Blog Archive USA

Ray Anderson, the founder of Interface and the world’s most famous sustainability expert in the business community, passed away on Monday after a battle with cancer.

Ray generously offered The Natural Step and me personally his friendship and support some 15 years ago. He called himself a pupil of The Natural Step, inspired both by our way of systematic strategic thinking around sustainability and by the principles which he used to define sustainability for Interface. But at The Natural Step, we certainly consider ourselves his pupils when it comes to responsible, inclusive, faithful, humorous, humble leadership—one that brought soul into business.

On behalf of the entire Natural Step community, it is my pleasure to congratulate Dr. Karl-Henrik Robèrt for being inducted into the International Society of Sustainability Professionals’ (ISSP) Sustainability Hall of Fame.  I am personally thrilled that the ISSP recognized Dr.

The innovative sustainability efforts of InterfaceFLOR, long time partner of The Natural Step, were recently highlighted in an article from Guardian Sustainable Business. InterfaceFLOR has been a leader in sustainable business as they continue to work towards their ambitous target to eliminate all of their negative environmental impacts by 2020.

To read more about what inspired InterfaceFLOR and how they implemented their sustainability plan visit the InterfaceFLOR case study.

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Randomised tile design and the war on waste campaign are just two InterfaceFLOR initiatives to eliminate waste, leading to an 80% reduction in landfill and savings of $433m

Congratulations to The Natural Step partner Nike for being recognized as a sustainability leader! You can read our case study to learn more about Nike’s sustainability journey and how The Natural Step helped them apply the principles of sustainability to its business operations. Nike has also won an award for their Corporate Responsibility Report. Please read the following article highlighting Nike's sustainability achievements from the Environmental Leader.

Congratulations to The Natural Step Founder Dr. Karl-Henrik Robèrt and The Natural Step Canada Board Member Bob Willard for being named finalists for the International Society of Sustainability Professionals’ inaugural Pinnacle Award. We would also like to extend our congratulations to the other finalists, who are all friends of The Natural Step: Interface’s Ray Anderson, Natural Logic’s Gil Friend, and Rocky Mountain Institute’s Amory B. Lovins.

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Sustainability is not skin deep. Several members of The Natural Step team around the world have been working with CEW and Givaudan to help develop the criteria for the new CEW Eco Beauty Award, and has been involved in ranking the nominees based on science-based sustainability principles.

Please read the following article from Global Cosmetic Industry Magazine announcing the CEW Beauty Award finalists.

The Portland-based nonprofit Natural Step USA announced Tuesday that it merged with the Cascadia Green Building Council.  The two groups will continue their existing operations and will retain their public identities under a unified leadership and infrastructure.

Last week The Natural Step Network-USA and Illahee hosted Boston College sociology professor and author Juliet Schor, who spoke about her most recent book Plenitude: The New Economics of True Wealth. Schor has examined the intersection of our economic and social systems for many years.