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Best Buy has launched a pilot program in Chicago that will enable customers to switch from their current electric utility to Constellation Energy right in the store -- and also will encourage them to buy smart thermostats and other energy-efficiency products.

McDonald's has just announced a major environmental initiative: The company is launching a pilot program to phase out polystyrene beverage cups (McD's long ago gave up Styrofoam for its food packaging, but hot beverages have still been served in polystyrene).

If you're like me, you have at least one old electronic gadget sitting unused in a drawer, closet or bureau. I think about getting rid of these gadgets during the occasional cleanup, but it takes some time to recycle them – and I know I'm not supposed to throw them in the trash – so I end up putting it off. And the computers and phones stay where they are, just gathering dust.

Guinness Stout is one of the world’s great beverages. It is the darkest of beers, as hearty and full-bodied as they come, with a characteristic cream-colored head on top. Its color is black with, to my eyes, a hint of dark chocolaty brown. It’ has been brewed in Ireland for the better part of three centuries and may it never change.

$10 billion. That is the annual dollar amount of the potential roof top solar installations being proposed to customers by Clean Power Finance’s national network of 1,550 installers.

There are plenty of examples of how things go awry in the world of business and buildings when it comes to growth and environmental impacts -- those problems help fuel the sustainability solutions industry.

At the Green Grid Forum in March 2012, several companies that host digital marketplaces and social networks highlighted their efforts to create greener data centers. Today data centers use more than 2% of all electricity. Approximately half of electricity in the U.S. is generated by burning coal. Rapidly rising data center energy use will contribute an ever increasing amount of greenhouse gas emissions unless we can decouple the growth of data storage and processing from fossil fuel pollution.

Much has been written about Google and its millions upon millions in investment in renewable energy. But until recently, the public seldom got a peek into the inner workings of the Silicon Valley juggernaut and its own energy practices.

That changed with last fall when the company lifted the veil on its energy consumption, efforts to make that more efficient and other work to reduce the environmental impacts of operations.

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Today, more than 1.8 billion square feet of commercial property is certified under the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design standards. And for many, obtaining the shining LEED plaque that attests to green building achievement is a major goal

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For all the talk about the energy-saving promise of smart meters, which allow two-way energy data communication between ratepayers and their utility providers, it’s still just mostly potential. In hopes of getting more consumers engaged in tracking and managing their home energy use, GE this week announced a raft of new products, launched under GE’s Brillion home-energy-management-system brand.