To that end corporate social responsibility must address the needs all it’s stakeholders from an economic, environmental and social standpoint. Speaking specifically of climate change President Clinton stated,

“We are not going to win the climate change battle till we prove it is economically feasible to do so.”-President Bill Clinton

The rest of the panel, moderated by The Economist’s New York Bureau Chief Mathew Bishop, Richard Kaufamn CEO of Good Energy, and included John Podesta Co-Chairman of the Obama transition team, Judith Rodin President of The Rockefeller Foundation, and Reggie Van Lee SVP of Booz Allen Hamilton focused on their organizations efforts in conjunction with the Clinton Global Initiative to bring about positive social and environmental change.  John Podesta spoke of the need to develop partnerships as we transition from a high-carbon to a low-carbon economy.  He felt very strongly that the Obama administration was committed to developing theses sorts of partnerships.  Mr. Van Lee felt that because the global issues were so interdependent and complex there was a necessity to create a new taxonomy that could optimize the outcome as opposed to maximizing the outcome.

In closing his introductory remarks President Clinton spoke to the need for engagement and  accountability, if we are to survive the current economic crisis and build the kind of world we all believe is possible.

We have to have a world of shared opportunities and shared responsibilities-President Bill Clinton

-FR

Corporate Social Responsibility, Sustainability Bill Clinton, climate change, corpororate social responsibility, Sustainability, The Clinton Global Initiative

…according to Mindy Lubber, President of Ceres, who was speaking about sustainability at MIT’s Sustainability Summit last week. Ms. Lubber was a member of a panel entitled “How do we progress towards sustainability during  a recession.” It was clear from her point of view as well as the other members of the panel, Michael Wise, Partner at A.T. Kearney  and Wayne Balta Vice President of Corporate Environmental Affairs at IBM that sustainability is an imperative even given the current economic climate. Discussing the impact of global warming to the governments and businesses Lubber stated, ” The costs of ignoring climate change will make sub-prime look like child’s play.”

The cost of ignoring climate change will make sub-prime look like child’s play.

The conference held at M.I.T’s Sloan School of Business, brought together students, engineers, business leaders, academics, environmental activists, and public servants and focused on real world challenges we face in moving to a sustainable world. Discussions ranged from corporate social responsibility to climate change at the macro level, to the most effective way to interact with local government officials  and historic preservation as a sustainable business practice on the local level.

The other members of her panel were as emphatic as Lubber in their points of view that business cannot afford to let the current business climate prevent them form implementing sustainable business plans. Mr. Wise who was one of the authors of the “Green Winners” report (cited in my February 11th post) spoke to the driver for implementing an effective sustainability plans which include competitive advantage, innovation and risk management. He said that the pace of environmentally related business change has accelerated to a degree that many top corporations are running scenario analysis’ and war games to identify the risk potential  environmental issues may place to their businesses.

Wayne Balta, who rounded out the panel spoke to IBM’s “Smarter Planet” campaign and he clearly believes that IBM has embarked on an initiative which converges traditional IT infrastructure and applications with sustainable business practices. He stated that because of the following factors there is an opportunity for technology to bring about change in the environmental and corporate social responsibility arenas. The factors he listed were:

• Devices are becoming vastly instrumented
• They are becoming interconnected
• Because of this they are becoming more intelligent.

These intelligent devices allow businesses to better measure the environmental footprint of their businesses. Mirroring what Mindy Lubber said earlier in the program. “What can be measured, can be managed.”

-FR

Corporate Social Responsibility, Sustainability climate change, Corporate Social Responsibility, green winners, M.I.T., Mindy Lubber, Sloan School of Business, Sustainability