Publications

March 1994 (Revised October 1994)
Case

Reading Energy

By: Forest L. Reinhardt

Reading Energy builds facilities that produce energy from nontraditional fuels. A privately held, entrepreneurial organization, it has spent six years developing a plan to build a waste-to-energy plant in the town of Robbins, Illinois. The plant would burn municipal... View Details

Keywords: Energy Generation; Wastes and Waste Processing; Business and Community Relations; Business Plan; Agreements and Arrangements; Contracts; Risk and Uncertainty; Government and Politics; Environmental Sustainability; Business Strategy; Energy Industry; Utilities Industry; Illinois

Find at Harvard

July 2022
Case

FIJI Water: Carbon Negative? (Abridged)

By: Michael W. Toffel, George Serafeim, Francesca Gino, Stephanie Van Sice and Tom Quinn

In the midst of increasing press scrutiny of the bottled water industry’s environmentally harmful practices, FIJI Water made a series of sustainability promises. The boldest of these was a pledge to go “carbon negative.” The company said that not only would they offset... View Details

Keywords: Carbon Footprint; Carbon Offsetting; Environmental Accounting; Climate Change; Environmental Sustainability; Pollution; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Misleading and Fraudulent Advertising; Non-Governmental Organizations; Brands and Branding; Food and Beverage Industry; Fiji; United States

November 2019
Case

Hapag-Lloyd AG:Complying with IMO 2020

By: Benjamin C. Esty, Mette Fuglsang Hjortshoej and Emer Moloney

A new environmental regulation known as IMO 2020 was creating what one industry analyst called “the biggest shakeup for the oil and shipping industries in decades.” According to the new regulation, all ocean-going ships would have to limit their sulfur emissions by... View Details

Keywords: Valuation; Ship Transportation; Strategic Planning; Game Theory; Pollutants; Supply Chain; Corporate Accountability; Capital Budgeting; Environmental Sustainability; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Governance Compliance; Shipping Industry; Transportation Industry; Germany

July 2009 (Revised January 2014)
Case

Sustainability at Millipore

By: Michael W. Toffel and Katharine Lee

This case describes Millipore Corporation's approach to becoming a more environmentally sustainable company. As he prepared for his quarterly meeting with the CEO, the Director of Sustainability needed to develop positions on several issues. Tactically, he needed to... View Details

Keywords: Investment; Corporate Disclosure; Operations; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Organizational Structure; Natural Environment; Environmental Sustainability; Pollutants

01 Sep 2008
News

Is Market Capitalism Headed for Trouble?

contract, and they know this can breed violence and terrorism. Their democracies seem unable to adopt appropriate remedies. In Asia, they are mostly sanguine about economic growth. But there is concern about the environment, particularly the View Details

Keywords: Garry Emmons; Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services; Management, Scientific, and Technical Consulting Services; Professional Services

October 1992 (Revised August 1994)
Case

Allied-Signal: Managing the Hazardous Waste Liability Risk

By: Richard H.K. Vietor and Edward Prewitt

Allied-Signal, Inc., one of the world's oldest chemical companies and today a diversified conglomerate, is liable for clean-up costs of old hazardous waste sites. These costs are substantial: reserves grew to nearly $500 million in 1991. Attempting to avoid further... View Details

Keywords: Wastes and Waste Processing; Environmental Sustainability; Programs; Cost Management; Policy; Government Legislation; Factories, Labs, and Plants; Governance Compliance; Legal Liability; Chemical Industry; United States; Europe

19 Jun 2007
First Look

First Look: June 19, 2007

addition, firms with more KLD concerns have slightly, but statistically significantly, more pollution and regulatory compliance violations in later years. KLD environmental strengths, in contrast, do not accurately predict View Details

Keywords: Martha Lagace

01 Dec 2007
News

Mead Treadwell

sincerely doubt that. It is likely that nations will agree to disagree on some things and agree to agree on the fundamentals. The fundamentals, in my opinion, are that no matter who owns what in the Arctic, we want to make sure that human activity does not bring large... View Details

Keywords: Garry Emmons; Oil and Gas Extraction; Mining; Management, Scientific, and Technical Consulting Services; Professional Services; Transportation

2010
Working Paper

Accelerating Energy Innovation: Insights from Multiple Sectors

By: Rebecca Henderson and Richard G. Newell

A combination of concerns about climate change and energy security has recently led to significant increases in public funding for energy R&D. Some commentators are suggesting that these increases need to be sustained, and are advocating for increases of as much as... View Details

Keywords: Innovation and Management; Technological Innovation; Knowledge Use and Leverage; Research and Development; Pollutants; Climate Change; Energy Industry

Read Now

Research Summary

Overview

By: Michael W. Toffel

My research examines how companies manage environmental issues, occupational safety, and working conditions in global supply chains. More recently, I have also begun researching the drivers and implications of CEO activism, where organizational leaders speak out on... View Details

15 Nov 2012
Research & Ideas

Funding the Design of Livable Cities

emissions, restructuring the urban environment can have an enormous positive impact on the global climate. Within a relatively contained geographic space, a city's "inputs" of water, transportation infrastructure, energy and breathable air and "outputs" of waste, air... View Details

Keywords: by Lisa Chase; Construction; Real Estate; Energy; Utilities

05 May 2015
First Look

First Look: May 5

ourselves. May 2015 Journal of Marketing BYOB: How Bringing Your Own Shopping Bags Leads to Treating Yourself, and the Environment By: Karmarkar, Uma R., and Bryan Bollinger Abstract—As concerns about pollution and climate change have... View Details

Keywords: Carmen Nobel

06 Jan 2012
Op-Ed

Where Green Corporate Ratings Fail

characteristics such as pollution levels, regulatory compliance, environmental management practices that affect operations (such as environmental auditing), and stakeholder engagement (such as environmental reporting). Where Rankings Go... View Details

Keywords: by Michael Toffel & Auden Schendler; Information; Publishing

07 Oct 2013
Research & Ideas

The Case for Combating Climate Change with Nuclear Power and Fracking

seen evidence that renewable energy sources will get cheap enough, fast enough to slow global carbon emissions, particularly those from coal-fired power plants in China and India. "The Chinese and Indians are going to clean up their local View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Energy; Utilities

01 Apr 2022
Blog Post

Climate Stories Episode #3: Keith Kinch, BlocPower

pollution and greenhouse gasses, block by block, and focuses on low income neighborhoods. Augmented Construction - this architecture and construction management firm is optimizing access to job specifications with cloud technology.... View Details

26 Apr 2011
Op-Ed

HBS Faculty Comment on Environmental Issues for Earth Day

Environmentalists find the private sector increasingly receptive to their message (or pressure). Numerous companies know that reducing waste, recycling, and avoiding pollution makes economic sense. When Home Depot encouraged two of... View Details

Keywords: by Staff; Energy; Utilities

June 2008 (Revised October 2008)
Case

International Carbon Finance and EcoSecurities

By: Andre F. Perold, Forest L. Reinhardt and Mikell Hyman

In late 2007, EcoSecurities had to decide whether to undertake a new Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) project in China. EcoSecurities was an aggregator of carbon credits and also invested directly in projects that produced carbon credits. Governments and firms... View Details

Keywords: Non-Renewable Energy; Cost Management; Investment Return; Business and Government Relations; Risk and Uncertainty; Investment; Cash Flow; Valuation; Pollutants; Environmental Sustainability; Financial Services Industry; China