Why sustainability is win the CEO

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By Duane Stanford

At PepsiCo (PEP) walking potato chips plant steam Leicester, England, the Fryer rises through exhaust pipes in the open sky. The window of his Office, Martyn Seal, European Director of the business of sustainability, look wispy clouds and sees nothing but resources lost and wasted money. To change all this, seal and his team are working to develop a manufacturing process that will allow them to suck the water from the potatoes and even disconnect the plant from the public water system.

Potatoes are 80% water, which most is lost as steam when the 350 000 tonnes of crutches are sliced and fried annually at the plant. Seal hopes to condense the steam, possibly with a system of cooling tubes, reuse captured H2O to clean equipment, help wash potatoes along the lines of manufacture and even irrigate shrubs outdoors. The method could save 1 million per year plant. "Many people think we are nuts," said the seal. "We try to push the limits to make a difference."

In many companies, being socially responsible generally meant distributing checks to victims of natural disasters, environmental groups or producers of green television commercials. Now the movement of the sustainability of companies has a simple principle: save the planet can save big bucks. Executives are trying to achieve significant savings by coming up with innovative ways to go easier on the environment.

Recent price volatile swings in fuel, cotton, plastic packaging food ingredients such as corn, and a host of other raw materials have added an emergency to the efforts of companies to shave costs to competitive prices and protect margins.

How fully companies adopt sustainability efforts in this decade could have a real impact on their value for shareholders, says Daniel c. Esty, Professor of environmental policy at Yale Law School. Esty believes that sustainability will become as transformative for corporations like revolutions in information technology and quality earlier, once more senior executives are recognizing the enormous potential to trim costs.

"Sustainability has become a determining factor which companies win market, and smart CEO invest in a more rigorous approach to the environment, says Esty, on leave from Yale to run Environmental Protection Dept." Connecticut, with responsibilities of additional energy, pending the approval of the Legislative Assembly. "A good number of companies starting to see the upside opportunity." The best companies see the mark and the possibility of the corporate identity. ?

Stores Wal - Mart (WMT) is far ahead target (TGT) and Sears Holdings (SHLD) when it comes to savings by working with retailers to reduce packaging. This means of freight and warehouse costs. Chain Seiyu Wal-Mart at the 2009 Japan of packages for its fresh fruit cut of distributor and salad oil corn plastic. That cut the weight of the packaging by 25 per cent and 13 per cent cost, save more than $195,000 per year.

International Paper (IP), a global document and company packing, recognized long ago that its future depends on a steady supply of trees, said James McDonald, Director of the sustainability of society. IP says planted with tree seedlings in addition of 4 billion between the 1950s and land, about four years ago, when he sold his forest. More recent efforts have focused on the use of less water and energy to its manufacturing operations. The company cut purchases of 21% from 2005 to 2010 fossil fuel - in part by the burning of members and other debris of the biomass of the transformation of the tree - generating $ 221 million in annual savings to last year's prices.

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