Now that the economy is beginning to rebound, will the business sector incorporate the lessons they've learned — or will things revert back to conniving for profits at all costs? For all of our sakes, let's hope things don't return to path that led to the Great Recession.

Some folks, and I'm included, are looking for new types of investments. We're looking for ways to invest that will benefit our communities as well as our retirement funds. We're looking to help finance the green economy and help people like Sherane Berkeley buy her first home ...

From the moment she arrived in the U.S. from Trinidad and Tobago in 1994, Sherane Berkeley dreamed of owning her own home. But as a single parent with a young son, it wouldn’t be easy. A lousy credit score and little sense of how to go about getting a loan meant Berkeley needed help before making any move. Fed up with her inner-city neighborhood in Washington, D.C., she set out to get it.

In 2004, at a weekly class held by Manna, a D.C.-based group that lifts low-income families onto the property ladder, advisors helped Berkeley budget her money, polish her credit score and learn the steps to owning a home. And when a modern brick-and-siding home renovated by Manna came onto the market in 2007, they offered her favorable terms to buy it.

“Friends say, ‘You don’t come out anymore,’” says Berkeley, 39. “I say, ‘No, I have a home now. I love it.’ The Caribbean Blue in my bathroom reminds me of back home.” Berkeley—and the hundreds of others helped by Manna—isn’t alone in profiting from the organization’s work. Equally gratified are its investors. One of Manna’s lenders since 2003, the Maryland-based Calvert Foundation, which sets out to blend social impact with financial return through its $200 million fund of investments, has few regrets about its wager on affordable housing. Scores of successful ventures in more than 100 countries allow the foundation to pay its backers, from individuals to large institutions, up to 3 percent interest while boosting poorer communities.

It’s “an opportunity to know my investment is [going] toward those things I care about more,” says Anderson Allen, a 48-year-old office worker in Durham, North Carolina, who placed a portion of his retirement savings with the foundation in 2008. “It’s unambiguously positive for the people trying to make it. I’m writing to friends and family saying, ‘This is something to consider.’”

Financial returns should not be an investor’s sole measure of success, though. Social and environmental change might once have been the preserve of the charitable sector, but the opportunities for investors to blend good causes with good returns are growing. And for those same individuals comes an additional responsibility. Before picking a retirement plan or signing up for a mortgage, ask yourself where any return will come from and what will have gone into it. “Money can only be earned if there’s real value creation,” cautions Blom. “And that only happens in the real economy.”

Read the rest of this Ode Magazine article, by Adam Smith, here.

Tom Croft, author of Up From Wall Street: A Responsible Investment Alternative, discusses how responsible investing can generate positive social, economic, and environmental benefits — and financial returns:

Those of you familiar with Twitter know it's not uncommon for an average Joe to pose as a celebrity online, so it should come as no surprise that BP's public relation's department also has a parody account sending out messages like this gem:

By the way, we made it so if you google image search "oil spill" or "bp" you'll see some great celeb sideboob pics. #bpcares

And this one:

We take this situation very seriously, which is why tonight's oil wrestling event will be followed by a candle light vigil.

And this one:

Money can't buy happiness. But Tony Hayward did buy a giant yacht he calls 'Happiness'. It has a frickin' helicopter pad on it!

The faux Twitter account, BPGlobalPR, claims its mission is to "get BP's message and mission statement out into the twitterverse!" Currently, the account has nearly 140,000 followers. BP's actual public relation's Twitter feed, BP_America, has just over 12,000 followers.

Read more about the parody account from The New York Times:

The parody site is updated throughout the day, offering a combination of “everything is going exactly according to plan” P.R. speak, macabre humor and occasional glimpses of genuine outrage.

Over the last week, BPGlobalPR boasted of a deal on “blackened shrimp” at BP gas stations, linked to the photographs of oil-soaked pelicans with the out-of-character postscript “warning: truly heartbreaking” and spoke of how “we’ve modestly made modest changes to this modest gulf.”

Beyond its followers, BPGlobalPR benefits from retweeting, becoming grist for other Twitter feeds. On Saturday, this cynical packet — “Safety is our primary concern. Well, profits, then safety. Oh, no — profits, image, then safety, but still — it’s right up there” — was bounding its way across the Internet.

Read the rest of this article, by Noam Cohen, here.

Further reading: BP Buys 'Oil' Search Terms to Redirect Users to Official Company Website -- ABC.com

The fake account has even made CNN:

The U.S. Environmental Protection agency is cracking down on sulfur dioxide pollution, much of which comes from coal fired power plants.

This is a huge win for Charlotte's air quality, which is piss poor. (Today is a code yellow day, by the way.)

There are at least four working coal plants in and around Charlotte: Riverbend (12 miles from Uptown), Allen (16 miles from Uptown), Marshall (37 miles from Uptown) and Cliffside (52 miles from Uptown). All four are owned by Charlotte-based Duke Energy.

The Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday set a new health standard that coal-fired power plants and other industries will have to meet on sulfur dioxide, a pollutant that triggers asthma attacks and causes other respiratory problems.

The EPA set the new standard within a range that an independent panel of scientists suggested. This marks the first time the standard has been changed since the original one was issued in 1971.

The new rule sets the amount at 75 parts per billion over a one-hour period, a level that's aimed at protecting people who go outdoors from short-term exposures. The EPA said that even brief exposure could create health problems, especially for children, people with asthma and older people.

The agency also changed its rules to require more monitors in areas that have the highest amounts of sulfur dioxide pollution.

Sulfur dioxide comes mainly from coal-fired power plants. The EPA is in the process of tightening controls on other air pollutants from coal and other fossil fuels. It's expected to issue a final rule tightening the regulation of ozone, or smog, in September.

The EPA estimated that cleaner air as a result of the new standard would mean 2,300 to 5,900 fewer premature deaths and 54,000 fewer asthma attacks per year. It said the estimated cost to upgrade pollution controls was about $1.5 billion.

Clean Air Watch, an advocacy group, gave the EPA "a B plus or A minus" on the new standard. It was slightly less strict than the group and the American Lung Association had recommended.

Read more at McClatchyDC.com.

Further reading: Coal hard facts: A Charlotte company teams up to clean up Duke Energy’s plants — The Mecklenburg Times

Keep up with Charlotte's air quality alerts on Twitter.

In addition to being horrible for our health, sulfur dioxide contributes to global warming.

Checking into Facebook this morning, someone I respect a great deal greeted me with this question, "What are you doing to decrease your reliance on oil?"

I answered her question and now I'll ask you: What are you doing to decrease your reliance on oil? How about energy in general?

The fact is Americans are addicted to petroleum -- which is in damn near everything, and coal -- which powers many of our homes and businesses.

We consume and consume and consume, and are then told to consume more. To make matters worse, most of the things we consume come wrapped in some sort of paper or plastic and stuffed inside a plastic bag. And, if we're being really honest with ourselves, we know that a lot of the stuff we buy isn't needed and that new stuff will sit around in our house, taking up space, collecting dust or sucking up electricity.

Look around your home and office. Look at your habits. I'm looking, and I see a lot of excess. I'm looking, and I see an opportunity for positive change.

In my family, with the understanding that we vote with our dollars and that everything we consume requires energy of some sort to produce and transport, we've decided to try to consume less in general.

We're driving less and (organic) gardening more. We're trying to buy more from local vendors and less from big box stores. We're looking for products that have less packaging, recycled packaging and compostable packaging. We use reusable bags when we shop — everywhere, not just at the grocery store. We repair and re-purpose broken things and buy used things instead of new things when practical, in part to avoid packaging but also because of all of the energy and water required to make new stuff and deliver it to local stores or our doorstep. I drive a hybrid that not only requires less gas but fewer oil changes and my husband is considering a hybrid to replace his aging vehicle, too.

But, even with all of that effort and commitment, when I list things it's easy to see that — though we think we're doing a lot — we're not doing nearly as much as we could.

Now, if Duke Energy was the friendly and green corporate citizen they like to say they are, would they be holding other alternative energy companies back? No. But the truth is, there isn't anything friendly or green about Duke Energy other than a lot of "visionary" rhetoric from Jim Rogers.

Duke Energy's green when the greenbacks are good and dodgy when the greenbacks are good. Don't get confused. It's all about, and always has been about, the Benjamin's, baby.

THIS is the exact type of thing that earns Rogers a Fossil Fools Day award and constant criticism from environmentalists who call him a greenwasher.

What we'd like to see, Mr. Rogers, is your company putting its money where its mouth is. Think you can make that happen?

Duke Energy’s policies in North Carolina are stifling the growth of the local solar industry there, according to a report in the Charlotte Business Journal.

According to the story, Duke Energy Carolinas has succeeded in controlling the local solar sector by refusing to pay competitive pricing on solar energy and building and operating its own solar projects.

The Journal reports that Duke rarely pays more than 12 cents a kilowatt-hour from independent solar projects. At that price, developers say it is not worth the effort to develop projects. Since Duke already has agreements in place for all the renewable energy credits it requires for the next four years, it can now afford to sit on the sidelines, if it chooses.

The recent complaints aren’t the first against Duke. In 2008, Environmental Leader reported on Wal-Mart’s complaint that Duke’s plan for a $100 million network of solar panels would choke off its own plans to develop a solar power project in the region. Grocery chain Kroger, industrial power consumers and solar advocacy groups also opposed that plan. Duke eventually acquiesced to pressure and reduced the scope of its project by half.

Read more at the Environmental Leader: Energy and Environmental News for Business.

Further reading: The Smooth-Talking King of Coal—and Climate Change (Bloomberg Businessweek)

Greenwashing = greenbacks:

Charlotte Viewpoint and Charlotte Magazine are teaming up to bring Charlotte something they haven't seen before: A live magazine.

During the second week of June, two local magazines will create a new way for area residents to experience some of the best our city has to offer. "Type/Face: A Live Magazine," will showcase our region's top writers and artists as they explore experimental theater, architecture, fashion, pro wrestling, poetry, food, comics and more.

Billed as a literary, journalistic and artistic happening, Type/Face is the collaborative effort of two of the region's leading magazines, Charlotte magazine and the Charlotte ViewPoint. The one-night performance will feature 3-D essays, opinions, photography, video and interviews on a variety of topics.

Lila Allen is the editor-in-chief of Charlotte ViewPoint. She spoke to me about bringing "the page to the stage" for this evening, which promises to re-invent the visual story and re-imagine the visual word.

"We are a culture that increasingly relies on consuming content through technology," says Allen, "A byproduct of the explosive use of social networks where people connect virtually is that, ironically, people crave face-to-face interaction. People like to have a personal connection with writers they read, people they've read about and engage in a way with thought leaders where synergies develop. Type/Face offers that connection and more."

Echoing those thoughts is Charlotte ViewPoint founder and publisher Mark Peres. "There is a desire in our region for smart gatherings that explore our creativity and what we might be," said Peres. "Charlotte ViewPoint is about citizen expression and the meaning of things. Charlotte magazine tells word and graphic stories about the city we live in. So we thought why not come together and address a deep need in our city and have fun at the same time?"

Read the rest of this Charlotte Observer article, by Michael J. Solender, here.

Learn more about Type/Face and purchase your tickets here.

I'll be there. In fact, I'll be one of the people on stage. I'm extremely proud that my Charlotte Magazine article "One Man and a River," about our Catawba Riverkeeper and his work to watchdog Charlotte's coal ash ponds, was chosen to be part of Type/Face. I look forward to telling you all about what it was like to stand between Mountain Island Lake's two high-hazard coal ash ponds.

Never heard of Charlotte Viewpoint? Allow me to clue you in:

Check out more Charlotte Viewpoint videos here.

Congratulations, O2 Energies.

Mount Airy could find itself at the cutting edge of the “green power” movement through the development of a proposed solar farm on city-owned property near the wastewater-treatment plant.

The city board of commissioners unanimously approved a letter of intent Tuesday night that will allow a Charlotte-based firm to move forward with the project.

An entity known as O2Energies is proposing to lease two sites totaling roughly six acres near the sewage-treatment facility located off U.S. 52 at the southernmost boundary of the city limits.

Plans call for a 1-megawatt facility at the site, according to Joel Olsen, managing director of the company. “This would generate enough power to offset the consumption of roughly 200 households,” Olsen told board members in explaining the electrical production to be realized.

Information presented Tuesday night shows that O2Energies has planned, designed and installed more than 70 solar energy systems of different types. It has formed a “strategic partnership” with Pike Electric Inc. in Mount Airy to help make the local effort a reality. Pike has been branching out into alternative energy systems in addition to its traditional focus on electricity, based on Tuesday night’s discussion.

Read the rest of this Mount Airy News article, by Tom Joyce, here.

Get a feel for what the solar farm may look like by watching this installation in Charlottesville, Va., last month:

Donna Lewis (The Ken's wife), former Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory, WBTV personality Barbara McKay and NASCAR star Geoff Bodine are all mentioned in this article from MSNBC.com about a pyramid scheme that's got several states raising their eyebrows. Of course, all these folks are responding to questions from the State of Denial.

Several prominent Carolinians including the wife of former Bank of America CEO Ken Lewis have signed on as sales reps for a multi-level marketer recently fined as a "pyramid scheme."

Donna Lewis joined Fortune Hi-Tech Marketing known as FHTM in December of 2008 at the invitation of her friend, Charlotte television personality Barbara McKay.

Last month FHTM agreed to pay almost a million dollars in refunds and fines to settle a claim by the Montana Commissioner of Securities and Insurance that the multi-level marketer was a "pyramid promotional scheme."

Read the rest of this article, by WCNC's Stuart Watson, here.

Here's the spiel. Any idea WTF they're selling, besides soft lighting and bullshit?

But, according to some industry watchers, he gets an 'A' for his forward-thinking visions.

Four years into an avowed effort to change the utilities-industry business model, Jim Rogers’ report card is filled with incompletes.

Observers give the Duke Energy Corp. chief executive high marks on vision and theory. He also scores well on visibility as his reputation has grown considerably since arriving at Duke four years ago.

That reputation is largely deserved, says John Gartner, a senior analyst with Pike Research, which follows the new energy industry.

“For the head of a big utility that makes its profits from traditional energy, he is perceived as being outside the industry norm and more in line with people with environmental concerns,” Gartner says. “I think he is making progress, but it’s going much slower than he or the company might like.”

That judgment isn’t universal, however.

“They shouldn’t be in the mode of just selling kilowatts — I agreed that he’s got the proper frame for the issue,” says Stephen Smith, executive director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. “But I don’t have the sense that he is leading in that in a big way as much as maybe his rhetoric would indicate.”

Rogers has been clear on what he views as the future model. The industry must decarbonize, decentralize and sell energy efficiency as well as energy.

And he thinks Duke can lead the way.

Read the rest of this Charlotte Business Journal article, by John Downey, here.

In other energy news: Duke Energy starts generating solar power in Shelby (Charlotte Business Journal)

Not everyone loves, or even likes, Jim Rogers. (Who knew Darth Vader and Jim Rogers were buds? Not I ... Apparently, the "Death Star" is powered by coal.)

Never forget: The water that flows through the Catawba ours, not some company's. The Catawba River is the source of our drinking water. It also powers our community's businesses. We have every right to speak up when its health is in danger. Here's your chance ...

From David Merryman, our Catawba Riverkeeper:

Please help ensure public safety & environmental health with your comments and requests for a local public hearing in your community by 5pm, May 28!

Now's your chance to have your say in what's discharged into our Catawba River from four coal ash ponds. Deadline is May 28 at 5pm! Tell your friends and have them make comments.

Our Catawba River - our drinking water supply - deserves absolute assurances that the four coal ash ponds along its banks will be cleaned-out, lined, monitored and closed for usage as soon as possible. Also, the discharges from these ponds should not be permitted to discharge a "laundry list" of heavy metals above state water quality standards any longer. This comment period will end on May 28. The Catawba is no place for the discharge and dangers of coal ash wastes.

It's Our River, Not An Ash Tray!

Four Simple Steps to Commenting & Requesting a Public Hearing for Discharge Permits

Step One- View the draft discharge permits below.

Lake Norman- Marshall Steam Station, NC0004987, draft permit.

Mtn. Island- Riverbend Steam Station, NC0004961, draft permit.

Lake Wylie- Allen Steam Station, NC0004979, draft permit.

Step Two- Write a comment letter which includes: (1) your name and address, (2) permit number in subject line, (3) your concern for the protection of the Catawba River, (4) comment points from the providing sheets below, (5) request for a public hearing in your local community. At least, request a public hearing regarding the coal ash pond in your local community. See an example beginning of a comment letter by clicking here.

Talking Points for Marshall Steam Station, NC0004987.

Talking Points for Riverbend Steam Station, NC0004961.

Talking Points for Allen Steam Station, NC0004979.

Step Three- Address an envelope to Surface Water Protection Section, Point Source Branch, 1617 Mail Service Center, Raleigh, NC 26799-1617. Or select the email address for the correct Steam Station.

Email for Marshall Steam Station, sergei.chernikov@ncdenr.gov

Email for Riverbend Steam Station, sergei.chernikov@ncdenr.gov

Email for Allen Steam Station, gil.vinzani@ncdenr.gov

Step Four- Mail or email your comments and requests for public hearings. Please copy David Merryman, Catawba Riverkeeper on all email comments.

These permits can have a profound impact within our Catawba River basin. Our River needs your help- Please provide comments and make requests for public hearings in your area!! You and your River deserve more than one public hearing regarding these discharge permits.