Ted is always looking for ways to minimize his ecological footprint. Professionally, Ted is working to gain the skills necessary to turn his passion for sustainable development into action, as an entrepreneur or financing sustainable businesses.
Ted studied economics and international business at Saint Louis University’s campus in Madrid, where he graduated Magna Cum Laude and was honored as the Distinguished Student in International Business for his class. As the founder and president of the SLU Madrid Business Club, Ted focused the club’s activities on sustainability.
While working for commercial real estate multi-national Jones Lang LaSalle’s Madrid office, Ted strove to implement sustainable practices both within the firm and for its clients. He proposed and designed an Environmental Sustainability Action Plan for JLL Spain. Green Building and Environmentally Sustainable Development remain a passion for Ted: he believes that the intersection of sustainable infrastructure and sustainable attitude is where we’ll find a sustainable society.
Ted currently works for a private equity firm in Madrid, learning skills that he hopes to apply to finance Environmentally Sustainable Development in the United States and around the world.
Tracy is the CEO and Founding Partner of Technical Green - a green industry career site focused on clean tech and green research and development.
Tracy's professional experience are in the recruitment advertising and non-profit sectors and she has for many years maintained a sustainable lifestyle.
Marie Oser is a best-selling author, columnist, and host/producer of VEG TV. A vegan lifestyle expert, and environmental advocate with a focus on nutrition and its role in disease prevention, Oser specializes in creating original gourmet recipes with a solid nutritional bottom line.
Many prominent medical and nutrition professionals endorse her work, including Dr. Colin Campbell, Professor Emeritus, Cornell University and principal researcher of the groundbreaking CHINA STUDY, and Neal Barnard, M.D. founder and president of Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine in Washington, DC.
Marie is president of VEGTV, Inc., a video production company producing content for TV and new media. VEGTV streams hundreds of lifestyle videos to more than 1,000 sites globally. In her role as Director of Product Development at Smart Planet Kitchen, she has created, Marie Oser’s Lean & Green, a new line of vegan and Fair Trade Certified products. Marie has appeared on CNN, ABC, National Public Radio, QVC, WUSA, WNBC, KCAL, KOVR, Home & Garden Television (HGTV), FINE LIVING, TECH TV, and Discovery Channel.
Vegetarian since 1971; vegan since 1990, Marie left a career in TV advertising to pursue her interest in food, health, and nutrition. Born and raised in Philadelphia, PA, she studied psychology at St. Joseph’s University. Marie is a gourmet cook and organic gardener living in California, writing her 5th book and hiking every day with Travis, her Yellow Lab companion.
Cherl Petso is the Associate Editor at Disaboom.com, an online magazine for people with disabilities. Her writing expertise includes articles about the environment and sustainable living, and vegan/vegetarian issues. A vegetarian for 16 years and a recent vegan, Cherl is passionate about animal rights and issues. She enjoys writing about simple ways to lessen the impact on the Earth.
Cherl recently moved to Denver, Colorado from Bellingham, Washington. She enjoys hiking and hanging out with her puppy.
Nathanial Manning works for the Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI) as a Regional Analyst for Asia. He focuses on two programs for CCI, the Green Building Retrofit program and the Waste Management program. Nathaniel recently graduated from Brown University as an Environmental Studies Masters student, specializing in sustainable design and international carbon policy. Nat also completed a Bachelor of Arts in World Religions at Brown, focusing on the philosophy of ethics and the intersection between religion and politics. He is completing his Masters thesis on clean-technology-transfer within the UN's carbon credit mechanism (the CDM), which allows developed countries to invest in carbon mitigating technologies in developing countries with the purpose of promoting sustainable development.
Nathaniel has a long history of involvement in environmental development work ranging from waste-to-energy entrepreneurial ventures to designing sustainable homes for the Guatemalan chapter of Habitat for Humanity, to working for a tidal energy engineering firm in Singapore. Nat's passion is in how intelligent innovative solutions and technologies can be applied to create a sustainable and free world. When Nat thinks of the word "green" he does not just think of the word "environment" but how we as humans can design systems and solutions that create win-win situations.
Robert Cowin is a political consultant for environmental NGOs. His nomadic childhood reveals a world-class carpetbagger, but he masks as a Texan-New Yorker hybrid. Formerly with the National Environmental Trust (now the Pew Environment Group) in DC, he’s spent time on Capital Hill advocating for Kyoto ratification, clean air, renewable energy technology, and green energy policy.
Robert has also worked on marine conservation issues, directing the Conserve Our Ocean Legacy coalition in the Mid-Atlantic States which successfully worked to help strengthen and reauthorize the Magnuson Steven’s Act. He now happily lives in Southern California, flying back east often as he finishes his Masters in International Relations at Tufts University’s Fletcher School.
Dayanti Karunaratne is a freelance journalist based in Canada's capital city, Ottawa.
Since graduating from Carleton University's journalism program in 2006, Karunaratne has worked on the news desk at the Port Hope Evening Guide, the Ottawa Citizen, and the Molokai Times. Karunaratne's writing appears in the Ottawa Citizen, Ottawa Magazine, the Globe and Mail, and other lifestyle publications.
Heather O'Neill is the founder of Eco to the People, a green living blog.
Before founding Eco to the People, Heather O’Neill wore so many hats in the field of journalism that even the Queen Mother would envy her collection. She has worked as the managing editor of a beauty trade magazine; as a copy editor for an online tech magazine; as the associate editor of a city magazine and as a newspaper reporter and columnist, and as the senior editor at the popular online newsletter ecofabulous.
Her work has appeared in many publications, including Parenting, Alternative Medicine, Natural Solutions, Marin Magazine, Greenwich Magazine and HOME.
Heather earned a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing from California College of the Arts. She lives and works in San Francisco.
As I wrote about earlier in the week, President-Elect Obama has named New York Fed Chairman, Tim Geithner, as Secretary of the Treasury, and former Clinton Treasury Secretary, Larry Summers, as head of the National Economic Council. These two men are extremely well respected in both the academic economic community as well as the business community. Neither individual is untainted by the recent economic crisis (Summers as a champion for deregulation, and Geithner as a key decision maker for how $350 billion of the bailout has been spent). But the fact remains that these are America’s brightest economic minds, and we should feel confident in their abilities.
President-Elect Obama named Christina Romer Director of his Council of Economic Advisors. This is indeed a refreshing choice. Romer is a Professor of Economics at UC Berkley, and an expert on the Great Depression and the recovery that followed. The job of the Council of Economic Advisors is to …well, advise the President on economic policy. It may be completely irrational on my part, but I derive some small comfort from the fact that the bug in the President’s ear will not be of the Wall Street variety but rather, an academic/ economist/ historian. The study of economic history along with a creative, forward-thinking approach is key to getting us out of this economic mess. Romer appears to be cut from this cloth.
Coming on board as the President’s Director of his Domestic Policy Council is Melody Barnes. Barnes is the former Executive Vice President of Policy at the Center for American Progress (a think tank dedicated progressive domestic policy with a focus on economic and healthcare policy) and Chief Council for Senator Ted Kennedy. Barnes’ new job in the Obama Administration will be to implement healthcare reform in a way that can advance the President’s economic recovery plan. Indeed, this is an extremely challenging job, but it’s safe to say that she is eminently qualified for this position having worked intimately for “Mr. Healthcare” as well as her advocacy for working families.
President-Elect Obama appointed sacred cow and economic guru, Paul Volker, chair of his “Economic Recovery Advisory Board.” One gets the feeling that Obama and Volker have a close relationship. Volker was an early supporter of and advisor to Senator Obama, and he appears to have been at the forefront of helping to develop the President-Elect’s economic policy. Volker’s record as an economic genius is unquestioned. He is widely credited with helping to reign in the stagflation of the Carter era, and has twice served as Chairman of the Federal Reserve. At 81, Volker’s vast experience should prove valuable in helping to mold America’s economic recovery policy. Indeed, this temporary role seems to be a perfect fit for the ageless Volker.
It appears that the President-Elect is striking the perfect tone between experience and youthfulness; conventional economic thinking, and new creative approaches. I wish Nobel Prize winning economist, Paul Krugman was in the mix somewhere, but all said, Obama has put together a top-notch economic team.
What about Thomas Friedman. He has strong perspective both first hand and academically. Is there an appropriate position to incorporate him and his ideas, or is he best left to journalism?
Lydia G Sanchez Bracamonte
December 2, 2008 2pm EST
I am somewhat pleased that there is a new line of thinking that is not inherently tied to Friedman Economics as Freidmen economics can be tied to all the economic devistations lived in Latin America where it was experimented first under the regan administration and then on the US economy under the two Bush administration. However, the key to assure that we remain a forward thinking economy that does not allow the invisible hand of comerace (corporate power) manipulate our economy with be vigilance of its citizenary. We need to send letters and question each appointent and nominee to have them clearly delineate their positons and if we are not satisfied we also need to contact our representatives and make them work hard to question where these appointees intend to lead. Will it be to implement the FTC and its original mandates to break up the monopolies of industries that are squeezing the economy of money that they withhold from the economy via loopholes in the tax laws. Or their corporate policies of disregard for humanity in order to enrich the hand full of pockets that have been lined under the past administration with such disregard for the environment or the impoverishment of an entire nation and the global economy.
Lydia G Sanchez Bracamonte
December 2, 2008 2pm EST
Milton Friedman Is who I am refering to. Under the Milton Friedman system of economics, Corporations have flurished and workers, middle class on down the economic ladder have greatly suffered. That is who I am refering to. Thomas Friedman is relative new and I would have to study his approach.
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What about Thomas Friedman. He has strong perspective both first hand and academically. Is there an appropriate position to incorporate him and his ideas, or is he best left to journalism?
I am somewhat pleased that there is a new line of thinking that is not inherently tied to Friedman Economics as Freidmen economics can be tied to all the economic devistations lived in Latin America where it was experimented first under the regan administration and then on the US economy under the two Bush administration. However, the key to assure that we remain a forward thinking economy that does not allow the invisible hand of comerace (corporate power) manipulate our economy with be vigilance of its citizenary. We need to send letters and question each appointent and nominee to have them clearly delineate their positons and if we are not satisfied we also need to contact our representatives and make them work hard to question where these appointees intend to lead. Will it be to implement the FTC and its original mandates to break up the monopolies of industries that are squeezing the economy of money that they withhold from the economy via loopholes in the tax laws. Or their corporate policies of disregard for humanity in order to enrich the hand full of pockets that have been lined under the past administration with such disregard for the environment or the impoverishment of an entire nation and the global economy.
Milton Friedman Is who I am refering to. Under the Milton Friedman system of economics, Corporations have flurished and workers, middle class on down the economic ladder have greatly suffered. That is who I am refering to. Thomas Friedman is relative new and I would have to study his approach.