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John Shegerian: Welcome to another edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good brought to you here in downtown Chicago, and we are so honored and excited to have with us today Erin Schrode. She is the co-founder of Turning Green. Welcome to Green Is Good. Erin Schrode: Thanks for having me. I’m thrilled to be here. John Shegerian: Oh, well, we’re thrilled to have you, Erin. Before we get talking about what you are doing with Turning Green can you share a little bit about your journey because you started your journey very, very young in green and sustainability. Erin Schrode: I did. Well, I’m going to rewind about 24 years to when my mom was pregnant with me. John Shegerian: Wow. Erin Schrode: She read a book called “Diet For A Poison Planet” that completely changed her world and therefore that of her unborn child. My dad went to work one day, came home and she had “organicized” – as I like to say – the entire house. Cleaning products were out – lemon and vinegar were in. No plastic. All organic food. Farm fresh. Local. That is how I grew up. That was my norm. John Shegerian: Wow. Erin Schrode: And being in the Bay Area – you know – it helped. We would search for tadpoles in the creek at school and grow our own food in the garden, and it was a rude awakening for me to find out that this wasn’t how everyone was raised. And that moment for me, when I became an environmentalist, when I really owned that cause as my own – we’re in counting of the highest breast, prostate and melanoma cancer rates in the world. John Shegerian: Whoa. Erin Schrode: In 2002, it was announced and no one knew why. There were studies and nothing correlated so we started looking into lifestyle choices. And the energy of youth around these issues, around getting to the bottom of it, asking the simple question “why?” John Shegerian: Yeah. Erin Schrode: “Why are cancer rates off the charts?” So looking at products we use in our home, products we use on our body, products on our food, products outside. And that was the beginning of me really delving into the depths of eco-lifestyle. John Shegerian: Really? And so what was your high school experience and your college experience like? Erin Schrode: When I was in eighth grade, I co-founded this organization – Turning Green. John Shegerian: OK. Erin Schrode: There was a study that came out that linked the ingredients in personal care products – it’s not mascara and lip gloss; it’s soap, shampoo, deodorant, toothpaste – to cancer, birth defects and reproductive harm. So I was 13. I was seeing melting polar ice caps. I understood the impacts of climate change. But I couldn’t fix that. I couldn’t take my house off the grid. I didn’t have a house. I couldn’t buy a hybrid car. I didn’t have a car. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: But I could swap my lip gloss. I could change these personal choices. So for me my advocacy journey was really what carried me through high school and college. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: But we started and we realized it couldn’t just stop with personal care, looking at that, looking into apparel, looking into dorm choices. So for me I went to school. I love learning. I got to learn, but it all was through this eco-filter. John Shegerian: Where did you go to college? Erin Schrode: I went to NYU. John Shegerian: NYU. So did I. Erin Schrode: Really? John Shegerian: So we are both Violets, right? I think, unfortunately. Erin Schrode: School pride. John Shegerian: Exactly. Erin Schrode: It was an amazing school that gave me an opportunity. I spent four semesters abroad. John Shegerian: Wow. Erin Schrode: I did my entire sophomore and junior year in Ghana, Israel, Spain and Argentina. John Shegerian: How interesting. Erin Schrode: So four continents. John Shegerian: And what did you decide to study there? Erin Schrode: My major was social and cultural analysis. John Shegerian: Yes. Erin Schrode: I did Comparative Africano and Latino Studies. John Shegerian: Got you. Erin Schrode: But my thesis was on the evolution of cause marketing and supply chain efficiency in waste management. So in all of these markets, the U.S. included because I was – contrary to popular opinion – a student in New York for quite a bit, I got to compare the way in which people were embracing this environmentalism from a cultural standpoint, the way which companies were marketing towards it, greenwashing or not, and it was fascinating. It was. John Shegerian: That’s so interesting. Erin Schrode: It was a really unique education journey but a lovely one. John Shegerian: Talk a little bit about NYU. I was asked once to come back and speak to their sustainability program – or maybe not program, club. How big is sustainability at NYU right now? What was your experience there? Erin Schrode: I actually got involved with the sustainability lead at NYU prior to even arriving there. John Shegerian: Wow. Erin Schrode: And they are doing a lot of really amazing work. The fact that we are in the city of New York. John Shegerian: Yeah. Erin Schrode: I mean, that gives us an upper hand just in terms of the access that we have but it’s an enormous institution with a massive, massive, massive footprint. So I think just like with personal lifestyle, with anyone, reduction, less consumption, using less across the board is really, really important. I remember my freshman year we had an energy challenge and I didn’t even necessarily – my friends didn’t think about this as environmentalism, turn off the lights and whoever did the best would get a pizza party at the end. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: But I have used that in my own work in looking at incentives and looking at what drove my friends, what drove 18-year-olds then to change their habits? What was effective, and how can we use that at Turning Green when we go out onto campuses and say, “OK, we want you to change something.” Well, I was there just a couple years ago. Really. John Shegerian: Not that far removed. Erin Schrode: No. Class of 2013. John Shegerian: My gosh. For our listeners and viewers out there, we have got Erin Schrode here with us. She is the co-founder of Turning Green, and to find Erin and her colleagues and all the great work she is doing, please go to www.ErinSchrode.com. So talk to us a little bit about Turning Green and what is going on there and what projects you are working on. You are still in New York. Erin Schrode: Yeah. John Shegerian: You’ve got Turning Green in New York. Erin Schrode: Well, our headquarters are in the Bay Area. John Shegerian: OK. Erin Schrode: Born and raised. Proud NorCal girl. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: And that’s where our staff is. I co-founded the organization with my mother – she is the Executive Director. John Shegerian: Perfect. Erin Schrode: My mom and my role model, my best friend. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: And so we have three main programs. After about six years of running a plethora of programs related to prom, dorm, cleaning, space, body care, we realized we needed to distill down the content but amplify the reach. So we did that by creating something called “Project Green Challenge,” and it’s a 30-day eco-lifestyle challenge that happens every October. It’s for high school and college students, and every day has a theme. They say it takes 21 days to change a habit. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: So this is 21 and a little extra. You get a little leeway in case you skip a day. What do you do every day? What do you do? John Shegerian: Work? Erin Schrode: Every day? John Shegerian: Well, maybe not every day. Erin Schrode: OK, what do you do every day? John Shegerian: Brush your teeth. Erin Schrode: OK. What else? John Shegerian: Eat food. Erin Schrode: OK. So there is not that many things that we actually do every single day for a month so our idea was that if people had to do – people, students. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: Had to do an additional thing every day or change the way they did something every day that would have a lasting impact on their own life and a ripple effect out to their friends, to their family, to their communities. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: So days had themes like sustainable agriculture, school lunch, organic cotton, energy, transportation, paper, and you have different levels of challenges and they are deliverable. So there are specific asks. On the zero waste day – which is a theme, the green, greener and greenest – the green challenge is you have to walk around all day with a bag and anything you would typically toss you have to put in the bag. John Shegerian: That’s cool. Erin Schrode: So you think twice before you grab the extra napkin, before you take the straw, before you take the silverware, and you realize – with a visual manifestation – the waste that you as an individual create. John Shegerian: Create. Erin Schrode: Every day. And that is one person. But also if you walk into a classroom with a bag of trash, people go, “What are you doing?” so it’s that sort of personal lifestyle, school campus and community impact we seek to have. John Shegerian: And how big has this grown? Erin Schrode: So we work with about 500 or 600 campuses in the United States. John Shegerian: 500 or 600. Erin Schrode: Hundred. Campuses. Thousands of students. For the challenge, about 4,000 to 5,000 students take it each year. We are now four years into that. John Shegerian: It’s huge. Erin Schrode: Yeah, but in the spring, we do a road tour where we actually physically show up on different campuses in a six-week period – it’s called the “Conscious College Road Tour” – set up in the middle of a quad or a green with tables and visuals and products sampling. For us, education is paramount, first and foremost, but we are all consumers in the end, so buy less but buy better. So we show best-in-class, spoon-feed students that information before their blind brand loyalty kicks in. So for us that reaches about 400,000 students on campuses. You think – we go to OSU. Ohio State. John Shegerian: I’ve been there. It’s amazing. Erin Schrode: That’s 60,000 – 70,000. Boom! John Shegerian: Right. Largest campus in America, I think, right? Erin Schrode: It’s either that or ASU. John Shegerian: Yeah. Right. Erin Schrode: They are enormous. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: But Ohio State has a zero-waste stadium. John Shegerian: Wow. Erin Schrode: So talking to the students about what they have on campus, what they want on campus. We are all student driven on our chapters. So we have chapters on all of these campuses that lead unbelievable change, and the reason they are so effective is because of student voices going in and making demands of their leadership, of their administration,and that is what we hear from all of these universities. That’s what they want, that’s what they need. They need the mandate from the student body. So we are fighting the fight. John Shegerian: What is the next step, Erin? You’re a young woman – you are 24 – you are doing amazing stuff. What do you want to do with it? What is the evolution of Turning Green? How do you and your mom vision this out? Erin Schrode: So for us it’s very important that we stick this sort of 14 to 22, maybe skewing a little bit younger. John Shegerian: Yeah. Erin Schrode: But that is our core demo. Really, really important for us as an organization – not to mention stretching. We are focused on young people. We believe in the power of young people, the impressionability. I always say “a mind-melding for good,” right? I’m brainwashing, but you know…. John Shegerian: It’s OK. Erin Schrode: It’s OK. John Shegerian: For the good. Erin Schrode: Exactly. I’m really passionate about policy change. I think that it takes grassroots activists. I believe hugely in the power of business to change the world at a scale larger than a lot of nonprofits and at a pace faster than a lot of government. But I have seen the real need for policy change so it’s that multipronged approach. And I’ve gotten to – I’m really involved in the crusade to label GMOs right now, which is something that is important to me. John Shegerian: Is Turning Green a sustainable business model? Is it a for profit or a nonprofit? Erin Schrode: It’s a nonprofit organization. We get our funding from grants and foundations and from corporate partnerships so we align with companies that we really, really believe in. We have high standards. We vet for safety, sustainability and efficacy so it’s safe for the body, it’s sustainable for the planet and it works. John Shegerian: Awesome. Erin Schrode: Because if something doesn’t work you’re going to chuck it and be turned off from our whole hippie movement anyway. John Shegerian: Exactly. Right. So next steps for you and mom is the GMO? Keep working on GMO? Erin Schrode: Yeah. Really pushing on GMOs. But we – me and my mom – are an incredible staff and our army of interns and fellow campaign members really will keep fighting the fight focusing on issues like dorm. Move-in is a huge one for us. The things that are relevant – hyper relevant – to the college experience. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: I don’t want to add something to your life. Trust me. We’ve got enough going on. John Shegerian: Right. Erin Schrode: Just seeing it through a different lens, approaching it from a different mindset. But for me, personally, it’s that intersection – millennials and sustainability. John Shegerian: I love it. Erin Schrode: The sweet spot. John Shegerian: Well, continued success. We’re going to want you to keep coming back on the show. Erin Schrode: I would love to. John Shegerian: And sharing your journey. As we know, there is no finish line to sustainability. Erin Schrode: No. John Shegerian: It’s just a journey and we want to keep hearing about the Erin Schrode journey. Erin Schrode: Thank you. John Shegerian: For our listeners and our viewer out there to learn more about Erin and her great work at Turning Green please go to www.ErinSchrode.com. Erin, you are making the world a better place; you are truly living proof that Green Is Good, and thank you so much for joining us today. Erin Schrode: My pleasure. Thank you for having me. John Shegerian: Thank you.

John Shegerian: Welcome to another edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good here in beautiful downtown Chicago, and we’ve got David Stubbs with us. He is an Independent Sustainability Expert but he has a unique title to his story today: The Tortoise and the Hare: A Modern Day Tale of Bringing Sustainability into the World of Sport. Welcome to Green Is Good, David Stubbs. David Stubbs: Thank you, John. John Shegerian: You know, David, you are considered a rock star when it comes to sustainability, and we’re going to talk a little bit more about that in a while, but talk a little bit about the uniqueness of the title of today’s show and why you came up with The Tortoise and The Hare: A Modern Day Tale of Bringing Sustainability into the World of Sport. Share a little bit about your journey. David Stubbs: Well, I’m glad you found it an unusual title. It goes right back to the beginning of my career. I’ve always been passionate about the environment and ecology, and that’s what I trained in. John Shegerian: Ah. David Stubbs: And my first sort of professional assignment was studying wild tortoises in the south of France. John Shegerian: No kidding. David Stubbs: Absolutely. So I was effectively exiled into Provence into a little village in the middle of nowhere. At the time, I hardly spoke a word of French so I had to learn the language, learn the local customs and everything, and it was all through a research program to look at the ecology of wild tortoises. John Shegerian: Wow. And what did you study in university? David Stubbs: Botany and Zoology, so it was sort of a natural thing for someone of that ilk to do. John Shegerian: Yes. David Stubbs: I’ve always been passionate about conservation biology, and this was just sort of a dream come true. John Shegerian: And there you were with the turtles outside of Provence. David Stubbs: Yes. These are land tortoises, little creatures that live in the forest amongst the olive groves and woodlands of southern France, which was great. And to this day, there is a conservation project inspired by that research. John Shegerian: That’s so wonderful. David Stubbs: Which is ongoing, and I’m still associated with it. So it has been a long slow process and I think that’s really the emphasis I wanted to sort of bring to this little interview – that it’s about persistence and really starting out with a long-term vision and just keeping going. John Shegerian: And it’s a journey. It’s a journey. David Stubbs: It’s virtually 20 years to the day almost since I started looking at the Olympics. John Shegerian: Wow. David Stubbs: And there’s a big gap between that and the tortoise thing. John Shegerian: Yeah. David Stubbs: But it’s just to show that while nowadays we’re talking about substantiality, and it’s much more mainstream, let’s just remember there’s a bit of history to this and it’s actually a very slow start up. I think having that early vision and just keeping going – there are a lot of knockbacks in the early days and there are not that many believers, but you have to keep going. And now I feel it’s more like the hare bit because it’s running fast and furious. You look at the Green Sports Alliance and the number of companies and teams and members they’ve got and just the way sustainability is now a core part of so many different elements of the sport and major events sector. John Shegerian: Got you. And for our listeners and viewers who want to find you, they can go to www.SustainabilityExperts.net. David Stubbs: Yes. That’s my own personal website. John Shegerian: That’s your personal website. David Stubbs: And, hopefully, they’ll find a few interesting nuggets there and a bit more details of what I’ve done. John Shegerian: Right. Perfect. Now one of the greatest success stories in sustainability and sports was the London 2012 event, which you were the Head of Sustainability, you were in charge of greening it. Can you share that journey? When did you land that position? How many years prior to the event were you working on it? And walk our listeners and viewers through it, because that itself is just a fascinating story. David Stubbs: Right. Well, before I was involved in the Olympics, I actually spent a lot of years working the golf course industry so I was already looking at the environmental management and design and development of golf courses throughout Europe. John Shegerian: Got you. David Stubbs: With the European Tour, European Golf Association, the RNA and that obviously was the sort of grounding I had in sustainability in sport. But halfway through the 1990s – around 1997 thereabouts – I had a call out of the blue from the British Olympic Association saying that they were looking for someone with environmental expertise to help them understand the direction things were going in for the Olympic movement because they were thinking – just thinking – about possibly bidding for the Olympic Games in 2012. So this was 15 or so years prior to the games. John Shegerian: Wow. David Stubbs: This was before we even had a bid. So I went to a number of IOC conferences on sport and the environment, and we also set up a working group in London looking at what would be the environmental issues and aspects of bringing the games to London. So all of this was going on four or five years before we actually formally announced our intention to bid. John Shegerian: Wow. David Stubbs: And, as part of that, in 2000, I secluded myself – if you like – took a mini sabbatical and went down to Australia and joined the environment team in the Sydney Olympics and spent a couple of months working with the guys on the ground and that was the first time really getting my hands dirty in the field on greening an event. It was a massive learning experience John Shegerian: Wow. So you started really training yourself. David Stubbs: Yeah that was the idea. John Shegerian: That was real smart. David Stubbs: Sort of pull yourself up by your bootstraps because there was no one else out there doing it so you have to sort of figure it out yourself. John Shegerian: Right. Breaking new ground. David Stubbs: Yeah. John Shegerian: Wow. So you did the Australian Olympics. David Stubbs: Yeah. John Shegerian: And then talk a little bit about what happened after that was over. David Stubbs: Well, shortly after that – because that was 2000. John Shegerian: Yeah. David Stubbs: The early part of that decade the British Government finally decided we would bid for the games – that was in 2003. John Shegerian: OK. David Stubbs: So at that point I joined the bid team. I moved over from my golfing world straight into the London 2012 bid team, and what we knew was that this was going to be a tight race. We were up against Paris, New York, Moscow and Madrid – five great global brand cities. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: And we wanted to win this thing. John Shegerian: Sure. David Stubbs: Now, most of our citizens and the media did not expect us to win, but we thought differently and the Mayor of London at the time – Ken Livingston – had a great vision about how the games could be a catalyst for revitalizing a very underdeveloped and deprived part of East London. So the whole notion of sustainability and urban regeneration was core to our proposition. John Shegerian: How big was the team working on it? David Stubbs: Not a big team. It was never more than about 100 people. John Shegerian: Really? It’s that small of a group of great people. David Stubbs: Yeah. John Shegerian: Committed people. David Stubbs: Obviously, a lot of partners and support from government, from the mayor’s office and from commercial companies and we rallied together a great coalition of NGOs, of green groups and sustainability experts who helped us flesh out a vision of how our games could deliver sustainability. And it’s not easy to do that. In 2003, 2004, looking ahead eight or nine years to when the games are going to be, trying to imagine what would be a good practice or best practice at the time. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: It’s really difficult so sometimes you’re future casting things that are not going to work and other things are probably going to be way off the pace by then. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: So it’s not easy. But one thing was clear – the core mission vision of the bid was to deliver sustainable games. John Shegerian: Wow. So when did the bid go in? When did the bid go in for consideration? David Stubbs: Well, formally, the process started late 2003, but the bid book goes in in November 2004, the evaluation commission came around the following spring, decision day, sixth of July 2005 in Singapore. I’ll tell you, I was there, and that was the best party I have ever been to afterwards. John Shegerian: Wow. I didn’t realize that. So decision day, literally, that is the day you find out. Right there. David Stubbs: And it’s a fork in your life because there was a final round choice of Paris or London, and you’re standing there watching this President of the IOC fumbling with an envelope, picking out a name. John Shegerian: And the name is going to change so many people’s lives and potentially cities and the history of the city forever. David Stubbs: If it had gone the other way, then my career in the Olympics would have finished at that point. John Shegerian: Wow. David Stubbs: As it was, it went London’s way and so then the work had to start. John Shegerian: Now we’re six years prior? David Stubbs: Seven actually. John Shegerian: Seven. David Stubbs: That sounds a lot – to deliver the scale of a generation, build a team from scratch. John Shegerian: Wow. David Stubbs: The thing is you’re not an established organization. An organizing committee doesn’t exist, and in seven years, it’s got to go from a micro enterprise to a major corporation, and then within six months of the games, you’ve got to disband so it is an incredible change journey. And all the way through that, you’ve got to keep that drumbeat of “we’re doing sustainability, we’re going to make it an integral part of how we go about bringing management systems and things.” John Shegerian: So you went from a team of 100 on the pre-bid to then now, after July sixth of 2006, how many people were part of the team preparing for the Olympics? David Stubbs: Well, most of the bid team went their separate ways. There was about 40 people who started the whole thing and it became about 8,000 seven years later. John Shegerian: Wow. And sustainability was a core theme throughout everything that happened. David Stubbs: One of the key aspects of that – I think – and uniquely as so far in Olympic history, I managed to stay the course from the bid all the way through the organization phase so there wasn’t a day I missed. Normally, the bid teams don’t tend to have somebody who carries on the sustainability thing straight into the organization. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: So being there at day one was a great position because everyone who joined – any director of any function – I would meet them and they would know that – “possession is nine-tenths of the law we say.” John Shegerian: That’s right. David Stubbs: And sustainability was in possession from day one. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: So we had that opportunity to really build it into the structures and processes and the whole mindset of people delivering the games, and for us, that was the core of it. John Shegerian: If you just joined us now, we’ve got David Stubbs. He is an Independent Sustainability Expert. You can find David at www.SustainabilityExperts.net. This is the Green Sports Alliance of Green Is Good. To learn more about the Green Sports Alliance, please go to www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. You can learn a lot about everything that is going on in the greening of the sports world. So talk a little bit about now that it’s three years or so in the rearview mirror, talk about some of the greatest wins that you got in terms of sustainability that you were able to showcase to the world from London 2012. David Stubbs: Well, the obvious one is the Olympic Park, and that was the centerpiece of the whole project. This was the piece of land – something like 500 or 600 acres of land – which was just derelict and underdeveloped. It was contaminated, polluted. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: In a right mess. And that has been transformed, and now we have the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, which is open to the public. You’ve got the sports venues, which are now in full-time ownership and proper use. The Olympic Village is now transformed into a residential neighborhood. John Shegerian: Unbelievable. David Stubbs: There is more housing and commercial development going on, but at the core of it, you’ve got this amazing green park. So that is the sort of physical manifestation of the legacy, but the bit I’d like to talk about, actually – something that perhaps is not so physically tangible, but I think has actually been as important – has been the knowledge legacy and the processes that we develop. So we had to set about figuring out how to put sustainability into event management. As a consequence of that, the International Standards Organization issued an event sustainability management system standard – ISO 2012-1. Now, that might sound like a rather dry number, but it is a process, which is the first certifiable sustainability management system standard in the world, which is applicable to the events sector. And more and more organizations and venues around the world are adopting that standard and that gives them a blueprint for how to introduce sustainability properly into their organizational management. So while we had to sort of figure it out for London, we’ve effectively left a blueprint for people to follow, and I’m really proud of that. John Shegerian: That’s really wonderful. That’s really wonderful because inspiring others and also giving them a plan to achieve sustainability success in whatever they’re trying to green is a huge win unto itself – as you say. David Stubbs: We didn’t get everything right by any means, and I think one of the things I’m proud of also is the learning legacy program that we developed, and we’ve put out loads of case studies and reports and documents, which showed our progress through and some of the things that we found challenging and what we had to overcome and what we didn’t quite succeed on. I think that’s important because sustainability is not something you just get right and have done and then walk away from. You’re always trying to improve. John Shegerian: It’s a journey. David Stubbs: Yeah. John Shegerian: How many people were actually on your core sustainability team leading up to the 2012 Olympics? David Stubbs: Obviously, we started with one – which was me – and gradually, others came along and by game time we had a permanent staff of 20 people and 15 volunteers. John Shegerian: Wow. David Stubbs: Pretty small core. But beyond that, we had a network of – shall we say – a mini industry of professional sustainability people and other organizations and stakeholders who supported and helped us. John Shegerian: Wow. David Stubbs: It’s also – though – getting it into the mindset of your colleagues. Wherever they’re doing catering, logistics, waste management ceremonies, torch relay, whatever, you need those people to come up to the mark and do their bit. John Shegerian: Wow. David Stubbs: So we were sort of orchestrating the program but there were others who were delivering on the ground the transport, the material. John Shegerian: Were buildings that you had to build for the Olympics, did they have to be LEED certified as part of the process as well? David Stubbs: Well, in the U.K., a system called “BREEAM” which is “building research establishment environmental assessment method.” John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: So that is a sort of LEED-equivalent, and there was that, which was used for the sports venues. But we had lots of temporary venues. One of the things about London was the majority of – we had more temporary structures than probably any games previously. Now, that is a different sort of dynamic, and one of the things we started off early in the process was figuring out what is the carbon footprint of the games going to be? Now, until you’ve actually done the games, you don’t know actually what it is, but then no one is really interested afterwards, so we said, “Well, let’s look at carbon footprinting as an impact assessment tool rather than a reporting tool,” and that enabled us to identify what it might be, but also where are the big hitters? Where are the areas where we could perhaps make the most difference in reducing our carbon footprint? So we used this carbon tool to help us refine our procurement decisions, our design, the material specifications and that – for me – was really key and that’s one of the things we’re going to be talking about later today at the summit. John Shegerian: Talk a little bit about that. You’re here today at the Green Sports Alliance. When did you get introduced to the Green Sports Alliance, and how long have you been working with it, and what are you going to be talking about today? David Stubbs: Well, I’ve been aware of GSA for a few years, but they’re not that old so it hasn’t been that long. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: It is my first time over here to participate in the summit, but I’m working with Dow – which is one of the Olympic’s top partners. John Shegerian: Sure. David Stubbs: And they have been developing a carbon mitigation program, which didn’t really start in London because they had only just joined the Olympic program in London so their initiative started in Sochi, and they’re doing it in Rio and future host cities, but what we have learned from the way we did it in London was the importance – first of all – of mapping out and measuring the anticipated footprint. So we know the scope of what we’re talking about to begin with and then you’ve really got to focus on how can we minimize those impacts, and then what are the most meaningful ways of mitigating these impacts. John Shegerian: Got you. David Stubbs: And we didn’t just want to do conventional offsetting – which a lot of people talk about still – but one of the profound things that our Chief Executive said is, “If you’re going to spend dollars” – or pounds, in our case – “on offsetting and taking money away from improving the games to some far flung part of the world, it’s not really what our stakeholders want.” John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: “If we’re going to do something that is beneficial to the environment and so on, let’s do it locally in our hometown where people can actually see and appreciate what it’s about.” So finding mechanisms which are meaningful in the local context is a key part of it, and I think that’s one of the areas which Dow is picking up on and is particularly keen to do. John Shegerian: Going back to the London Olympics, talk a little bit about your two or three biggest barriers that you had to push through during the process. David Stubbs: I suppose one of the big ones is this whole perception around “Oh, sustainability is going to cost you more.” It’s changing. It’s changing into uncomfortable territory. And when I look back on it, and I think the organizing committee was effectively a $3-billion business through attracting more sponsors to the table and through cost savings and our procurement sustainable sourcing process and resource efficiencies, we netted about $150 millions’ worth of savings and revenue. Now, if we had not had that, the organizing committee would have spent $100 million more and they would have had $50 million of revenue less. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: Now, that is 5 percent, if you turnover. That is a big hit. John Shegerian: That’s a big hit. David Stubbs: And the actual cost of doing our program, of my team and the consultants around, it was about $15 million so we netted a tenfold benefit for the organizing committee. John Shegerian: Isn’t that interesting? You turned the old adage that “green costs more” right on its head and you showed a 10x on what you had to spend. David Stubbs: Yeah. Now, I don’t think people really appreciate that. John Shegerian: That’s fascinating and very important, though. David Stubbs: It is really important, and that is something I do want people to understand because I’ve been listening to the debates over the last few days and it’s this constant refrain of “we don’t have a budget for this,” “it’s going to cost” and so on. If you really want to do this – and it means the leadership has to be committed and you have to have a clear vision about it. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: The best example I’ve heard so far is Disney because it started right in the founding father of Disney and it’s been something which has made sense to their model. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: To be fair, most sports organizations and venues and clubs have only discovered sustainability recently. John Shegerian: You’re right. David Stubbs: So they’ve got to get a new sort of mindset in here and this is where the barrier is. This is the problem – getting people to think differently and realize that if you’re going to do this, you’ve got to do it properly. You can’t just dip your toe in the shallow end. You’ve got to jump in the deep end and do it properly. But if you are prepared to do that, you can recognize some really big savings and big advantages. John Shegerian: David, we’re down to the last couple minutes. Talk a little bit about your professional life after the Olympics and what you’re doing with www.SustainabilityExperts.net, and what opportunities have you had come your way to continue to make the world a better place? David Stubbs: Well, one thing for certain is I didn’t want to sort of go into a big corporate career. I’m very much me. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: And you can’t imagine nine years on the Olympic project – fully intense, great experience, a little bit exhausting – so wanted to just be me. Obviously, I’ve had many decades of work now in this field so it was a natural progress to work as an independent consultant and help the IOC – the International Olympic Committee – and future host cities, really sort of the transfer of knowledge but in a personal way. So I do a lot of work with the IOC and through them to cities like Rio and Tokyo and also with their Evaluation Commission looking at bidding cities and assessing their sustainability programs. John Shegerian: Do other sports teams around the world or leagues reach out to you and say, “Help us become greener” or “Help us become more sustainable”? David Stubbs: Yes. But not actually just sport. I’ve had a couple of fascinating projects. One of which via an American company who had got to work with a Saudi university, and we were looking at sustainable waste management for the Hajj pilgrimage in Mecca. John Shegerian: Wow. David Stubbs: And there you’ve got. John Shegerian: That’s fascinating. David Stubbs: Fascinating thing. Millions of people go every year to a place, which is very constrained in space, and there is a lot of waste to deal with and it gets in the way and it’s unsafe but understanding how you might deal with that, and some of the principles of sustainable event management we developed in London were potentially applicable to that so that was a great one. John Shegerian: All sorts of interesting stuff – then – is coming your way. David Stubbs: Absolutely. John Shegerian: Cool. David Stubbs: So, busy. John Shegerian: Right. David Stubbs: Always interested in new challenges because it’s always fascinating what people are dealing with. And trying to turn the experience we’ve had in London into other applications. John Shegerian: Well, I wish you luck today in your speaking engagement. And for our listeners and our viewers who want to learn more about David or hire David to help green their venue or green their sports team or green their business, you can go to www.SustainabilityExperts.net. David Stubbs, you are really making the world a better place and are truly living proof that Green Is Good. Thank you so much for being with us today. David Stubbs: Pleasure, John. Thank you. John Shegerian: Thank you so much.

John Shegerian: Welcome to another edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good here in beautiful downtown Chicago, and we are so honored to have with us today Val Fishman. She is the VP of Corporate Partnerships of the Bonneville Environmental Foundation. Welcome to Green Is Good, Val. Val Fishman: Thank you. John Shegerian: Val, before we get talking about Bonneville and all the great work you do there, can you share a little bit about the Val Fishman journey on you becoming really one of the great leaders in sustainability. Val Fishman: Yeah. Thank you for saying that I am. John Shegerian: It’s true. Val Fishman: This is a lifelong dream of mine honestly. John Shegerian: That’s so nice. Val Fishman: This is the best job I have ever had. This is my career. I wake up every day blessed to go to work. John Shegerian: How neat. Val Fishman: It’s not without struggle and difficulty, but I absolutely love it. I’m doing my life’s work so that is fantastic. John Shegerian: When you were raised was this something that was going on in your household as a kid or did you get it in school or college, or where did you get the epiphany to be? Val Fishman: There was a lot. But I would say that the most stark one was I got involved in scuba diving when I was in my early 20s. John Shegerian: OK. Val Fishman: Off of southern California. I was living in L.A. at the time and learned to scuba dive there, and the best place to witness the environmental degradation happening on the planet is underwater. John Shegerian: Wow. Val Fishman: It is tragic and it’s happening so fast. So you could go on a dive one year and go to the same place the next year and the same place the next year – marked differences. And it’s invisible to all of us that don’t go underwater. John Shegerian: It’s true. Val Fishman: So that was a huge impetus for me. But as far as the actual job goes I spent about 15 years, had a really successful career working in media – advertising, sales – and that’s kind of where I cut my teeth in sales and business development, which is by the way the best industry to do that in. John Shegerian: Wow. Val Fishman: Had an incredibly successful career there. Loved it because I’m a driven person and I like sort of the art of the sale and learning about a lot of different industries. What was missing for me and the reason that I made the transition was I kind of woke up one day – I was about 27 years old – and I had achieved what I wanted to achieve and I looked around at the people who were in their forties and they were getting divorced, they had drug and alcohol addictions, they were – literally, had people dropping dead at work. John Shegerian: Oh. Val Fishman: And I was like, “OK, how much good am I doing by creating another” – like creating commercials for people to eat more McDonalds. John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: McDonalds was a big customer of ours. John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: So it was sort of all these things coming together. John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: Also experienced my own severe health problems at 27 that were pretty serious and it was all a big wake up call to say, “What am I really doing? Is this what I want to be doing, and what is my greater purpose?” and so that began my journey into sustainability, which was a very long one because I felt like I had two roads. I could either go back to school or I could kind of create it in my job. I opted for the latter because I didn’t want to take on any debt, so I started a sustainability program at Clear Channel Radio in San Francisco. John Shegerian: Wow. Val Fishman: And pioneered that for about a year and a half and then I decided I wanted to make a little bit of a lifestyle change and move to Portland, Oregon, for all the reasons that people move to Portland, Oregon. And then I ran – for about two-and-a-half-years, I was VP of Sales for a company called Collar House Paint that made zero VOC eco-friendly paints. John Shegerian: Whoa. Val Fishman: And helped them get some penetration into Home Depot, and they were the first online paint sales company. John Shegerian: No kidding. Val Fishman: So that was really fun but I was really missing even – I wanted to get into renewable energy. A friend of mine said, “Look at Bonneville Environmental Foundation; they are hiring.” I looked at the job description. It was business development for an intangible product – much like advertising – and I said, “I am the best person for this job absolutely.” John Shegerian: And how many years ago was that? Val Fishman: It will be five in October. John Shegerian: OK. So let’s give Bonneville Environmental a shout out. For our listeners and viewers, it’s www.B-E-F.org. What is Bonneville Environmental Foundation? Val Fishman: By the way, great job with the website. Not the most easy one to say. John Shegerian: Thank you. Val Fishman: And another website I would just say for individuals. John Shegerian: Yeah. Sure. Val Fishman: Is www.ShrinkYourFoot.org. John Shegerian: Love that. Val Fishman: So that is for individuals. www.B-E-F.org is the business website. John Shegerian: Perfect. Val Fishman: What we do is we work in renewable energy, renewable energy education, STEM education and carbon reduction and watershed restoration. We help corporations do what they can’t do. They can reduce and become as efficient as they want to be, but it’s very difficult for them to figure out how to restore their local watershed – or, for example, when I said STEM education. John Shegerian: Yes. Val Fishman: If you’ve installed a lot of solar arrays, we have a program called Solar for Our Schools, where we take your solar generation and we incorporate it into our K-12 teacher training program. So a tangible example of that would be we teach teachers how to teach kids how energy works – because that is not being taught in our schools – and we use solar as a tool to do that. So things like building solar boats. We have solar boat races, solar cars, solar car derbies. So those are kind of the tangible aspects of that. John Shegerian: Is Bonneville more regional or is it national or international? Val Fishman: We are national. I mean, I guess we should say we are international because we are North America. John Shegerian: OK. Val Fishman: But really not outside North America. John Shegerian: I got you. And since it’s a .org, explain to our listeners and our viewers how is it funded? Val Fishman: Yeah, 501C3 nonprofit. John Shegerian: OK. Val Fishman: We call ourselves an “entrepreneurial nonprofit.” John Shegerian: That’s interesting. Val Fishman: Because we get about, I think, 46 percent of our revenue – so last year our revenues were 6.6 million, and 46 percent of that came from foundations, grants, contributions and then 38 – I think – percent of that came from the sale of products, renewable energy certificates, water restoration certificates and carbon offsets. So we actually sell a tangible product to companies to fund our mission, like Solar For Our Schools and like watershed restoration. John Shegerian: So you do offset projects for big corporations. Val Fishman: We sell the credits. We are not a project developer. John Shegerian: OK. Got you. Val Fishman: Yes. John Shegerian: So you sell the credits. So explain what a water restoration certificate – how would you earn that? How does that go? Val Fishman: You don’t earn it. John Shegerian: OK. Val Fishman: But it is a tradable or saleable product. So here’s how it works. John Shegerian: OK. Val Fishman: I’m going to give you the simplest example, OK. John Shegerian: Please. Val Fishman: Irrigation infrastructure. John Shegerian: Yeah. Val Fishman: In the United States. First of all, agriculture accounts for 70 percent of our water use. John Shegerian: Wow. Val Fishman: OK. So we are using water incredibly unwisely right now. It’s like energy efficiency was 20 years ago. So there is a lot of low-hanging fruit. John Shegerian: Wow. Val Fishman: I’m talking about simple things like piping leaky ditches, going from flood irrigation to drip irrigation. I mean, just things that you think should be a no-brainer, but there is no financial incentive or mechanism to do so. There are a lot of NGOs on the ground that are working on these things, and BDF is kind of the matchmaker. So we support a lot of on the ground NGOs that are working on upgrading this irrigation infrastructure. What those NGOs don’t have the capacity to do – and this is where we come in – we are talking to all these corporations that are looking for a meaningful way to address their water impacts, typically in areas that are material to their business. So if they have operations in – let’s say – the State of Colorado or Southern California, they would like to restore water in those areas. John Shegerian: Oh. Val Fishman: So we are kind of the matchmaker. We say, “How much water do you need to balance? Where is your material impact? What is your budget?” and then we look at where those projects are that are available and we match them up. What happens with the actual certificate? John Shegerian: Yes. Val Fishman: Is that is just a measurement. It is one WRC equals 1,000 gallons restored to a critically dewatered ecosystem. John Shegerian: How cool. Val Fishman: OK. John Shegerian: OK. Val Fishman: And that is an environmentally traded product that can be retired on the Market Environmental Registry, which is the environmental registers system where all the carbon offsets are retired to. So it’s a traceable serialized product. John Shegerian: Is it fair to say that corporations need your services more than ever? Val Fishman: Yeah. John Shegerian: Yeah. And are you finding the pull from them, instead of the push from you, is now greater? Is that balance changing? Instead of you having to go out and sell or be entrepreneurial in getting corporations excited about sustainability and offsets and balancing their work and their core goals? Val Fishman: It’s still a balance. It’s still a push-pull. John Shegerian: OK. Val Fishman: Specifically, renewable energy credits and carbon offsets are really true commodities. The water is not so much of a true commodity. John Shegerian: OK. Val Fishman: OK. And so to the extent that any commodity is subject to economic fluctuations these are too. John Shegerian: Got you. Interesting. Val Fishman: So – yeah – the economy is doing a little better. John Shegerian: Ah. Val Fishman: So – yeah – we’re going to do a little better. But you know when the world is on fire and it’s crashing, it’s like “everybody batten down the hatches” and all they really want to do is figure out how they can save more money. John Shegerian: You know, we’re both here at the GSA. How many years have you been involved with the Green Sports Alliance? Val Fishman: Since the beginning. Bonneville Environmental Foundation was a founding member of the Green Sports Alliance, along with NRDC, as one of the environmental nonprofits to sort of authenticate the messages behind what the Green Sports Alliance movement is doing, so we’ve always had a board seat. This will be our fifth one. John Shegerian: So talk a little bit about, since you have an insider’s view. Val Fishman: Yeah. John Shegerian: Share with our listeners and viewers a little bit about the evolution in the five years of these summits. How’s it going? How is this one compared to the last one from day one? Explain the journey a little. Val Fishman: Well, just like – I’ll use the analogy of carbon, right? John Shegerian: Yeah. Val Fishman: So we always say, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: And so what we really needed to start with within the sports world was measuring. So we really started wit the operators, the venues, the facilities managers saying, “How is your venue operating?” John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: Making sure we had – before we go out and talk about anything. John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: We always knew our endgame was engaging fans. John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: And creating social change. But you can’t start with social change. If your venue isn’t operating well, you have nothing to talk about. So the very, very core foundational element was making sure that we had all the operators come to the table, take lessons learned from the ones that were doing it well and the ones that had other challenges. So it’s really bringing everybody together, developing these publications, developing webinars, creating the summit for people to come and talk to each other. So it has really been focused on that. Now we’re finally at that place where I think we have enough critical mass that we can start focusing on that fan engagement, so you’ve seen a lot of that focus here reflected in the content today. John Shegerian: Which I want you to share. You had two important speaking roles – one on a panel and one last night. Explain what you did at both of them. Val Fishman: Yeah. Last night was possibly the greatest honor of my life. John Shegerian: Explain what it was. Val Fishman: So we decided to have a special celebration last night and push the needle a little bit further than we have before. We invited Prince Ea – and that means “Prince Earth.” He is a rapper, spoken word artist and an environmental activist, and he is very, very driven from the heart. So he will not take on – no one can buy him. No one can say, “Hey, come be my advertising bugle.” John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: Everything he does is from the heart. John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: So he created this incredible video called “An Apology to Future Generations.” If you haven’t seen it yet, go to www.StandForTrees.org. John Shegerian: www.StandForTrees.org. Val Fishman: Watch the video. Get ready to have something out so you can wipe away your tears because it’s incredibly moving. John Shegerian: Wow. Val Fishman: So we played that video last night. It was released on Earth Day. He has had over 68 million views. One of the most viral videos. John Shegerian: Wow. Val Fishman: And Stand for Trees is directly tied to carbon offsets and supporting primary forests and protecting what remains of our primary forests, giving the public a tangible way to stand for trees. So he put together this video, it went viral, they sold over 40,000 certificates online since Earth Day, so it has been an incredible success. People care about this message. Sarah Hoversten of the Green Sports Alliance – when this video went viral, she sent me a text message and said, “Wouldn’t it be cool to have Prince Ea at the summit?” and I said, “Yeah,” and I called Rachel O’Reilly from Wildlife Works. John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: One of the best carbon offsets – as far as I’m concerned – on the planet. And Rachel said, “Let me see what I can do.” Here he is. So we had this event last night featuring him, his video, he got to say some words. Then Justin Zeulner, who used to work for Paul G. Allen and Vulcan, knew Shawn Heinrichs – an incredible Emmy award-winning cinematographer and conservationist and featured in the film Racing Extinction that is being released soon. So last night’s celebration was about bringing art and artists and inspirational messages to this topic. So we put them on stage and let them do what they did best, and people were clapping and standing up. John Shegerian: And this was at Soldier Field here in Chicago. Val Fishman: So I emceed the event. John Shegerian: Yeah. Right. You emceed this big event at Soldier Field. Val Fishman: Which was like “who cares?” I mean, I was – it was not about me; it was about them. John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: But for me to just be on stage in their presence and be there was just an incredible honor. So that was last night. John Shegerian: Right. Val Fishman: And I think the best. Just really moving. John Shegerian: Sounds amazing. Val Fishman: Today, I was on a panel about fan engagement and I was specifically talking about the Change The Course campaign, which is our water sustainability campaign. John Shegerian: That’s awesome. Val Fishman: And that is in partnership with National Geographic and Participant Media. John Shegerian: Wow. Val Fishman: So I was talking about the partnerships we created with the NHL – who has been a longtime partner of ours for over four years – and more recently, the Waste Management Phoenix Open, which made an enormous commitment to change the course this year and we were able to restore 35 million gallons of water to the Verde River in Arizona. John Shegerian: Whoa. Val Fishman: In a dry part of the western United States. And Waste Management has been an incredible partner. They helped us – the visibility they gave us brought new sponsors to the campaign and just has leveraged us in an incredible way. I just love those guys. John Shegerian: Val, we’re unfortunately out of time today. Val Fishman: Great. Thank you. John Shegerian: Any final words for our listeners before we say goodbye? Val Fishman: Go to www.StandForTrees.org, watch the video. I really hope you are inspired by it. See Racing Extinction. It’s coming out in December – I think – on the Discovery Channel. Then my final plug would be to measure your own footprint at www.ShrinkYourFoot.org, and if you want to restore 1,000 gallons of water to the Colorado River system, you can text “river” to 77177. John Shegerian: And you can find Val Fishman at the Bonneville Environmental Foundation at www.B-E-F.org. Val Fishman, it’s not only an honor to have you on but it is a pleasure. You are truly making the world a better place for all of us and are really living proof that Green Is Good. Thank you so much for spending some time with us today. Val Fishman: Thank you. Thanks for having me. John Shegerian: You are always welcome back. Thank you. Val Fishman: Thank you so much. John Shegerian: Continue your great mission and journey. Val Fishman: Thank you. John Shegerian: Thank you.

John Shegerian: Welcome to anther edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good, and we’re so honored to have with us today – the first time ever we’ve had – this is Joey McColm. He is a pro race driver. We have never had a green pro race driver before so this is a special edition of Green Is Good. Thank you for joining us today, Joey. Joey McColm: Oh, I’m absolutely honored to be on the show. John Shegerian: And you’re from Canada’s Best Racing Team, and to learn more about Canada’s Best Racing Team, it’s www.CanadasBestRacingTeam.com. Before we get talking about Canada’s Best Racing Team and your life as a pro race driver – which is very exciting and I really want to ask you a lot of questions – talk a little bit about where did you get your environmental consciousness from about being sustainable. Joey McColm: Well, I’ve always been racing, and I’ve been racing from a young age, but I wanted to connect my racing into the engineering world so I started studying engineering in university, and while I was studying engineering, a lot of our projects had to be focused on sustainable design. John Shegerian: Ah. Joey McColm: So I really fell in love with always looking at those options, looking at those initiatives, looking at how to create more efficiency, and I grew a strong passion for environmental sustainability. But at the same time, I’m trying to sustain a racing career, so now I have two passions in life and I want to bring those two passions together. It didn’t really hit me until I was at the track one day and we had a rain delay, so there was a lot of time to kill and I was just walking up and down the paddock area and I saw this garbage can. I don’t know why. It just struck me and it was my “aha” moment. It was something so simple. But there was this garbage can and it was overflowing with plastic bottles, Styrofoam plates, everything that a race team would kind of consume during a day, and even our race team, we would consume a lot of plastics and a lot of just garbage. And it hit me, and I thought, “There has got to be a better way to do this.” Then I thought, “Well, I’m going to school for this; how can I combine these two passions of life?” Because if I don’t, I have this fear that racing is not going to exist in 20 years. John Shegerian: That’s a great point. Joey McColm: That was the moment it hit me, and since then, it’s just been these progressive goals. I think when we started out, it was I wanted to change the rules as fast as I could. John Shegerian: Of course. Joey McColm: But it has been a process, and I think – looking back on it – we’ve come a long ways but we still have a long way to go. John Shegerian: How many years ago was that epiphany moment when you were walking in the paddock area and saw that overflowing can? Joey McColm: That was 2010. John Shegerian: Wow. Joey McColm: So it’s going on six years ago now. John Shegerian: So you said you grew up racing cars. Did you come from a racecar family or a driver family, or how did this happen growing up doing this? Joey McColm: It’s funny you mention that, actually. Nowadays, a lot of drivers are coming from families that are second or third generation. John Shegerian: Unsers. Andrettis. Joey McColm: Exactly. I’m actually a first generation. John Shegerian: Come on. Joey McColm: My dad was just involved. He was a mechanic, so I was always working on cars with him. He would take me to the racetrack on a Saturday – our local tracks – and that’s where I kind of fell in love with racing, and then I pestered my parents for years to get a go-kart and they finally got me one. My mom was actually away on vacation visiting her parents, and my dad and I went over and we bought a car and we built this racecar within the weeks she was gone because she was really against it. John Shegerian: That’s great. Joey McColm: So when she got back, we had this racecar sitting in the garage and we were like, “We’re going racing mom!” and that’s where it kind of all started, and since then, it’s just been a journey. John Shegerian: How old were you when that happened? Joey McColm: I was 15 when that happened. John Shegerian: Fifteen years old. Where did you grow up in Canada? Joey McColm: Just outside of Toronto, in a region called the Durham Region, in a town called Ajax. John Shegerian: Now – like you said – being green but also wanting to be the fastest racecar driver is a balancing act, and you are a trailblazer in the racecar industry doing this. Joey McColm: Right. John Shegerian: So talk a little bit about your epiphany and the evolution, your journey the last five or six years. How have you both maintained and grown your successful racing career but also become known as the green trailblazer with regards to environmental consciousness with Canada’s Best Racing Team? Joey McColm: Right. Well, like I said, it’s been a process and a journey. John Shegerian: Yeah. Joey McColm: I thought it was going to be easy, which – I mean – it’s obviously not. John Shegerian: Right. Joey McColm: But when I had this epiphany, and I left that race, what I did immediately is I contacted Earth Day Canada. John Shegerian: OK. Joey McColm: I reached out to the president – Jed Goldberg at the time – and Keith Treffry, who was the director of communications, and I requested a meeting with them, and I told them, “Hey. Look, this is what I am, this is what I’m doing, this is what I’m going to school for, I just want to come meet you.” John Shegerian: Right. Joey McColm: So I came in and I met with Keith, and within two minutes of telling him kind of who I am and what I do, I think he wanted to kick me out of the office, but I said, “No, listen. I want to create a change from within,” and he heard me out and he really fell in love with the story and he thought, “You know what, that’s exactly what Earth Day is about is creating that change from within and inspiring that change.” So from there, he actually brought me back in to meet with the whole team. Every member of Earth Day Canada, we got into a big circle right in their office. I couldn’t believe they took an hour out of their day to do this. John Shegerian: Wow. Joey McColm: And I told my story, and we went around in the circle and they all kind of questioned why I wanted to do this. John Shegerian: Yeah. Joey McColm: Because this was so unorthodox. “How can we partner with a NASCAR driver? We don’t know about that.” John Shegerian: Right. Joey McColm: But they all agreed and thought this is what Earth Day is about and this is why we want to create Earth Day every day in no matter what we do. So my story to them – I had one really good question come up out of it and it was, “You want to be racing and you want to be green and you say you really care about environmental sustainability, then why don’t you just leave racing?” I said, “Well, that doesn’t really accomplish anything, because whether I’m in racing or not, racing is still going to be there.” John Shegerian: That’s right. Joey McColm: So I think we need to create champions from within. I’m only one person. John Shegerian: That’s so smart. Joey McColm: And the whole goal, even just around this alliance, is to create that change from within and inspire more people and more athletes, more drivers to be a part. So when I started that journey, I started working with their Eco Kids and Eco Mentors programs working with the kids. We started a program called “Eco Driving.” And with NASCAR, there are so many rules that we are bound to so there wasn’t a whole lot we could do or focus on as far as the cars go themselves, but we could focus on how we get to and from the track, what kind of waste we’re producing at the track and then what we’re doing within our communities. So that’s where the focus began. Then I met a member at the Air Canada Center who was part of the Green Sports Alliance and he invited me. He said, “You’ve got to come down and check out the Green Sports Alliance,” so I came down two years ago to Brooklyn and I met some amazing people and I left so inspired and we went back, and that’s when we created Canada’s Best Racing Team. John Shegerian: Really? Joey McColm: It was about a year-and-a-half ago, and it was built on environmental initiatives and environmental foundations, and then within a year-and-a-half, we’ve expanded to three NASCAR Canada teams and one Trans-Am team in the U.S., and we just continue to grow, and it’s all built on an environmental foundation. John Shegerian: Now give the other side of that great story that you just shared. What about NASCAR? What were they thinking when you were doing all this? Joey McColm: Well, funny enough, NASCAR actually has a NASCAR Green division. John Shegerian: OK. Joey McColm: So that started up a few years ago. When I first started looking into this movement, I was kind of one of the first to get into it. With NASCAR Canada, it’s much like – I relate it to football a lot because you have the NFL in the U.S. and we have the CFL in Canada. John Shegerian: Right. Joey McColm: So NASCAR Canada is kind of like the CFL to the NFL. John Shegerian: Right. Joey McColm: For NASCAR U.S. So we still fall under the NASCAR umbrella, but we’re kind of a global division whereas NASCAR in the U.S. has its main three series. So they started the NASCAR Green program for the main three – the Sprint Cup, Xfinity and Camping World Truck Series – and now they’re expanding that, and I think you’re going to hear some news soon that is going to come out about NASCAR growing their green division even more. John Shegerian: Wow. Joey McColm: I know they have a summit coming up in September that I am going to be attending, and it’s going to be – I think – really exciting because now, especially with the NHL and other sports leaders and leagues, NASCAR is right up there and NASCAR is No. 1, No. 2 when it comes to sports, and they’re going to do that when it comes to green. John Shegerian: Let’s talk about all the great initiatives you’re doing at Canada’s Best Racing Team. What is your Plug’n Drive program? Joey McColm: Well, that’s actually a program that we’re just involved with. It’s a program that is based out of Toronto, and what they do is they educate people on all the options for EV and hybrid vehicles. So we work with them as an ambassador to take part in their programs to help educate just on the different options that are out there to the everyday person. We think – when we need to switch to environmental – it’s going to cost us so much money, it’s really hard to do. It’s not like that anymore, so there is an education process and so that’s where we’re trying to help. John Shegerian: Every time I am in Canada – Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto – these are very green cities. I’d be shocked to hear that the population in Canada is not excited about what you’re promoting. Joey McColm: I mean the population is hugely excited. It’s just a matter of getting our story out there more. John Shegerian: Got you. Joey McColm: It’s a matter of storytelling and engaging and visibility – and, especially, engaging. We have such great success with engaging with our young fans. For kids and teens and even now university students, green is second nature. I mean, it’s not even a second nature. It’s just a way of life. John Shegerian: Isn’t that great? Joey McColm: We call it “second nature” because we’ve adapted and we’ve realized we have to change something whereas they grew up with them and it’s just what we do. John Shegerian: So I know you helped facilitate a program called “Eco-Driving.” Share with our listeners and our viewers what Eco-Driving is. Joey McColm: It was a really neat program, actually, that we went across to different high schools in the Toronto area and we engaged with students about 15-, 16-years-old who were just starting now to drive, or they had to think about how they were going to get to and from places. How are they getting to and from school? If they want to go to the mall, how are they getting to and from that? Then, for them, it was kind of like a trickle up effect because then they would go home and question their parents. “Hey mom and dad what kind of car are we buying?” “You really should look at this model because it has better fuel efficiency.” “We don’t really need to take the car, we can walk.” “We don’t have to take the car everywhere, we can bike to school.” So it was just a matter of educating them about the different possibilities of transportation in their lives and also what that effect was – what fuel efficiency is. To them it’s: “I just get in the car and I go somewhere.” OK, well, how about understanding that impact? And that’s basically what that program was about. John Shegerian: That’s wonderful. How many green drivers now are there that are like you that are green ambassadors and eco-leaders in Canada? Joey McColm: In Canada, I don’t know of too many. I know we’re trying to inspire – or to create this change and to create a movement, and I think over the last year-and-a-half other drivers, other teams are looking at our team and going, “Wow, we can do this.” John Shegerian: “We can do this.” Joey McColm: And I look up to – like Leilani Munters is a great inspiration of ours. She is doing great things in the U.S. and what she wants to do with her racing, and we look up to other NASCAR teams that are doing some pretty cool green initiatives, so we have always got inspiration out there and we want to be like them. John Shegerian: Talk a little bit about your relationships now that you went to Brooklyn a couple years ago and you’re here today in downtown Chicago at this. What are you doing here today at the GSA, and what do you hope to continue to do with GSA in the future? Joey McColm: Well, we recently actually became a member of the Green Sports Alliance. John Shegerian: Great. Joey McColm: It’s about eight months ago roughly. John Shegerian: Right. Joey McColm: And that has really helped us just create a foundation. So we were built on this environmental foundation, but now we need a structure, so Green Sports Alliance is providing that help to us to create that structure and to create more goals moving forward so that is very exciting. John Shegerian: Yeah. Joey McColm: What I’m doing here this week is actually speaking on fan engagement. So aside from being very environmentally focused with our race team, Canada’s Best Racing Team is also built on engaging with fans. We’ve got this great story that we’re going to tell. We had this six-year-old little girl reach out to our team, and she designed a racecar – because we actually expanded to three cars this year and one of our teams is driven by a female. John Shegerian: OK. Joey McColm: Erica Thiering. She is such an inspiration to so many little girls out there, and this one little girl tweeted a 3D rendering model – so she designed this car in 3D and tweeted it out to us. John Shegerian: How old is this young girl? Joey McColm: Six years old. John Shegerian: Oh my gosh. This is great. Joey McColm: So she tweets out and says, “Erica, I think this should be your paint scheme,” and it’s this pink car with blue stars. And this is what we’re all about. We’re all about engaging, and we encourage fans to tweet us and we want them to know that we’re listenting all the time. John Shegerian: Right. Joey McColm: So we thought, “Wow, that’s really cool,” and we shared it and we liked it and we said, “Wow, what amazing talent.” Then about a month after that, we actually had to come up with a paint scheme for Erica’s car so we thought, “You know what? That little girl’s paint scheme was phenomenal. I think we should surprise her.” So what we did was we invited her to an event. We said, “You’re going to get to meet Erica.” That’s all we told her. John Shegerian: Wow. Joey McColm: She came to the event, and we had so much media there and we had so many people and the car was covered up and we unveiled the car and she was like, “Oh my god! That’s my racecar!” And we dubbed it “Racecar by Ava,” so it’s got the hashtag #racecarbyava, so if you go on social media and hashtag #racecarbyava, you’ll find so much stuff. John Shegerian: A six-year-old whose name is Ava. Joey McColm: Ava. And she is now her own little celebrity. Actually, when she comes to the races with us, she’s signing autographs. John Shegerian: This is great. Joey McColm: People know her. People want her autograph. Other little girls are inspired by her. John Shegerian: She is Canada’s Best Racing Team’s mascot. Joey McColm: Well, she is our graphic designer now. John Shegerian: She is a graphic designer. That is such a great story. So that is fascinating. Fan engagement – as you say – and getting visibility for all your eco efforts is so critical. Do you have – for Canada’s Best Racing Team – someone who is just in charge of social media? Joey McColm: Yes, we do actually. That was one of the first people we brought on. I have got a bit of a background in it, so that’s why I started. I said, “We’re going to focus this team on engagement and social.” John Shegerian: So smart. Joey McColm: “And everyone wants to converge on social media, so that’s how we’re going to talk to them.” We also talk to fans at the track. John Shegerian: Sure. Joey McColm: We’re going to be very social. John Shegerian: Yeah. Joey McColm: So what we did is, it became too much for me to handle so I brought on someone just to manage social media. John Shegerian: Brilliant Joey McColm: And she has been just awesome. John Shegerian: And so if people want to see the car that Ava designed, they can go on www.CanadasBestRacingTeam.com and check it out. Joey McColm: That’s right. John Shegerian: Share a little bit about economics because, Joey, the world comes down to economics whether it’s sustainability or any successful business venture. And, obviously, Canada’s Best Racing Team is a business venture. Who are your sponsors? Are they as excited as you are about all of your eco efforts? Joey McColm: Definitely. We’ve got many, many partners, and if we sit here and list them all, I’d be talking all day. John Shegerian: Share a couple of them that – give a little plug. Joey McColm: We’ve got TSE Stores. It’s a country hardware store. It’s all about the farmers and all about green and living off the land. John Shegerian: Perfect. Joey McColm: They’re such an amazing supporter of ours. We can’t thank them enough because they support everything we do. John Shegerian: So that is just a great example of who one of your sponsors are. Joey McColm: Yeah. John Shegerian: They tie back to the land and where this all comes from anyway. Joey McColm: Exactly. John Shegerian: So they are so thrilled with everything that you are doing. Joey McColm: Yeah. And then you talk about the economics of it. Our headquarters has a massive solar roof. We actually produce one-and-a-half times the energy that we consume. John Shegerian: Come on. Joey McColm: So we’re selling back to the grid. John Shegerian: So you’re carbon positive? Joey McColm: Well, we’re carbon positive where we’re – yeah, we’re good positive, when it comes to consuming electricity at the race shop. John Shegerian: Right. And your race shop is where actually? Joey McColm: It’s just outside of Toronto. John Shegerian: It’s right outside of Toronto. Joey McColm: Yeah. John Shegerian: And you have three cars now that are racing under Canada’s? Joey McColm: So we’ve got three teams that consist of six NASCAR Canada cars and we have another team in the Trans-Am series, which races in the U.S., and that consists of one car for now and we’re looking to grow that as well. John Shegerian: Do you ever race in the U.S. and does the U.S. ever race in Canada? How does that work? I don’t understand all of the great racing stuff. Joey McColm: It goes for leagues and divisions. So what we compare ourselves to – I’ll compare it to football, but I’ll also compare it to hockey. We’re like the AHL to the NHL, so our goal is to move into NASCAR U.S., but we also have the Trans-Am team in the U.S., so I will participate in races in the U.S. and my aspiration is to participate in more races in the U.S. John Shegerian: How about outside of Canada besides the U.S.? Do you travel internationally, also? Joey McColm: Not yet. We do want to. John Shegerian: That’s coming. Joey McColm: I mean, obviously, we want to become global. John Shegerian: Right. Joey McColm: So maybe five, 10 years from now. John Shegerian: Got you. Are you the only race car driver who is a member of GSA? Joey McColm: We are. We were – as far as I know – the first NASCAR team. I know Andretti Formula E team has joined as well, and I’m really looking forward to working with them to encourage more teams. The strength is in numbers. The fact that we have taken this initiative first really – to me – doesn’t mean anything. I want to see more race teams, I want to see more race facilities, I want to see more racing bodies take on these initiatives and join organizations like the Green Sports Alliance to get that help that they need to advance further. John Shegerian: Any last words for our listeners and viewers out there that are young that want to either get involved with sustainability or get involved with racing or become a professional athlete like you before we have to say goodbye today? Joey McColm: Reach out to us. We’re always listening – @CBRTINC on social, @JoeyMcColm on Twitter, and if you have any questions, just ask us. We’re more than happy to answer them and point you in the right direction and provide any feedback and mentorship. That’s what we’re all about. We work with so many kids and it’s exciting. I’m going to a race this weekend in Montreal, and I’ve got this little boy who is local there and he approached me a couple of weeks ago and he just inspired me to do something. I said, “Look, you’re going to come and you’re going to be a part of our pit crew.” He is only 11 years old. John Shegerian: Wow. Joey McColm: But he just loves racing, and I want to mentor this guy. So these are the kinds of things that we do. John Shegerian: And you could introduce him to Ava. They can hang out together. Joey McColm: Exactly. John Shegerian: That is awesome. For our viewers and listeners out there, to learn more about Joey McColm and Canada’s Best Racing team, please go to www.CanadasBestRacingTeam.com. Joey McColm, he is obviously winning the green race and truly living proof that Green Is Good. Thank you so much, Joey. Joey McColm: Thank you so much. It’s been a pleasure being on here.

John Shegerian: Welcome to another edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good in beautiful downtown Chicago, and we are so honored and excited to have with us today Hector Scarano. He is the VP of Sales and Marketing for Andretti Autosport. Welcome to Green Is Good. Hector Scarano: Thank you very much for having me. John Shegerian: Hector, this is so exciting to have you here today to talk about the great Andretti brand and all the green things you guys are doing in sustainability. But before we get to that, share a little bit about your brand, the Hector Scarano story. Where did you get the bug for sustainability? Hector Scarano: Well, I am originally from Puerto Rico – my family is from Puerto Rico. We moved to the United States when I was about six or seven years old. I’ve always had an affinity to the tropics. John Shegerian: OK. Hector Scarano: And obviously, we intend to be as eco-friendly as possible when we live by the coast. John Shegerian: Right. Hector Scarano: So I have always been instilled with a sense that green is good, and it’s exciting to be in a position where now we can actually affect change in a positive direction as part of Andretti Autosport and all the great things we’re doing in Formula E. John Shegerian: That is great. When did you join Andretti Autosport? Hector Scarano: I have actually been with the organization for less than three years now, actually. John Shegerian: OK. Hector Scarano: So I have just recently started. It is a fantastic experience working with a handful of just immensely talented individuals across the board from our competition division all the way down to our commercial services. John Shegerian: And you are in charge for Andretti Autosport of sales and marketing. Hector Scarano: Yeah. So Andretti Autosport’s business development team is made up of our CMO – Doug Bresnahan – myself, as Vice President of Sales and Marketing, also Alex Muller, who is our Director for Strategic Partnerships. So all of the business development programs that we’re working on actually flow through that department of Andretti Autosport. John Shegerian: Got you. Hector Scarano: And we support a number of different series that we’re a part of including IndyCar, including Global Rallycross and, obviously, including Formula E. John Shegerian: Wow. And for our listeners and our viewers out there, to find Hector and his colleagues and all the great work they’re doing at Andretti Autosport, please go to www.AndrettiAutosport.com. You work – as we were talking off air before, and told you I grew up watching Mario and Michael Andretti. You work with Michael Andretti. Hector Scarano: I do. I work with Michael. Michael – obviously, the Andretti name enjoys a 50-year legacy of excellence in motorsports. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: And Mario was obviously a fantastic driver in his own right. One of the top drivers in the history of our sport. John Shegerian: Right. Hector Scarano: And his son – Michael – is my boss and team owner of Andretti Autosport. John Shegerian: So exciting. Hector Scarano: And we are based out of Indianapolis, Indiana. John Shegerian: Indianapolis, Indiana. Hector Scarano: Yes. John Shegerian: Little bit far from Puerto Rico. Hector Scarano: It’s a little bit far from Puerto Rico, but I’ll tell you what, before moving to Indianapolis I actually lived in Chicago for 15 years. John Shegerian: Really? Hector Scarano: So I’m actually kind of a Chicago boy. I went to law school here in Chicago at John Marshall, so I am very familiar with downtown Chicago. John Shegerian: So you feel very at home at this conference. Hector Scarano: I love this city. I love Chicago. John Shegerian: You’ve gravitated from a young person who has tropics in your veins. Hector Scarano: There you go. John Shegerian: You’ve become a Midwesterner here in the United States, right? Hector Scarano: I certainly have. And enjoy it. John Shegerian: That’s awesome. Well, let’s talk a little bit about the sustainability initiatives you’re working on at Andretti. Hector Scarano: Yeah. So we are a part of an all new, all electric global racing series called “Formula E.” John Shegerian: Wow. OK. Hector Scarano: And for more information about that series, you can go to www.FIAformulaE.com. The series represents – for Andretti – a departure from our traditional participation in IndyCar and Global Rallycross, and it is a series where the cars look very similar to our IndyCars. They are open-wheel formula cars, but they are powered exclusively by electric energy. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: And we race the cars globally. We actually just finished our inaugural season in London about a week ago actually, and now we ramp up. This is our “offseason.” It’s only about a three-month offseason, and we ramp up now for a competition in season two, which starts for us in October in Beijing. John Shegerian: Whoa! Hector Scarano: Yeah. So you can imagine it’s a bit of a departure from traditional motorsports series. Some of the traditionalists didn’t really know what to make of this series because it is an eco-friendly motorsports series. The cars don’t really make the traditional “vroom vroom” sound – they sound like big electric cars – but it’s actually quite intriguing, and it has really been a fascinating journey from our standpoint. John Shegerian: So first of all, I want to go back to a little something you dropped into this conversation that I can’t let go. So you are a recovering lawyer. You don’t practice law – obviously – anymore. Hector Scarano: I do not practice law anymore, no. John Shegerian: OK. Hector Scarano: Although, tangentially, I’d always had – I certainly have an affinity for racing, but I had – in my private law practice – I was lucky enough to represent some drivers and companies interested in participating in this space as sponsors. John Shegerian: Oh cool. Hector Scarano: I’m helping them activate their sponsorship around motorsports. But over the last several years, I am now fully ingrained with a terrific motorsports organization, a very diverse motorsports organization, and I think that really separates us from any other racing team. John Shegerian: How fascinating. Hector Scarano: Especially here in the United States. John Shegerian: So how many cars and how many motorsports teams are involved with this green FIA sector? Hector Scarano: So it’s 10 teams globally. John Shegerian: Ten teams. Hector Scarano: Ten teams. And it’s two entries per team. So on track, we have 20 cars competing against each other. John Shegerian: So you have two drivers and two cars at any time under your stable. Hector Scarano: We do. But to add to the mix, it’s actually four cars not two, and the reason for why that is is because as opposed to a traditional pit stop where a car would come into the pits – generally speaking they do a tire change, they add fuel to the car, they may made some aerodynamic adjustments to the car and then they send the car off back to compete – in our series, the car comes into the pits and the driver pops out of his or her car and then jumps into a fully charged car. John Shegerian: Whoa. Hector Scarano: The reason that we were doing that in season one – and we’ll most likely be doing that from season one, season two, season three, season four – the reason that we do that is because the technology just isn’t there to allow for the cars to complete at full song for the duration of one race. John Shegerian: Got it. Hector Scarano: So we’ll get there. We’ll get there. The goal is that by season five we’ll be able to do an entire race distance on one charge. John Shegerian: Fascinating, though. So what is also fascinating by that whole interrelationship that you just laid out is now you have four cars to move around the world at all times for this series. Hector Scarano: We do. And the way that the cars and other race team assets are transported globally is due to the efforts of our, frankly, fantastic series partner, DHL. DHL actually transports all of the equipment globally for the series. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: So it is an interesting way to race, because as all of the cars are packed up after a race, the mechanics and engineers don’t really get to tinker with the car until they make it to the next race. So also in order for – it’s a very unique series. I encourage you to take a look online to learn a little bit more about it. John Shegerian: Yeah, sure. Yeah, of course. Hector Scarano: But another unique aspect of the series is that we practice, we qualify and we race all in the span of one day. The reason behind that is to minimize, to lessen the impact on the host city because all of our races are in city centers. We don’t race – you said you were familiar with Indianapolis. John Shegerian: Sure. Hector Scarano: We don’t race at tracks like Indianapolis Motor Speedway or standalone motorsports venues. John Shegerian: Right. Hector Scarano: We actually bring the racing to the people. So we were racing in city centers. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: So we have raced in Malaysia, we have raced in Beijing, in Uruguay, Argentina, downtown Miami around the American Airlines Arena. John Shegerian: London. Hector Scarano: We raced in downtown London. Battersea Park. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: So it’s really a unique and new and engaging series. And really the aim of the series – the overarching theme of the series and goal – is to promote the faster adoption of electronic vehicle technologies because the technologies that we are racing will hopefully one day trickle down to the cars that you and I will be driving on the road. John Shegerian: And so let’s talk about the success you’re having so far. First of all, growing up as a kid watching the Andretti family and other great iconic families like the Andrettis, of course, the sponsors were Firestone and Pennzoil. Who are the sponsors now of this? Hector Scarano: It’s been interesting because in the series at Formula E Holdings – that is the parent company of Formula E the series – has done a wonderful job of recruiting companies that really take being green seriously. So again, partners like DHL. They’re a series sponsor. Partners like Julius Baers, the financial services company. They take their participation in the series very, very seriously because we are racing in very distinct markets throughout the world. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: And the message has been consistent – this series really represents a positive change in what traditionally has not been such a green-friendly sport, which is racing, motorsports. John Shegerian: Right. Hector Scarano: But this is really – this represents a change in what us – even what Andretti has done historically over our 50-year legacy, we’ve never done anything like this. And I speak on behalf of Michael and the entire Andretti organization that we are thrilled and so happy to be a part of this because we know that we are affecting positive change. And the competition – frankly – has been stellar. The on-track product has been fantastic. John Shegerian: Wow. That’s fascinating. And so who is the general audience that you’re going after? Like you said, is it the next gen? Is it the millennials? Or is it everyone out there? And are you deploying social media to help with this movement? Hector Scarano: What a great question because I actually just prior to coming here was part of a panel talking about how we’re engaging millennials through our very efforts. John Shegerian: Great. Hector Scarano: And obviously, I was talking about what Andretti is doing in the Formula E space. John Shegerian: Yeah. Hector Scarano: So we are engaging millennials through technology. John Shegerian: OK. Hector Scarano: We are a little bit different than some of the other initiatives that people have been promoting here at the Green Sports Alliance because we aim to attract millennials – a new generation of motorsports fans – through the use of EV technologies. We are really moving the state of the art. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: And we can engage through social media channels. In fact, the series has implemented kind of an innovative way to engage with millennial fans. It’s called “Fan Boost,” and what that means is leading up to a particular waste you can go onto Twitter or the Formula E app and vote for your favorite driver. Just prior to the start of the weekend’s competition Formula E announces the top three drivers that have earned the most votes during the voting window period. John Shegerian: OK. Hector Scarano: Those three drivers will earn an extra boost in power that they can use during competition. So you and I and millennials that are engaged with the on-track product or engaged with the series are actually affecting change. You are actually a part of the competition and that is something that you can’t find in any other form of racing nor can you find – really – in any form of sport. John Shegerian: Right. Hector Scarano: That’s one way that we’re engaging. And also content creation. The series has done a wonderful job of using social media and digital channels to promote the series. And remember this is the first year. This is the inaugural season so I am very excited about what the future holds for the series in terms of just getting the word out to more people. John Shegerian: And for our listeners and our viewers it’s …? Hector Scarano: The website is www.FIAformulaE.com. John Shegerian: Www.FIAformulaE.com. Hector Scarano: Correct. John Shegerian: Wow. And where is its headquarters out of? Hector Scarano: The series is headquartered in London. John Shegerian: London. Hector Scarano: Correct. And there are teams that are based all over the world. And Andretti Autosport, we are lucky to be one of two North American based teams. John Shegerian: GSA. You are here at the GSA. You spoke earlier today. Hector Scarano: I did, yes. John Shegerian: On engagement with millennials. How many years has Andretti Autosport been involved with GSA, and how did you hear about the GSA? Hector Scarano: This is actually only our second year. John Shegerian: OK. Hector Scarano: Last year, I was also lucky enough and proud to have been invited to participate in a forum in Santa Clara in California. John Shegerian: OK. Hector Scarano: And this is our second year. And we heard of the Green Sports Alliance through a mutual friend of the organization and also because of our participation at the time with our Electronic Drive Transportation Association – the EDTA – and we were kind of just brought into the mix, and it’s just been a wonderful experience. In fact, I hope this is still correct, but Andretti Autosport was the first racing organization to be a part of the Green Sports Alliance. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: So we can hang our hat on that. John Shegerian: That’s a big thing to hang your hat on and something to be really proud of. Hector Scarano: Yeah. We’re very proud of that. We were. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: Yeah. John Shegerian: That’s great. So it’s been a great forum for you to continue to message what you’re trying to accomplish. Hector Scarano: And the opportunity to network with like-minded individuals and companies that – and it’s interesting. Even after I had the pleasure of speaking earlier today, a lot of people have come up to me and once they hear about what it is that we’re doing in Formula E, they’re over the moon. They want to know how they can get involved. And I’ve heard a lot of people say that they’ve never even heard of the series, so maybe we have to do a better job in terms of promoting it. But again, this is the inaugural season. It’s just ramping up. I also played a bit of a short clip during the presentation giving the folks an overview of what Formula E is, and I can’t tell you how excited people were. John Shegerian: Wow. Hector Scarano: I mean, it’s really amazing. So again, I encourage you to get the word out. John Shegerian: We’ve got to get that clip on our website. Hector Scarano: For sure. John Shegerian: Once your show airs. Hector Scarano: For sure. John Shegerian: That is wonderful. Hector, you are always welcome back here. Hector Scarano: Thank you so much. John Shegerian: Obviously, sustainability is a race without a finish line but – as you say – you already have a great five-year plan so we want to continue to hear and cover your journey during these five years. It’s going to be a great one. I can just tell. You’ve done a lot of planning with your colleagues and this is going to be really great. And again for our listeners and our viewers out there, we have been so honored and excited to have with us today Hector Scarano. He is the VP of Sales and Marketing for Andretti Autosport. To learn more about Andretti Autosport, please go to www.AndrettiAutosport.com. To learn more about the Green Sports Alliance, please go to www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. Hector Scarano, you are making the world a better place. You are making change every day; you are creating a whole new generation of people who are going to save energy and you are truly living proof that Green is Good. Thank you so much for joining us. Hector Scarano: Thank you very much. John Shegerian: Thank you.

John Shegerian: Welcome to another edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good here in beautiful downtown Chicago, and we’re so honored to have with us, Jennifer Cox. She is the Vice President and Regional Chef of Levy Restaurants. Jennifer Cox: Yes. John Shegerian: Thank you for being with us. Jennifer Cox: Thank you for having me. John Shegerian: This is going to be great because it’s always fun to talk about food. Jennifer Cox: I know. Everybody loves to talk about food now. It’s probably the single most popular topic of conversation. Next to social media. John Shegerian: Exactly. So before we get talking about Levy Restaurants, tell us a little bit about Jennifer Cox, your journey in food and then your journey with regards to why we’re here today, but first talk about your story. Jennifer Cox: Sure. I’ve been cooking professionally for a little over 20 years. John Shegerian: Wow. Jennifer Cox: Almost 25 years. But I started out – I did the whole undergrad thing, grew up in Ohio, Midwestern girl, went to college, worked for Procter & Gamble for seven years in National Accounts, Sales and didn’t like that so much and went back to school. My parents were very disappointed. They wanted me to get my graduate degree, and instead, I went – I took a $5/hour dishwashing job and got my Associate’s Degree in Culinary here in Chicago and started cooking professionally then and have been doing it ever since. One of the benefits, or curses, of being somewhat at a management level in my life when I started cooking was that I very quickly got into elevated positions in the kitchen. So I was a really good cook, but I became a really good sous chef and worked in small restaurants and hotels. I worked for Compass Group doing development, project development, menu development. So I’ve done a little bit of everything that led me to the point where I’m partly regional chef, partly taking on some special projects for our company and doing things like this – representing the company and some of the initiatives that we’re doing – to hopefully create a more sustainable food experience for our fans and our guests in our buildings across the country. John Shegerian: Sure. Jennifer Cox: But Levy Restaurants brought me back to Chicago. I lived here once before, and I’ve returned, and I’m hoping this is it. I’m done moving. John Shegerian: Tell us a little also about Levy Restaurants and what are they doing. Jennifer Cox: So Levy – a lot of people ask me, they’re like, “Oh you have lots of restaurants.” We have about maybe 10 restaurants total. John Shegerian: OK. Jennifer Cox: Most of which are in Chicago. Some of which are in Florida. Most of our business, though, is in sports and entertainment venues. Venues in Chicago like the United Center or Wrigley Field or in L.A. We do all of the food and beverage at the Staples Center. John Shegerian: Wow. Jennifer Cox: We do the food at Barkley Center in New York. We do convention centers – the Cleveland Convention Center, for example. So we have about 100-plus – 120 almost – sports and entertainment venues across the country that we either do all of the food and beverage services or part of them. Sometimes we get part of a building and one of our competitors will get a different part of the building. John Shegerian: Right. Jennifer Cox: But generally speaking, we’re across the country. We have some businesses in Mexico and Canada as well so we’re everywhere. So we really focus our energy – a lot of it – on executing really premium, elevated food experiences in venues that you wouldn’t otherwise expect it. John Shegerian: So today you’re here at the Green Sports Alliance. How long has Levy been involved with the Green Sports Alliance? Jennifer Cox: Probably – how long have we been involved? I don’t know the exact. John Shegerian: Just recently. Jennifer Cox: Just recently, really. John Shegerian: OK. Jennifer Cox: But to be fair, we’ve always had top-of-mind serving our guests more responsibly and our fans more responsible. John Shegerian: Got it. Jennifer Cox: And I think that probably before – since we’ve been doing business for over 30 years, it might have even been before there was an alliance to be had. John Shegerian: Got it. Jennifer Cox: If that makes sense. John Shegerian: I understand. Jennifer Cox: In a less organized fashion. John Shegerian: I understand. Jennifer Cox: And I hesitate to say it because people want to think it’s all for posthumous societal reasons that we would do this, but really it makes good business sense to be socially responsibly. It makes good business sense in planning our menus, it makes good sense responsibly for the environment, but all of those things add up to make us a better organization. To be fair, we’re not a not-for-profit organization. John Shegerian: Right. Jennifer Cox: And yet it makes good sense business-wise and socially for us to be more responsible. John Shegerian: Creating great yummy sustainable food for your clients. Jennifer Cox: Creating less waste. John Shegerian: Less waste. Jennifer Cox: Creating menus that aren’t wasting ingredients in the planning process if that makes sense. Forget having anything leftover but let’s not start out with so much so that we’re using the right amount of product to begin with with the right number of ingredients and not throwing a bunch away just trying to figure it out. John Shegerian: So you’re here today talking about what issues? Jennifer Cox: So I sat today on a panel. We discussed, really, game day food and how we – the other two panelists – how the three of us combined, and how our respective businesses, can have an impact on the game day food experience – whether it’s in the planning of the menu, in procurement. How do we source product more efficiently and more sustainably? How do we utilize local farms and ranches and purveyors in a better way that really not only puts them in front of the fan in a way that makes a difference, but also the more we can increase their business, the better it is for them, the better it is for the local community, the more the fan is exposed to that experience, the more inclined they are going to be to buy locally, presumably – hopefully – the less we will waste, the less we will throw away, and when we do have waste, where does it go? How do we process it in our buildings in a way that is responsible? How do we help our buildings navigate through the process of recycling, composting where in some municipalities maybe they’re not doing it at that level? And then how do we donate what we have leftover at the very, very end to the organizations that can utilize the food the most and the best? John Shegerian: Got you. Jennifer Cox: So discussing all of that and how do we engage our partners in that conversation. Where do we see those needs most relevantly requested from our fan base? How do we respond to those requests? So the whole panel was in talking about those very relevant issues. John Shegerian: Got you. For our listeners and viewers who just joined us, we’ve got Jennifer Cox with us. She is the Vice President and Regional Chef of Levy Restaurants. To find Levy Restaurants, please go to www.LevyRestaurants.com. So wait a second, that is a lot of issues you guys were talking about today. Jennifer Cox: Oh yeah. John Shegerian: So talk a little bit about the evolution of the changing habits and tastes of your client base and then break it down. You’re a regional chef. Barkley’s – I’m sure – is a little different than Staples is different than the United Center. Explain that a little bit to our listeners. Jennifer Cox: Sure. I think that one of the things I said on the panel is fans are very vocal and fans that have very specific needs – although they may be outnumbered by the fan who comes to our building – let’s be honest, the things that we sell most of are hotdogs and chicken tenders. John Shegerian: OK. Jennifer Cox: And it’s just the truth. That’s what we sell. People go to a sporting event and they want to participate in the whole experience. They want a pretzel, they want the hotdog, they want a cold beer. They want all the things they attach to those experiences. But you have fans that perhaps can’t participate in that because they’re either vegetarian or they’re vegan – let’s say – or they just don’t want to participate in that food experience. They want something different. John Shegerian: Right. Jennifer Cox: They may be small in number, but they are very vocal and they will make it very well-known that they would like their needs met, too, so we work very hard to try to position food offerings in a building where those fans can find them and participate as well. There is nothing better than a young kid who can’t have – let’s say they have to have a gluten-free lifestyle and we have our gluten-free cart and they can go up and actually get a hotdog that they know they can eat safely. John Shegerian: Wow. Jennifer Cox: Then they can participate with the rest of their family in the experience. That is really important to us. And where it starts is it’s kind of a – no pun intended using the “chicken versus the egg – which came first?” John Shegerian: Right. Jennifer Cox: But I think that we listen to what our fans say, then – as regional chefs – we try to develop menus that speak to that fan base. We also have taken our menus and made them less home office and corporate-y. In other words, Levy, we do have some menu items that are staples – no pun intended on the Staples Arena – that are hard and fast. You’ll find them on every menu. But we also have a good portion, if not 30 percent of our menus, are developed and created locally. John Shegerian: OK. Jennifer Cox: So that speaks to that local element that people are asking for. Then it goes to working with our buildings on the waste piece of it. So it’s sort of like the circle of life in a building. John Shegerian: Right. It’s an ecosystem. Jennifer Cox: It is an ecosystem. The biggest challenge is that because of the sheer volume of food that we serve it makes it a little bit tough because you can only buy – I tell the funny story of a little restaurant that my friend ran in Rhode Island, where she went to the farmer’s market one day and she bought radishes to put on her farm-to-table restaurant and found out later she bought all the radishes in the entire state. It was six bunches of radishes. Those were all the radishes grown in the entire state. John Shegerian: Holy Toledo. Jennifer Cox: So if you expand that out- John Shegerian: Wow. Jennifer Cox: You get an environment where, yes, you’d love to support the local farm, but when you’re talking about hundreds and thousands of pounds of food, you have to be a little bit careful about depleting the supply. That’s not sustainable either. John Shegerian: Right. Jennifer Cox: So it’s that fine balance between the supply and demand. John Shegerian: Three questions. First about organics, the rise of organics. How much has that affected your buying in terms of the need to implement and use organic products in your preparation and then also message that a lot of that is being organic? Jennifer Cox: We try where we can. I would say that we focus on organics but less organic and more local because sometimes you’ll find that a lot of your local farmers they may be actually selling you organic produce, but they haven’t spent the money to be certified. John Shegerian: Got you. Jennifer Cox: So we really spend a lot of time in the locations trying to utilize those locally grown items, which may or may not be organic. And you’re right. Sometimes you also have to do the cost equation. John Shegerian: Right. Jennifer Cox: Will the fan spend the money that is required in order to offer that item? And that’s a balancing act. John Shegerian: Talk about the local part, though. How do you then – if you’re using some great local people- Jennifer Cox: How do you menu it? John Shegerian: How do you menu it and message it to make sure that – non-intrusively – the folks at Barkley’s or Staples or United Center appreciate the fact that you went out of your way to source locally and support the community? Jennifer Cox: I think in some cases – I think there are two pieces. In our general concessions areas, I think our local involvement is most evident in our stands, where we’re using local producers and local vendors and local restaurants. Let’s say it’s a small local restaurant that then has a concessions stand in the building. In that way, that is very automatically recognizable. Where it’s a little tougher is the local farm because a fan may not be as tuned in to what the local farm is, and we may do something like that in our more premium levels, in our clubs and in our a la carte restaurants, where they can see it on a printed piece of paper, where they can make that connection. They understand it because they’re experiencing it in the local restaurant themselves. John Shegerian: Right. Jennifer Cox: “Oh look, just like Joe’s” – whatever kind of place. John Shegerian: Right. Jennifer Cox: They’re doing the same thing. They will note that the food was sourced locally from the following farms – or whatever. John Shegerian: Got you. Jennifer Cox: So it’s a little bit different in each area of the building, I think. John Shegerian: Wow. And last but not least. The rise of composting. Jennifer Cox: Yeah. John Shegerian: Is that a phenomena that is just really fascinating to see how fast it has grown? Jennifer Cox: It is. It has really grown. And again, that’s something that really the building itself has to be our partner on because sometimes how you get rid of waste is sometimes an operational building piece that we may or may not be as directly involved in. John Shegerian: Right. Jennifer Cox: So it’s really important for us to push that message. I can tell you that in our case we do the food at the US Open every year. Seven-hundred-thousand people at the US Open Tennis Tournament. John Shegerian: Sure. Jennifer Cox: And we do compost there. I want to say it was 18,000 pounds. I’m probably messing the number up to be honest with you. But it’s just a tremendous improvement over what we were doing. John Shegerian: Wow. Jennifer Cox: But we have our partners involved in that, and it’s an important thing for us to make sure that we are disposing of our waste responsibly. So that is definitely an area that is a dual effort – that is the building and the food and beverage partner working together to make that happen. John Shegerian: Before we have to say goodbye for today, any final thoughts for our viewers and our listeners? Jennifer Cox: Where are you eating when you’re in Chicago? John Shegerian: That’s what I was going to ask you. I was going to ask you for that advice, where am I eating when I’m in Chicago. Jennifer Cox: Really? John Shegerian: Yeah. Jennifer Cox: Oh, there are many, many, many fun places. John Shegerian: Good. Jennifer Cox: I think the nice thing about – which makes our job as a final point – our job is made easier by the local restaurants that are doing such great work in all of the cities across the country, supporting their farmers, supporting their local vendors. John Shegerian: I mean, this is a food town. Jennifer Cox: Oh yeah. But it makes it better for us because it brings that awareness and the more awareness that the local restaurants bring the more fan demand will happen in the bigger venues and buildings. They’ll ask for more. It creates a customer demand. John Shegerian: That’s a great point. Well, thank you for being with us today. Jennifer Cox: You’re welcome. John Shegerian: This has been Jennifer Cox. She is the Vice President and Regional Chef of Levy Restaurants. To find Levy Restaurants and to find Jennifer, please go to www.LevyRestaurants.com. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good. You can find the Green Sports Alliance and learn more about all the great things they’re doing to green sports at www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. Jennifer Cox, you’re making the world a better place by feeding us all more healthy and better food. Thank you so much. Jennifer Cox: Thank you. John Shegerian: You are truly living proof that Green Is Good.

John Shegerian: Welcome to another edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good in beautiful downtown Chicago, and we’re so honored to have with us today, Ryan Gilchrist. He is the Assistant Director of Business Development of Urban Green Energy, which is now called UGE. Welcome to Green Is Good. Ryan Gilchrist: Thank you. Thanks for having me. John Shegerian: Ryan, before we get talking about UGE and all the great work you’re doing there can you share with our listeners and our viewers a little bit about yourself. How did you even get here? Was this something you dreamed about as a kid growing up? Were you always sustainably minded or was this something that happened sort of in high school or college where something turned you really into a greenie? Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah. Growing up, I did a lot of hiking, a lot of mountain biking. I’ve always been a lover of the outdoors. Then in college, I enrolled in a program called “Environmental Thought and Practice,” which was very interdisciplinary, involving urban planning, conservation, all kinds of different – environmental law was in there so that kind of brought together the whole picture of environmentalism. I was also studying a little bit of physics at the time so got a picture of the energy situation in the country as well and it kind of clicked for me that that’s one of the biggest problems that our society has was dealing with our energy issues and I got into solar energy immediately after college. John Shegerian: Where did you go to college by the way? Ryan Gilchrist: University of Virginia. John Shegerian: OK. Got it. A little shout out for University of Virginia. Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah. Go ‘hoos. John Shegerian: Go ‘hoos. And then after college you got into solar. Let’s talk about that a little bit. Ryan Gilchrist: So yeah. UGE – we’re a wind and solar company. These days primarily a solar developer, but back then, we did even more wind and that’s really what we got into immediately. I started off as an intern for them, worked my way up on the sales team and now I have a very distinct focus on our commercial and industrial market for large commercial projects. John Shegerian: How many sales people do you have working for you? Ryan Gilchrist: About a dozen right now. John Shegerian: Really? Ryan Gilchrist: We’re still a fairly small organization, yeah. John Shegerian: Is it east coast or state-based, or is it beyond that? Ryan Gilchrist: It’s actually very international. We’ve done 2,000 projects now in 90 countries. John Shegerian: Whoa! Ryan Gilchrist: And they way we actually tackle that is we don’t have 12 people going out to 90 countries. We have something called the “Partner Network,” which is a network of contactors throughout the world and they’re out there installing our systems. They’re our boots-on-the-ground sales force for a lot of these projects. We engage them on a daily basis through webinars and we do a couple of biannual events where they all come together as a network for training and to meet each other. John Shegerian: When did you join UGE? How many years ago? Ryan Gilchrist: 2010. So five years ago. John Shegerian: 2010. Five years. And for our listeners and viewers that want to learn more about UGE, you can go to www.UGEI.com. So UGE started – what year did it start? Ryan Gilchrist: 2007 we were started. John Shegerian: And so now you’re based out of …? Ryan Gilchrist: New York City. John Shegerian: New York City. And how many employees or so do you have now? Ryan Gilchrist: Total, it’s close to 100. John Shegerian: About 100. So talk a little bit about the last five years, the journey. Is it what you thought it would be? Is it much bigger? And where are you now on the journey? Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah, it’s been interesting. I would say where we’ve landed is really focusing on this commercial and industrial space. We see not only is it scalable in the sense that you do – for example, one Whole Foods market will install a set of solar carports and wind energy then they have hundreds of other facilities where they can implement it. At the same time, though, it’s scalable to their consumers, so these people who shop there every day are seeing these green technologies and they realize they can do that in their personal lives as well, so we love the fact that it’s scalable both from a business perspective but also more of a social movement where people are noticing this in their daily lives. John Shegerian: So you’re saying if they see solar that you’ve put in at Whole Foods – or wind – then they can actually then employ it for their own household. Ryan Gilchrist: That’s right. John Shegerian: There’s a way that they can buy it or lease it or get it for their own household. Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah. John Shegerian: Wow. Ryan Gilchrist: As a company we’re not very focused on residential, but there is a huge residential solar market right now and we like to think that we contribute to that through some of these projects. John Shegerian: Got it. You said you’ve done about 2,000 projects around the world. Ryan Gilchrist: That’s right. John Shegerian: You’ve done some very high profile projects. Can you share them and how they went with our listeners and our viewers, such as the Eiffel Tower? Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah. The Eiffel Tower is a really interesting one. That – wow – we couldn’t believe it when that lead came in that they were serious about it, but it’s a real project and we’re producing – so we have two wind turbines actually installed on the second platform of the tower. It’s about 100 meters up in the air so it’s some high-flying artists – basically – up there installing the system for us, and it’s offsetting a good amount of the power that goes into the lighting of those platforms. John Shegerian: Have you been there for this? Ryan Gilchrist: I have not. I have been to Paris once before but not since they were installed. John Shegerian: And it’s already installed? Ryan Gilchrist: It is, yes. They’re up and running and commissioned. John Shegerian: And how is it working so far? Ryan Gilchrist: It’s going well. There are actually some great winds up there that come through the middle of the tower very high up, which helps. And it’s going very well so far. We’ve had 100 percent up time since they were commissioned, so we’re extremely excited about that project. John Shegerian: I mean, talk about high visibility. Ryan Gilchrist: Exactly. John Shegerian: This is about as great as you can get. Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah. Can’t ask for a better – it’s an iconic landmark that the entire world knows about. John Shegerian: Wow. Talk a little bit about the Bayer one. Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah. So Bayer MaterialScience at their China facilities, they installed a system on one of their facilities that offsets 40 percent of the power, so they’re saving 40 percent of their energy costs. John Shegerian: What kind of system was it? Ryan Gilchrist: All solar on that one. John Shegerian: Solar. Ryan Gilchrist: It’s about a 50 kilowatt system. It’s offsetting 1,000 metric tons of CO2 per year, so they’re making a big offset on economics as well as carbon. John Shegerian: And Lincoln Financial. Talk a little bit about Lincoln Financial. Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah. And that’s really what brought us to the Green Sports Alliance here. Lincoln Financial Field – home of the Philadelphia Eagles football team. John Shegerian: Sure. Ryan Gilchrist: They installed a couple years ago a three megawatt solar carport system plus 14 of our turbines above the end zones, so it’s a hybrid wind and solar system, and it’s offsetting all of their energy that they use on game days. John Shegerian: And talk about, again, another high profile to see your technology right at work. Ryan Gilchrist: Absolutely. John Shegerian: Is that messaged anywhere? Where is that messaged so that way more leads come into your organization? Ryan Gilchrist: Well, to be honest the turbine itself can be our messaging in a lot of cases. There are not a lot of companies making something that looks so iconic as the vertical axis turbine that we actually manufacture, so that certainly helps. Solar is more of a commodity these days, so we have to rely on the client saying who they bought it from and who they worked with and – a lot of how our leads take place now it’s really a network of trust advisors who have done this before and are telling other people in their network who they worked with and what worked well, so we rely on those referrals quite a bit. John Shegerian: What does “distributed energy” mean in your industry? Just for our listeners and our viewers, I would like you to explain what “distributed energy” means. Ryan Gilchrist: So distributed means anything really off of the central utility grid. So you have central power plants, but then you also have the ability to produce power locally, so that can be in the form of micro grids, which can operate fully autonomously from the utility grid, or it can be a system that is net metering where you’re feeling a lot of power into the grid while the system is producing, and then you still have the ability to produce off the grid. And this is really taking off all over the world because it’s checking a lot of boxed for the developing world, where there is no power system yet. It’s oftentimes the cheapest way to get power to these remote villages. In the developed world, it’s more about just saving money on your utility bills, which in most states in the U.S. now it’s actually at grid parity, where if you install solar, you’re actually paying less for the energy over the lifetime than you would from the utility. John Shegerian: Explain, though, a distributed energy project that you would be working on that we can understand. Bring it to life. Ryan Gilchrist: OK. For example, there is a skyscraper that is being built right now in Boston that I’ve been working on. They’re going for LEED certification so they need to offset a certain amount of their energy onsite. We’re hitting a 2 percent target for them with rooftop solar. It’s about a 12-month process typically to get these started. You’re working with the architects on the front end, making sure it fits into the building plans. You’re working with the electricians for the building so you understand how you’re going to tie into the grids. Of course, if you’re in an area like Boston, you want to have utility power as well, so you’re really supplementing it with your renewable energy. Construction will take about two months and then we’ll be up and running for them this fall. John Shegerian: It sounds funny, though. Boston, I don’t think about solar as much as I would think about wind. Wind did not make sense for a building like that? Ryan Gilchrist: I should have mentioned they have wind turbines on the building too. John Shegerian: Oh, they do? Oh, OK, so they have both? Ryan Gilchrist: So that’s another hybrid system, yeah. John Shegerian: And that’s your wind turbines? Ryan Gilchrist: It is, yeah. John Shegerian: Wow. What does C&I mean in your industry? Ryan Gilchrist: Commercial and industrial. John Shegerian: OK. So that means C&I, with regards to distributor energy, fits well for that. Ryan Gilchrist: That’s right. So they have big enough facilities where we can do large projects for them, and they’re also very scalable. John Shegerian: When you’re making sales and doing your deals, what percentage is wind and what percentage is solar? Roughly speaking. Ryan Gilchrist: That has changed over the years as a company, so now I’d say it’s 95 percent solar. When I first started, it was much more skewed towards wind, but we’ve really distinguished ourselves as an industry-leading solar developer these days. John Shegerian: Wow. If you’ve just joined us we’re so honored to have with us today, Ryan Gilchrist. He is the Assistant Director of Business Development at UGE – Urban Green Energy. You can find him and find his great company at www.UGEI.com, and of course, you can find the Green Sports Alliance at www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. Let’s talk a little bit about micro grids. What does “micro grids” mean to you and to your company? Ryan Gilchrist: So a micro grid has the ability to operate autonomously from the utility grid, so you have the ability if the power goes out you that still have power to that site. That could be as small as one home going off the grid if you have a cabin in the middle of Colorado – for example. It could be an entire university. It could be a neighborhood or a district in an urban area even. John Shegerian: Really? And how popular are they getting? Ryan Gilchrist: I would say very popular. There are kind of three main motivations that people have when they’re thinking about micro grids. One is reliability – so you have power no matter what happens with the utility. The second would be cost savings – so you have the most economic mix of power so during the afternoons – for example, when utility prices tend to peak in a lot of areas. John Shegerian: Right. Ryan Gilchrist: The renewable power is still very inexpensive. Then the final one would be sustainability. Universities probably check all three of these boxes. They have very public sustainability goals and that is something very important to them. John Shegerian: The Partner Network seems – though – is a great leader for you in terms of bringing in leads. Ryan Gilchrist: Absolutely. John Shegerian: It sounds like you’re never bored. Ryan Gilchrist: Not at all. They bring us some very interesting projects. Some of them are pretty crazy like installing turbines on top of trees. We have to kind of filter through. They have a lot of great ideas. They really are the strongest part of our company I would say. They’re the reason why we’re able to operate in so many markets, why we have so much visibility internationally. John Shegerian: Ryan, was that a paradigm that you guys created – a Partner Network – or is that being already done in other industries and you guys modeled after that paradigm? Ryan Gilchrist: I think it’s certainly being done. It goes as far back as probably just electrical contracting. Some of these larger electrical distribution houses that have been around for 120 years now they have networks of distributors and then installers, so it does mirror one of those industries, I would say. John Shegerian: Let’s talk a little bit about Elon Musk for a second. Elon Musk recently came out with that new battery that’s going to be able to store energy. One day will your grids be tied up or will your buildings have those batteries there, and you’ll be able to with wind and solar be able to fill up the battery, and then – as you say – be able to sort of regulate the way they’re pulling energy off the grid because now they’ll just pull it out of the battery? Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah. That’s exactly right. And battery technology is something we’re watching really closely, so it’s really the key right now to bring down the cost of these micro grids. The cost of solar equipment has come down. To give you an example – a project in 2006 would cost $10 a watt to install. John Shegerian: Right. Ryan Gilchrist: Today, it’s $2 and $0.50 a watt, so we’re looking at maybe 20 percent year over year decrease in cost. Energy storage hasn’t quite followed that yet, but we think it will now and that will give us the opportunity to have the systems that are fully off the grid also supporting the utility grid. So you’re doing frequency regulation with these energy storage systems, you can do demand and response. So we’re really excited about the maturation of energy storage. John Shegerian: On the other side of Elon Musk is Solar City. Ryan Gilchrist: Yes. John Shegerian: How has the advent and the explosion of Solar City as a brand been good for UGE? Ryan Gilchrist: They’ve helped make solar primetime. It’s really in the mainstream now. They’ve been a huge driver in the scalability of the industry. You’re bringing the cost down for solar equipment, bringing the awareness out there. They’re really the pioneers of the residential solar PPA so customers don’t have to pay anything upfront and that is the model we’re also pursuing with commercial and industrial but they’ve really done a great job of making consumers understand that you can have a system that has no upfront cost and you just simply pay for the electricity generated from it. John Shegerian: That education has then helped you make more sales, I take it? Ryan Gilchrist: Absolutely. I would say in some cases – we have a lot of competitors in the industry, but we’re all a partners in a sense as well. John Shegerian: What are you doing here? What is the excitement about UGE and GSA? Why did you guys come? Is this your first summit that you guys have come to? Ryan Gilchrist: Second summit. John Shegerian: Second summit. Ryan Gilchrist: We met through the Eagles project. John Shegerian: Got you. Ryan Gilchrist: And they convinced us that it’s a very powerful industry. John Shegerian: It is. Ryan Gilchrist: Obviously, I think Allen Hershkowitz – the president – this morning said that maybe 19 percent of people follow science, but 70 of people in the world follow sports, so it’s extremely high visibility and, certainly, large impactful facilities that need a lot of power. John Shegerian: How has been your experience at this conference? Ryan Gilchrist: It’s been great. It’s small enough where you can meet everybody and make some really great connections, but it’s just large enough that you feel like there’s going to be some global changes that happen from it. John Shegerian: Got you. And did you meet some potential clients? Ryan Gilchrist: Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, there have been quite a bit of networking events and cocktail hours and the party last night was great and I’ve met a lot of people at the panels as well. John Shegerian: Ryan, so many of our guests come back and continue – because sustainability is a journey – they continue their journey on our show. We’ve been around seven years. We intend to be around a lot longer, so we want you to come back in the future and continue to share the great journey of UGE. Ryan Gilchrist: I’d love to, yeah. John Shegerian: Thank you for spending time with us today. For our listeners and viewers, to find Ryan Gilchrist and his colleagues at UGE, please go to www.UGEI.com, and to find the Green Sports Alliance and all the great work they’re doing, please go to www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. Ryan Gilchrist, you’re doing great work. You’re making the world a better place. You are truly living proof that Green Is Good. Thank you so much. Ryan Gilchrist: Thank you for having me.

ohn Shegerian: Welcome to another edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good in beautiful downtown Chicago and we have got Sara Allen with us today. Welcome to Green Is Good. Sara Allen: Thank you. John Shegerian: Sara, you are a recent graduate of UPenn and you were a gymnast there, you were an eco-rep there and you are going to be speaking here at the GSA. Before we get going and start talking about UPenn and what you are speaking about, tell our audience a little bit the Sara Allen journey. Were your mom and dad really into green or was it something you learned along the way in school? What happened and how did you become so green? Sara Allen: Well, my parents aren’t that interested in sustainability. I grew up in New York City in the heart of the city. John Shegerian: Really? Sara Allen: But I grew up watching a lot of PBS and nature shows and I just was really passionate about science, and as soon as I started learning about sustainability and climate change, it just sort of spiraled out of control and my parents were like, “Oh my gosh, what is this new passion you have? We don’t really understand it,” and I started educating them as well. But it ended up turning out pretty good. And I did sustainability in high school, and then as soon as I got to college, I dived right into the sustainability activities. John Shegerian: Where did you go to high school? Sara Allen: I went to a school called “Nightingale” in New York City. John Shegerian: I know it well. I’ve got you. So OK, got it. So you went to Nightingale. And were they open to you working in sustainability and stuff in there? Sara Allen: Yeah. It was great. We had an Earth Club when I started, and we brought it on as part of the student government while I was there. John Shegerian: Cool. Sara Allen: And I worked with our facilities manager to try and improve the sustainability of our school. It was a pretty small school. Then I worked with the Green Schools Alliance, which is focused on K-through-12 sustainability. So that was an early opportunity for leadership, and it was amazing. I got to work with the founder of Green Schools Alliance and helped organize some conferences and then that sort of led into how I’m now working and speaking at the Green Sports Alliance. John Shegerian: And at UPenn you were a gymnast. Sara Allen: Yeah. John Shegerian: And you were also an eco-rep. What does that mean at Penn? Sara Allen: So eco-reps is our administratively run student leadership environmental program. So we have sort of two different camps of student environmental groups. We have just the ones that students start on their own. A lot of them are really specific. We have almost 20 student groups at Penn that are focused on sustainability, which is kind of crazy. John Shegerian: Right. Sara Allen: And then we have our group that is run out of our sustainability department – our administrative group – and that is called “eco-reps.” So it’s a leadership program. We have eco-reps in college houses, which are our dorms, athletics and then our Greek chapters, and so they are really liaisons into their communities and we think that peer-to-peer engagement is the way to go as far as getting other students engaged and involved and excited about sustainability. John Shegerian: Were you an eco-rep from your freshman year on? Sara Allen: Yeah. So freshman year, I applied for eco-reps in my freshman dorm and then sophomore year, I applied for an internship in the sustainability department and became the student coordinator of eco-reps and helped start our athletics eco-reps program with a few other people. And that was really one of the first programs like that in the country to use student athletes as the catalyst for sustainability improvements in the athletics department. John Shegerian: Talk a little bit about the zero-waste program at Palestra. What is that about? Sara Allen: Yeah, so the Palestra is our basketball stadium. It’s pretty well-known as far as Philadelphia basketball goes. It’s a really old stadium and really well-known and there are fans who just bring their kids to that area, to the stadium to enjoy it, and so we’ve been working for the past couple of years to make it a zero-waste location, which has obviously a lot of challenges involved. So it’s been a student-led initiative but with a lot of administrative support, of course. So we started out by just having a zero-waste game, where we would just raise awareness and that was a big deal because just trying to even convince administration that we could do this for one game during the season was a big deal. And we had student volunteers stand by all of the bins, make sure that things were being sorted correctly. We had to make sure that back of house things were being sorted correctly. And then all the way to last year we had almost all of our games. We were collecting compost. We’re not quite at zero waste yet – we’ve had some setbacks – but we are definitely getting much farther. John Shegerian: Well, talk about the four years you were there. From what percentage was going to a landfill to when you graduated from UPenn; how much did that needle move in four years? It’s always interesting to track that. Sara Allen: Yeah. So I guess it’s a little bit difficult because – the overall campus versus just athletics. John Shegerian: Right. Sara Allen: But we weren’t collecting any compost when I first got there. John Shegerian: Really? Sara Allen: In our athletics facilities. We were only doing that in the dining halls. John Shegerian: Wow. Sara Allen: So we weren’t doing any of that. We were doing recycling but no compost. So that has increased a lot. The setback that we had was that with the bioplastics we switched a lot of our items over to bioplastic and then our compost facilities said that they actually weren’t interested in taking bioplastic, so we had to sort of reassess our program. But I think that a lot of the students who were involved in the project – we had about eight student athletic eager-ups and they learned a lot about facilities management and how all the stuff goes. I mean, it’s not perfect, but that’s how it’s going to be when you’re actually working, too. John Shegerian: It’s real. It’s a journey. Sara Allen: Yeah. That’s how it works. John Shegerian: For our listeners out there who just joined us, we’ve got Sara Allen. She just graduated from U-Penn and she is here talking about sustainability on campus and student engagement. To learn more about what is going on in green at the University of Pennsylvania, please go to www.UPenn.edu/sustainability. To learn more about the Green Sports Alliance, please go to www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. Sara, you are here at the GSA. When did you learn about the Green Sports Alliance? Sara Allen: I think it was probably my sophomore year – so about three years ago. When we were starting up our athletic eco-reps program, we were trying to see what other programs were like it in the country and we found that there weren’t that many, but the Green Sports Alliance was helping other sports programs go green and so we really have used them as a resource to build our program. John Shegerian: Is this your first conference that you have come to for GSA? Sara Allen: I went to one day of one in Brooklyn a couple of years ago. John Shegerian: OK. Couple years ago. Sara Allen: But this is the first time I’ve been to the full conference. John Shegerian: And you’re speaking here. Sara Allen: Yeah. John Shegerian: Share with our audience what you’re speaking about here at the GSA conference. Sara Allen: I was speaking today on a student engagement panel and I am focused on using students, actually, in the drivers’ seats. Students are great as volunteers. They want to get involved. They are really excited about participating and recycling and composting. Not only that, but students can also be the ones coming up with the projects, running them, collecting data, using the skills that they’re learning in class and learning even more by being part of these projects. John Shegerian: Great. That’s so important. When you got to UPenn and you were a freshman, was there a large portion of your freshman class excited about sustainability and green? Sara Allen: I would say – so Penn has about 10,000 undergrads, and Penn students tend to be extremely ambitious. A lot of Penn students have their own passion. So, as I mentioned, we have about 20 student groups that are based on sustainability, so there are a fair number, but it’s also a challenge to get those who aren’t focused on sustainability. You’re not always going to get everyone really excited about sustainability, but just to get them conscious of it and changing their everyday actions is important. John Shegerian: Brilliant. I love it. Speaking of that, by the time you matriculated from UPenn, did you find that more and more students were getting more excited about it? Is this a growing trend among millennials and America’s youth, is really what I’m looking for? Sara Allen: I think so. I think people are seeing that this can be applied to any job, and a lot of employers are really looking to see how people are going to fit sustainability into their jobs. So pretty much anything – if you’re looking at operations or facilities management or things like that, people need to have some sort of knowledge of sustainability. But I think it’s slow to get going. John Shegerian: Yeah. Sara Allen: But hopefully – I mean, it’s necessary. John Shegerian: So with your fellow eco-reps that are graduating now how many of you are going into sustainability practices or fields or professions? Sara Allen: I don’t have an exact number. John Shegerian: Of course. Sara Allen: But I know a bunch of people have gone either into consulting or something waste-related. John Shegerian: How about yourself? Let’s talk about Sara Allen. Sara Allen: So I am joining Northstar Recycling, which is a small company based in western Massachusetts. John Shegerian: It’s a little shout-out for Northstar. Sara Allen: Yes. John Shegerian: OK. I got it. Good promotion. Sara Allen: So I joined them in August so I haven’t started yet, but they work with manufacturing companies to help them improve their recycling and landfill diversion. So I’m really excited to be able to use the things that I’ve learned at Penn. John Shegerian: And apply them. Why did you choose Northstar? I mean, you’re a very bright young lady. I’m sure that you had a lot of opportunities. Why was that the choice that you made? Sara Allen: Well, I really love the small company atmosphere. John Shegerian: OK. Sara Allen: They have really high values, and even though they are looking at the profit incentives – because every type of sustainability initiative really needs to have a good bottom line under it – they really have strong values of why they’re doing this and everyone is really passionate about what they are doing, and for me, I personally need to feel really passionate about what I’m going to work every day doing. John Shegerian: That’s an important point. You are speaking on student engagement today. In terms of students matriculating and getting employed even now – and now you’re going from a student to a professional – is this something also that is a growing trend? It’s not all about how much salary or money you can make. It’s a lot about the mission of the greater good that you’re going to do and the company that you’re joining and what their values and ethics and mission is? Sara Allen: Yeah. Definitely. I think there was a report done – I think it was maybe done by McKinsey, I’m not quite sure – that’s shown that millennials are much more interested in joining a company that they really believe in, and I think it makes for a much better workplace as well. You feel a sense of purpose. You’re excited to go to work every day. John Shegerian: That’s interesting. Going back to you were a gymnast at UPenn. What did you guys do with regards to the Penn relay, track and field team and everything else with regards to the sports program? What other things in sustainability were you working on besides the great work you did at the Palestra? Sara Allen: So we do some sort of the low-hanging fruit, and then we also have some big projects. So the low-hanging fruit is like shoe recycling, which is pretty easy. We use ShoeBox Recycling, so they send us boxes and we place them in the locker rooms, and then people can just throw their old shoes in there, and we ship them off to ShoeBox, and they repurpose them. John Shegerian: Wow. Sara Allen: So that is one of the easier things. We also do just pure outreach and education so have eco-reps talk to their teammates about different things that they can do – water conservation, energy conservation, things like that – but then we have our Palestra project and we also have the Penn Relays Project, which is one of the biggest track meets in the world. It’s enormous. So we have a bunch of different initiatives we’ve done there for the past three years. They used to give out a bottle of water to every finisher of the track meet. So they would cross the finish line and you’d hand them a bottle of water, but of course that is incredible wasteful. Nobody is going to chug an entire bottle of water right after they have run a couple of laps. John Shegerian: Right. Sara Allen: And so instead now we have volunteers stand there and hand out cups of tap water. And the athletes are just as happy. It’s water just the same and we’ve saved thousands of water bottles each year. We also have an outreach and engagement tent where we have games and prizes for all of the attendees and we have really clear signage on the recycling and trash bins because we have a lot of international attendees who are coming from all over the place and recycling is different in different parts of the world. John Shegerian: That’s awesome. Have you done a lot of public speaking like you’re doing today at the GSA conference on student engagement and sustainability? Sara Allen: I’ve done some, but I would say more of it is informal. It just comes from getting up in front of a big group of peers and talking to them at an event or something like that. John Shegerian: Sustainability seems to be a DNA and cultural issue at UPenn. Obviously, we both have a common friend in Joanne Spigonardo, who is the executive director over at the IGEL program. How much do the students interrelate with the IGEL program? Did you take any courses over there and were you involved at all over at IGEL? Sara Allen: I was an Environmental Studies major. John Shegerian: Right. Sara Allen: Which is actually in the College of Arts and Sciences. Then, IGEL is part of our business school – part of Wharton – so it’s a little bit separate. John Shegerian: Right. Got you. Sara Allen: But I definitely did take courses in Wharton that mentioned sustainability, and I think that has to do with the fact that they have IGEL there. And I took a course with Eric Orts, who is working closely on that, and with Gary Survis as well. But IGEL also puts on these great events that are open to students, and I think that is a great opportunity. John Shegerian: Who are some of your role models in sustainability that you enjoy following and that inspire you on a regular basis? Sara Allen: That’s a good one. I haven’t thought of that that much. I guess there are just so many. I try to take something from pretty much everyone I see. John Shegerian: That’s so nice. Sara Allen: Whether I am at a conference or watching a documentary. I know it sounds really nerdy, but I have definitely learned a lot from the Sustainable Brands team. John Shegerian: Really? Sara Allen: I worked for them briefly. So Koann and a bunch of the people over there. John Shegerian: Right. Great people. Sara Allen: They also run sustainability conferences, and they have such a broad knowledge of what is going on in corporate sustainability. John Shegerian: Right. Well, don’t worry about being a nerd. Embrace your nerd, because I think nerds are now running the world basically. Sara Allen: Yeah. I love it. John Shegerian: That’s the way I look at it. So, Sara, any final thoughts before we sign off for today? Sara Allen: I mean, I would just say that I think sustainability – there are so many opportunities for college students or even high school students to get involved. And if they have an idea for a project, put together the case, use the lessons that you’ve learned in your courses and submit it and present it and push for it to happen. I did that a couple of times at Penn and the administration was thinking “who is this girl here who wants to do this big facilities project” or “who really wants to make an impact,” but if you have a strong case you can learn a lot and you can get some really cool things done. John Shegerian: I love it. And you’re getting a lot of cool things done, Sara. For our listeners and viewers out there, you have been listening to the Green Is Good Green Sports Alliance edition here in beautiful downtown Chicago. To learn more about the Green Sports Alliance, go to www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. To learn more about all the green things going on at the University of Pennsylvania, go to www.UPenn.edu/sustainability. Sara Allen, you are making the world a better place and truly living proof that Green Is Good.

John Shegerian: Welcome to another edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good radio here in downtown Chicago. Today we are so honored to have with us Allen Hershkowitz. He is the cofounder of the Green Sports Alliance. Welcome to Green Is Good. Allen Hershkowitz: Hey, John. Good to be here. John Shegerian: Years ago – and I can’t even remember how many years ago – you were kind enough to come on this show, Allen. And actually the first time you came on, you talked about the launch of the Green Sports Alliance and what you were doing. For our listeners and viewers who didn’t have the opportunity to hear that show, which still lives online, but I would like you to share a little bit how you created the Green Sports Alliance with your cofounders and how we got here today. Allen Hershkowitz: Well, now I’m President of the Green Sports Alliance, but for 26 years, I was a senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: I joined NRDC at the end of 1987, and actually, I just retired at the end of 2014 to become the President of the Green Sports Alliance, which – as you say – is something that I founded. I founded the organization with a colleague named Jason Twill, who worked for Paul Allen. Paul Allen – the cofounder of Microsoft – owned at the time three professional sports teams: the Seattle Seahawks, the Seattle Sounders and the Portland Trailblazers. When I was at NRDC, I developed a program to green sports and entertainment venues under the premise that we need to instigate a cultural shift in the way people think about the planet. Thirteen percent of Americans follow science, 71 percent follow sports. And actually, back when I started developing this kind of work in 2004, 2003, 2004, as you remember the previous administration – the Bush Administration – was trying to confuse people about climate science. The whole issue of climate change was being politicized. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: So for me the question was, “How do you break through that noise?” John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: How do you actually counter the bully pulpit of the White House on climate science? And it occurred to me that if we could get the Commissioner of Baseball to say that climate change is real, it would be hard for politicians to attack it. Politicians can attack the EPA, but they can’t attack the Commissioner of Baseball or the Commissioner of Hockey or NASCAR. So through friends I made contact with the Commissioner of Baseball, and I started a program. I launched – with Commissioner Selig – Major League Baseball’s Initiative on Sustainable Ballpark Operations. And this was back in 2005. About 10 years ago. John Shegerian: Yeah. Allen Hershkowitz: And it took us two years to really work the whole program out. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: And then we announced it. Then we developed a similar program for the National Basketball Association. We developed NBA Green. And then because the NBA shares nine arenas with the NHL, we got invited to work with the National Hockey League, and we developed NHL Green. Then, actually I got a call from Billie Jean King and she heard about what we were doing and she said, “Will you work with us on the US Open?” so we developed a greening program for the US Open Tennis Championships, and then we also started to work with Major League Soccer and the NFL and NASCAR. So now we advise all the professional sports leagues, as well as NASCAR and the USTA. But along the way – in 2009 – I got this call from Paul Allen’s office and he said, “We hear what you’re doing with sports leagues. We have three teams from three leagues. Would you come on out and work with us?” I said, “Well, you have three teams from three leagues. I’m also working with the Seattle Mariners – that’s a fourth team from a fourth league. Why don’t we form some kind of professional sports greening coalition?” and he said, “That sounds like a good idea. Come on out.” So about a year after that conversation – we had many meetings throughout the year – we launched with six teams from six leagues the Green Sports Alliance. John Shegerian: Wow. Allen Hershkowitz: And this was launched in March of 2011, and today the Green Sports Alliance is over 300 teams and venues from 20 leagues in 14 countries. And you and I are speaking right now from Chicago where the Green Sports Alliance is hosting its fifth annual summit. It’s the only international conference – it’s the only conference of any kind in the world focused on sustainability in sports. We have here about 800 attendees – Representatives from Major League Baseball, from the NBA, from the National Football League, from NASCAR, from Major League Soccer, from the National Hockey League. Actually, Commissioner Bettman from the NHL was here yesterday. I hope you got a chance to interview him. If you didn’t, I’ll help you get that set up. John Shegerian: I’ll take a rain check on that one. We didn’t get him yesterday night. Allen Hershkowitz: And the idea is that if we could change the operations at venues, if we could get energy efficiency enacted, if we could get energy efficiency audits, if we could reduce the amount of carbon coming out associated with the professional sports, if we could get professional venues to reduce their water use, if we could get them to develop recycling programs for electronic waste, for food waste, if we could develop food waste composting programs and collect bottles and cans, if we could get them to use smarter chemicals when they do cleaning and, especially, if we can get them to educate fans about environmental stewardship, then we can help instigate a cultural change in the way people think about the planet. And at the same time, when we affect the operations of a venue, we also send a message to the supply chain. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: So what has happened now over the years, right now all of our members are teams, leagues or venues. But increasingly we have been asked by companies who want to become members of the Green Sports Alliance. ESPN, Kimberly Clark, UPS, BASF, HOK Architectural Firm, Office Depot. I could go on and on. NatureWorks, they want to be members of the Green Sports Alliance. So what we’re doing – the sports industry is a $1.3-trillion industry annually. John Shegerian: Wow. Allen Hershkowitz: Right. And every industry is associated with sports, either as a supplier or a sponsor. The food industry – obviously – the water industry, the transportation industry, the chemical industry, the textile industry, the paper industry – you name it. John Shegerian: The building industry. Allen Hershkowitz: Exactly. So if you can get the sports industry to be sending out environmentally intelligent messages to the supply chain, the supply chain will notice. And it’s not coming from NRDC or Greenpeace. It’s coming from the New York Yankees and the Red Sox or NASCAR, even better, frankly. John Shegerian: Or the heroes of America. Allen Hershkowitz: Exactly. John Shegerian: Brands that influence the next generation and beyond. Allen Hershkowitz: Well, sports spends tens of billions of dollars a year advertising. The commercial market invests tens of billions of dollars a year in advertisements at sports venues and events. Why are they doing that? Obviously, IBM or Toyota or Chevrolet or Wells Fargo are doing this because they think that affiliating with sports will have a market and a cultural influence on the market. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: Well, why wouldn’t that work for environmental stewardship? John Shegerian: Right. And for our listeners and viewers out there that want to see all the great work you and your colleagues are doing at the Green Sports Alliance, they can go to www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. So we’re here. This is 2015. I’ve been to four out of five of your annual events. I mean, Allen, did you ever dream in 2005, when you started this journey in sports with Bud Selig, that this was how big it would be right now? And even though it’s this big right now, you’re only half a year into your new Presidency. You’re half a year into it. Is this still just the top of the second inning? Allen Hershkowitz: We are very early in the game. John Shegerian: Yeah. Allen Hershkowitz: In fact, I just spent the last month in Europe meeting with the French Ministry of Sport, meeting with the European Soccer Federation – UEFA – meeting with the French Tennis Federation, meeting with the IOC. We have established the Green Sports Alliance in Europe. John Shegerian: Wow. Allen Hershkowitz: We have established a Green Sports Alliance in Australia. We’ve established a Green Sports Alliance in the U.K. We have affiliates. In the U.K., it’s called “BASIS” – the British Association for Sustainable Sport. In Australia, it’s called the “Sports Environment Alliance” because we can’t use the word “green” in Australia because it’s too political. It’s a political party. It’s political jargon. John Shegerian: Got you. Allen Hershkowitz: But basically, we are mobilizing the sports industry around the world on behalf of environmental stewardship. We currently coordinate and collaborate with the largest network of sport industry professionals in the world dedicated to environmental stewardship. John Shegerian: So it’s your thesis then – basically – to take the Green Sports Alliance and continue just to make the tent bigger. Allen Hershkowitz: Well, look, there is a lot of work to be done. There is a lot of work to be done. We have reduced carbon emission by hundreds of millions of pounds. We have set up recycling programs at venues all over the world. We’ve proliferated composting. But there is still a lot of work to be done. Consumer goods packaging, a lot of it is still environmentally ignorant. It’s not recyclable. It’s not compostable. A lot of the cleaning products that are used at sports venues still are toxic and dangerous to use and puts janitors at risk. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: And also pollutes the environment. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: A lot of paper products are still not made from recycled content paper. There are still improvements to be made there. Textiles in the sports industry. When you think about apparel, I challenge any of your listeners to walk down any city block for more than 10 minutes before they see some form of sports apparel. John Shegerian: Oh, is this – right. Allen Hershkowitz: Right. And it’s probably going to be shorter than that. John Shegerian: Yeah. Allen Hershkowitz: Whether it’s yoga, a jogging shirt or baseball cap. John Shegerian: It’s the star of society now. Allen Hershkowitz: Right. Well, could you imagine if we changed sports apparel so that it was made in an environmentally intelligent way? Food. The sports industry feeds hundreds of millions of people every year. Well, we just produced and released today a report called “Champions of Game Day Food.” John Shegerian: Right here? Allen Hershkowitz: Right here. Right there. In fact one of your guests I believe you had on the show – Will Witherspoon, a former NFL player. John Shegerian: I did. Yeah. Allen Hershkowitz: Who now runs an environmentally intelligent, grass-fed beef farm. Well, whether you’re a vegetarian or not, we all recognize that people do eat beef, and if they’re going to eat beef, they should eat it in a way. John Shegerian: Shire Gate Farm. Allen Hershkowitz: They should eat it in a way that is not as environmentally damaging. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: But, in fact, many venues offer vegetarian and vegan options and many venues also offer local and organic options, so we’ve put together a documentation of all those better healthier ecologically intelligent options called “Champions of Game Day Food,” which people can download off of the Green Sports Alliance website for free. John Shegerian: This is downloadable right off of www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. Allen Hershkowitz: Correct. For free. John Shegerian: Wow. Allen Hershkowitz: And there is a lot of information about what the sports industry is doing on that website. Again, if we could change the – if the food industry was a country, it would be the third largest generator of global warming pollution. John Shegerian: Wow. Allen Hershkowitz: And the fact is that the way we produce our food, the way we raise livestock, the way we manage crops and the way we process food is making people sick and it’s undermining the functional integrity of the biosphere. It’s actually making life on Earth more difficult. We have to change the way food is grown and processed. John Shegerian: And also – then – treated after we have extra food. It should not be going into landfills for sure. Allen Hershkowitz: We throw out 100 billion pounds of food waste every year and not even 5 percent of it is recovered for composting. John Shegerian: Come on. Allen Hershkowitz: Right. And a very small fraction of it is recovered for food donations. But here is the good news. The National Hockey League mandates – as a result of their collaboration with us at the Green Sports Alliance – the National Hockey League now mandates that in all of its arenas prepared uneaten food after games must be donated. John Shegerian: Wow. Allen Hershkowitz: Right. So could you imagine if the New York Yankees do it? Actually many Major League Baseball teams do it. More and more food donations are taking place throughout sports and it’s sending a message to other businesses. John Shegerian: So that’s how – really – the GSA gets to move the needle in so many areas of sustainability just like you just outlined with regards to food. Allen Hershkowitz: Absolutely. If the sustainable economy doesn’t exist – and probably there is no one because of your work and your radio show and the work that you do in other areas, you probably know this better than anybody – but if the sustainable economy doesn’t exist, it still has to be built. John Shegerian: Absolutely. Allen Hershkowitz: And it’s going to be built by the private sector. John Shegerian: Absolutely. Allen Hershkowitz: And it’s going to be – I mean, does government have a role to play? Absolutely. Is government stepping up to the plate and playing that role effectively? Absolutely not. In fact, just recently the Supreme Court ruled here in the United States that hazardous mercury emissions and other hazardous pollutants, that the EPA’s regulation of them, they ruled illegal. They’re making it harder. Our House of Representatives and Congress is actually – and again, the GSA is not political so I’m not going get into it. John Shegerian: OK. Allen Hershkowitz: But suffice to say that government is not leading the way on environmental stewardship. John Shegerian: But that void, Allen, leaves – this is still the innovation nation of the world – and that void leaves a tremendous opportunity for the next generation group of young innovators to come in and create solutions for the next billion-dollar project to be made in private industry. Allen Hershkowitz: Right, but we can’t wait for the next generation, we have to do it ourselves right now. John Shegerian: No, you’re right. You’re absolutely right about that. Allen Hershkowitz: The decisions we make now will affect thousands of generations to come after us. John Shegerian: There is no doubt. Allen Hershkowitz: And we have to think of it. I think – I hope – that there will be thousands of generations coming after us. But guess what? Scientists are telling us that if we continue on the path we’re on right now, the temperature of the Earth – if we keep the status quo as it is – the temperature of the Earth will rise six degrees, and if that happens, it will wipe out human life on Earth. John Shegerian: We’re here at – as you say – the fifth annual GSA Annual Convention here in downtown Chicago – and for our listeners that want to learn more about the GSA, they should go to www.GreenSportsAlliance.org – but talk a little bit about why this even has become so important on an annual basis and what can people come and do here now whether you’re a sports team, a vendor, a supplier, any person in the whole ecosystem; why are these events now more important than ever before, and what kind of speakers do you have here, and what kind of workshops do you have here? Allen Hershkowitz: Well, we started with professional sports and now we are working very closely throughout collegiate sports. We work with the Ivy League. The Pac-12 is a member. All schools in the Pac-12, including the Commissioner’s office, are members of the Green Sports Alliance. The Western Collegiate Conference – WCC – is a member of the Green Sports Alliance. The Boy Scouts, which has 693 recreation facilities around the country – including an 80,000-seat stadium in West Virginia – is a member of the Green Sports Alliance. So we’re in colleges. And guess what? We want to go to high schools. We want to go to playgrounds. There are baseball fields or basketball courts in almost every neighborhood. John Shegerian: That’s true. Allen Hershkowitz: Some of those fields are being manicured with chemicals that are not safe. Some of those fields – many of them – do not have recycling infrastructure. The potential to influence the culture and infrastructure of the United States – sports teams are now begging for composting infrastructure because sports teams are forced to throw out food waste that can be composted because their local municipality doesn’t have a composting infrastructure available to them. John Shegerian: Wow. Allen Hershkowitz: Every year, Major League Baseball – because of our work with them they started something called the “Green Glove Award.” What is the most environmentally responsible team? And it’s mostly based on recycling and whatnot, and every year they San Francisco Giants were winning it. Why? Because San Francisco has a wonderful recycling infrastructure. So what baseball did to accommodate that was they now have the Green Glove Award by division recognizing that different regions have different infrastructure. The point is that the New York Yankees let the Mayor of New York know and the New York Mets let the Mayor of New York know that they wanted composting infrastructure in New York because they were spending millions of dollars throwing out food waste that they could instead send to a composter at a much lower rate and a much lower ecological profile so why should they be throwing out money? John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: Same thing with recycling. Right now – you know this better than me – plastic is going for at least $600-$700 a ton. Aluminum is going for even more than that right now. If they throw out aluminum bottles or aluminum cans or plastic bottles or plastic cans, they’re throwing out money. John Shegerian: That’s right. Allen Hershkowitz: And if the infrastructure is not there, and if you get the Red Sox complaining and the Dodgers complaining and the Chicago Cubs complaining and the New York Yankees complaining and the Miami Heat complaining, these are very noticeable members of the business community. They’re not Greenpeace, they’re not NRDC, they’re not Environmental Defense Fund. They’re very mainstream business messengers and they’re saying, “It’s hard enough t make a buck these days and you’re forcing us to throw money out,” because what’s normal in Europe – what’s interesting in developing the Green Sports Alliance in Europe is they chuckle at the fact that we celebrate when we set up recycling programs at our venues because in Europe it’s law. They are required by law to have recycling programs. And when we celebrate our carbon reductions at our venues and we publicized it and we put out case studies, they laugh at that, too, and it’s because they are required by law in Europe to reduce their carbon emissions. Actually, the European Soccer Federation – who I was just with last week and actually have to go back next week – they are putting on 51 games for the Eurocup. The Eurocup is the second largest and most important soccer tournament in the world. There is the World Cup, which is run by FIFA, and then there is the Eurocup and there are 51 games. And you know what they’re doing there? We could never do this here, but they are banning private car parking at all 51 games. John Shegerian: Wow. Allen Hershkowitz: You have to either take public transport or shuttle busses because they want to reduce the carbon emissions associated with the game. John Shegerian: Allen, we’re almost out of time for today – unfortunately – but I want you just to share with our listeners and our viewers your vision for the next five years with the GSA. Allen Hershkowitz: Well, we want to have all professional teams in all professional leagues as members. We want to have all colleges as members. We want to start educating high schoolers. John Shegerian: That’s awesome. Allen Hershkowitz: We want to start getting playgrounds to be environmentally healthy. We want to change food. Basically, we want to change the food that parents are able to serve to their children when they go to a ball game. So many parents are now more and more mindful, especially your listeners. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: Your listeners are really mindful about food. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: They don’t want to serve their kids chemically saturated fruit, vegetables or processed breads or grains or trans fats or meats saturated with antibiotics. They want to serve their kids healthy food and they do that at home. John Shegerian: Right. Allen Hershkowitz: But then they go to baseball game or a football game or a hockey game or a NASCAR event and they have few options that are healthy and they’re not happy about that. So changing the food profile. And that’s one of the things that we had here. Today, we had Levy, we had Centerplate, we had Arrowmark, we had the major food vendors here for the announcement of the release of this report and they said that this report is going to change what they’re doing at venues. John Shegerian: I see. And Levy came on the show – actually – thanks to your folks and they were great because they talked about how important it is to continue to upgrade their food quality and not only on a national basis but on a regional basis. Allen Hershkowitz: John, think of what sports has already done. Think of Jesse Owens destroying the Hitlerian/Aryan myth. John Shegerian: Jackie Robinson. Allen Hershkowitz: Think of what Jackie Robinson did with race relations. Think of what Billie Jean King did with gender equality. Think of what Muhammad Ali did with the Vietnam War. John Shegerian: That’s right. Allen Hershkowitz: The conscientious objection. Think of Magic Johnson destigmatizing having AIDS. John Shegerian: That’s right. Allen Hershkowitz: Think of Michael Sam coming out as a gay individual and what he’s done for gay marriage. Sports has already changed the world through prominent athletes coming out, and they continue to do that. And now the sports industry is going to change the world for the environment. And I’ll leave you with this one last piece of information. We are coming out next year – we have already written this report on endangered species. There are 153 professional sports teams. Ninety of them share 50 animals as mascots, and of those 50 animals, 31 – three fifths – are in danger of going extinct in the wild. John Shegerian: Wow. Allen Hershkowitz: So we have commitments. Next year, we are going to be releasing a report called “Mascots at Risk” in collaboration with baseball, basketball, hockey, soccer and football. All professional sports teams are coming together to help promote species preservation because the fact is that more than 11,000 sharks are killed every hour. You heard that right. Every hour. More than 250,000 sharks a day are killed for shark fin soup. An elephant is slaughtered every 20 minutes for its ivory. Ninety-seven percent of all the tigers are gone. Ninety percent of all the lions are gone. These are sports mascots. Tigers, lions, elephants, polar bears, bears, sharks, rays, dolphins, marlins – these are sports mascots. The sports industry could help and wants to help save these species from extinction, so one of the next big initiatives of the Green Sports Alliance is a global initiative, and we are working with our partners in Europe, in Australia, in the U.K., in South America to get global attention to the risks. Do we really want it to be the endgame for the tiger? Do we really want it to be the endgame for the lion or the elephant? John Shegerian: No. Not at all. Allen Hershkowitz: Right. John Shegerian: Allen, thank you again for everything you’re doing. Obviously, you’re an inspirational visionary and it’s just such an honor to have you on the show, it’s such an honor to have you as the President of the GSA and also an honor for me, personally, to have you as my friend. Allen Hershkowitz: Well, let me say this, John. I have been doing this work for a long time, and you know what? I can tell you that there are not a lot of people that do what you do. the platforms that you provide, the way that you get the message out – frankly, when we talk about cultural influence and educating people, you are one of the great environmental educators of our time. John Shegerian: Thank you. Allen Hershkowitz: Your radio show is broadcast around the world, and for you to – I mean, we could be doing this work invisibly if it wasn’t for you, so I can’t thank you enough. John Shegerian: Well, this has been an honor. I’m so glad. Green Is Good wants to be a media partner of GSA. Allen Hershkowitz: You are. John Shegerian: From here on in. Allen Hershkowitz: Right. John Shegerian: Because your work is so incredible and the people that you bring together that are collectively changing the world and making the world a better place. It’s just such an honor to be among them and to be able to share and tell their stories on Green Is Good, so thank you so much. For our listeners out there to learn more about Allen and also all you colleagues and what you’re doing at the Green Sports Alliance go to www.GreenSportsAlliance.org and they can sign up, they can learn, they can sign up for your newsletters, they can download these great reports here, like “Champions of Game Day Food,” and get other information because you’re constantly putting out new information and offering resources for everyone to enjoy and learn from. Allen, you’re my friend, but you really are an inspirational visionary and you’re truly living proof that Green Is Good. I thank you for all you do and I thank you for knowing me from the planet at large because you have made the world a great, great place. Allen Hershkowitz: Well, you’re a brother. Thank you so much. John Shegerian: Thank you. Thank you so much.

John Shegerian: Welcome to another edition of Green Is Good. This is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good and we are so honored to have with us here in downtown Chicago Julie Schilf. She is from the EPA. She is an environmental scientist. Welcome to Green Is Good, Julie. Julie Schilf: Thank you for having me. John Shegerian: Julie, before we get talking about food recovery and sports arenas and the reasons why you are here today, talk a little bit about the Julie Schilf story, and how did you end up at the EPA? Julie Schilf: Well, I originally interned there. I was a cartographer. I started out by making maps. And a position opened up in the sustainable and materials management branch of the land and chemicals division, and I applied because I was interning, so I took the first available position to open. And this recycling and materials management gelled with my background because I spent a lot of time actually on tour with the band Phish picking up recycling in the parking lots after shows. John Shegerian: Really? Julie Schilf: With Green Crew. That is correct. John Shegerian: So wait a second now. Before we start talking about the EPA and all the great work you’re doing there with regards to the GSA – so you went to college. Julie Schilf: I was going to college, yes. John Shegerian: And what did you study in college? Julie Schilf: I studied environmental policy. John Shegerian: Got you. Julie Schilf: And I have a Master’s in Public Administration. John Shegerian: So you were really interested in the environment even back in your college days. Julie Schilf: Well, actually, I was going to college, while I was interning at the EPA. John Shegerian: Got you. Julie Schilf: I didn’t go to college ‘til later on. John Shegerian: So then talk a little bit about your relationship with the band Phish and what you were doing with Phish. Julie Schilf: Well, it was a big group of people, and what they really did was wanted to – they didn’t necessarily work for the band. It’s an all-volunteer group and they picked up recyclables in the lots after shows. John Shegerian: So cool. Julie Schilf: The group really helped. You don’t work against a lot of the rabble that the band and sometimes its followers get. John Shegerian: Right. And was this – did you travel with them nationally or was this locally, or where was? Julie Schilf: Well, it’s pretty much on your own thing. John Shegerian: Right. Julie Schilf: So I have travelled across the country. John Shegerian: Cool. Julie Schilf: From Southern California all the way to Maine. John Shegerian: That’s awesome. Julie Schilf: Yeah. John Shegerian: That is awesome. Julie Schilf: So that really is how I got my interest in recycling. John Shegerian: Right. That’s a wonderful way. Julie Schilf: Yeah. It was great. John Shegerian: So then how many years ago did you join the EPA? Julie Schilf: I joined the EPA in 2005, so about 10 years ago. I interned for four years for the Oakridge Institute for Science and Education. John Shegerian: Got you. Julie Schilf: Then I was hired on about six years ago. John Shegerian: And you work in the Illinois area. The EPA. Julie Schilf: That is correct. Our offices here in Chicago. John Shegerian: In Chicago. And so for our listeners and our viewers out there that want to learn more about all the great work the EPA is doing in this area, they can go to www.EPA.gov/foodrecovery. Julie Schilf: Well, that is for the Food Recovery Challenge, which we are going to talk about in a moment. John Shegerian: Right. Julie Schilf: If they want to know more about region five and our office here in Chicago, they can go to www.EPA.gov/region5. John Shegerian: Perfect. Got it. And for all our listeners and viewers out there that want to learn more about the great Green Sports Alliance, which is the reason why we are here today, they can go to www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. Julie, talk a little bit about what – as an environmental scientist – are you tasked with doing on a day-to-day basis? Before we get talking about GSA – what is your job, generally speaking, on a macro basis at the EPA? Julie Schilf: On a day-to-day basis, I primarily work with Food Recovery Challenge and WasteWise participants and their data in our Re-TRAC waste management system. John Shegerian: Got you. And does that have to do with composting and everything that is going on? Julie Schilf: You can report composting. The system – actually, a lot of the states across the country belong to their system and that is where they report a lot of their waste characterization data, which helps us then create our overall national waste characterization report. John Shegerian: Got you. Is composting going to become – in your mind – one of the biggest food recycling? Is that going to become one of the biggest trends that continue to grow here in the United States? What are your thoughts on that? Julie Schilf: I hope so. It’s because it’s easy and it’s easy to teach kids how to compost and for people to do it. Although, what I really like to focus on is really work up that chain and focus on reducing your waste for starters. John Shegerian: Great point. Julie Schilf: And then donating. John Shegerian: Great point. Before we even get to the composting. Julie Schilf: Before you recycle something. Yeah. John Shegerian: So you want to even intermediate – before we get the composting, there are other great things that can be going on. Julie Schilf: That is correct. The food recovery hierarchy will show you: At the top, always reduce first and then feed people second. That is very important. John Shegerian: That is really great. Julie Schilf: And then feed animals. A lot of wasted food can go to feed animals. John Shegerian: Great point. Julie Schilf: And then compost. John Shegerian: Let’s talk about why you are here today. So what are you doing here? How did you learn about the GSA, Julie, and how did you get involved? Julie Schilf: Well, the EPA previously had an MOU with GSA. John Shegerian: OK. Julie Schilf: They signed that a few years ago when the summit was in Seattle. John Shegerian: OK. Julie Schilf: So this is really primarily a program out of headquarters. John Shegerian: OK. Julie Schilf: But I – in region five here – work with a lot of sport venues and stadiums with their organics programs. John Shegerian: Explain what that means. Julie Schilf: They are part of the Food Recovery Challenge. They report to me and to the Re-TRAC system, like I mentioned before. John Shegerian: Right. Julie Schilf: Their activities and programs that they’ve implemented, they’ve reported their numbers – so whatever they’ve donated, whatever they’ve composted and whatever they’ve reduced. John Shegerian: So you help synthesize that and also aggregate that information. Julie Schilf: I do. Then a big point of the Food Recovery Challenge program is to help publicize their efforts. Not only do we facilitate information across the United States with other venues so they can share their activities. John Shegerian: Great point. Julie Schilf: But we can publicize their efforts for them. John Shegerian: Wow. That’s great. So how is that going by the way? Is that a growing trend what you’re seeing working with these arenas and these public areas and public venues? Are they all increasing their efforts with regards to food? Julie Schilf: Yeah. It’s awesome. I mean, look at all the people here today. We have a session at 2:15 on the organics MVPs of the Great Lakes region. We have the Cleveland Browns, we have Minnesota Wild and Xcel Energy Center, we have Rock and Wrap It Up and we have this venue right here – McCormick Place – speaking during the session today. John Shegerian: Really? Julie Schilf: On food recovery. Yeah. John Shegerian: So this food recovery is really a fast growing trend that you’re seeing. Julie Schilf: It is. We put out these municipal cell waste characterization reports, and we are seeing a trend that food is the biggest material generated and yet the least recovered, so all this food – 34 million tons – is ending up in our landfills. John Shegerian: Well, let’s step back. So historically, food – if it wasn’t intermediated before composting as you pointed out, and if it never went to composting, then all this excess food historically went to landfills. Julie Schilf: It’s going to landfills and it’s- John Shegerian: Needlessly filling them up. Julie Schilf: Yep. And it’s a problem. It affects our society, it affects our environment and it affects our economy. John Shegerian: And no need for this to be going on is what you’re saying. Julie Schilf: Correct. John Shegerian: If handled appropriately, and if people like you get education out to these arenas and public venues- Julie Schilf: Exactly. John Shegerian: Massive change can happen on a national and international basis. Julie Schilf: Hopefully. And with the help of the Green Sports Alliance and the NRDC ,who does a lot of the reports – they recently estimated that an American family wastes about $1600 a year just in wasted food. John Shegerian: On a micro basis. So families can even be- Julie Schilf: Families can even do their part, and it’s really at that level where we need to start education. John Shegerian: So I come to you, and I’m running an arena and I heard that others are doing great work. Walk our listeners and our viewers through what would be a coaching session by you on how to get involved, how to really make change on a larger level with a public venue. Julie Schilf: Well, what I would do first as a federal government employee- John Shegerian: Yeah. Julie Schilf: I am not – I can’t promote one business over another. John Shegerian: Correct. Julie Schilf: That is not fair. But what I would do is connect you with – say, for example, you are here in Chicago – I would connect you with a local group that recently formed called the Illinois Food Scrap Coalition. John Shegerian: OK. Julie Schilf: And they are at www.IllinoisCompost.org, and the group is made up of a number of people from all different kinds of stakeholders – haulers, generators, grocery stores, local solid waste districts, people from all over, universities here in Chicago, All-State Arena, venues. So many people make up that group, and I would send you to them. I would send you to that group, and they can then help you find the resources you need to divert your wasted food. John Shegerian: I see. Julie Schilf: Or donate, hopefully. John Shegerian: Got you. So you’d have me start working with a local group. Whoever is local to my venue. Julie Schilf: Correct. Yeah. John Shegerian: Got you. Then we’d start measuring what we’re doing with them. Julie Schilf: Always measure. You can’t manage what you don’t measure. You were just talking about that with Jackie before. John Shegerian: Right. Julie Schilf: You can’t manage what you don’t measure, and you need to start somewhere so benchmarking – especially for Food Recovery Challenge – is really important. You can’t set goals for yourself if you don’t even know where you’re starting. John Shegerian: So explain what you mean by benchmarking, and then do you leverage technology to do this? Do you have software? Julie Schilf: If you join the Food Recovery Challenge, we have that program I mentioned before – Re-TRAC. John Shegerian: Right. Julie Schilf: You have free access to that program and that allows you to track your data annually. John Shegerian: Got you. Julie Schilf: And it also will help you develop a report so you can share with your stakeholders what you are doing. For example, the greenhouse gas equivalencies. John Shegerian: Got you. Julie Schilf: Like I was saying before, you can share – let’s say, for example, you donated X number of tons of food. John Shegerian: Sure. Julie Schilf: And that is the equivalent to emissions from X number of cars a year. John Shegerian: Right. For our listeners and viewers who have just joined us, we’ve got Julie Schilf with us. She is an Environmental Scientist at the EPA. To learn more about what’s going on at the EPA, you can go to www.EPA.gov. If you want to learn more about Food Recovery Network and everything that she is doing with regards to food recovery, it’s www.EPA.gov/foodrecovery. And this is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good. Please check out all the great work Green Sports Alliance is doing at www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. So explain from the beginning, Re-TRAC. How many years ago did that launch, and what is it actually you are trying to accomplish with Re-TRAC? Julie Schilf: Re-TRAC really isn’t an EPA program. John Shegerian: OK. Julie Schilf: It’s a contractor’s program. John Shegerian: Oh, I got you. Julie Schilf: But a lot of the states use it to enter – like I said before – their state waste data. John Shegerian: Got you. Julie Schilf: We also use it for Game Day Challenge. A lot of the universities use it. There are many programs in Re-TRAC that you can use to manage and track your waste information. John Shegerian: Got you. And for our listeners and viewers that want to check out what Re-TRAC is, it’s www.Re-TRAC.com. Got you. So talk a little bit about what you’re going to be talking about here today at the GSA on your panel, and what are your goals today with regards to the Green Sports Alliance and goals in the future. Julie Schilf: Well, I’m really glad the summit is here in Chicago because here in the Midwest we lack the composting infrastructure that – say – the East Coast and West Coast have. John Shegerian: Really? Julie Schilf: So I feel like we’re behind, and a lot of people might think of that as a negative thing, but I think it’s great because we can now learn from the West Coat and East Coast. We can learn from their mistakes as we move forward. John Shegerian: Right. Julie Schilf: So, hopefully, today we’re going to learn how some of the venues that I mentioned earlier are diverting their food waste with the challenges that we’re facing here in the Midwest. John Shegerian: Got you. And when you study what is going on on the east and west coasts and what is going on in the Midwest how much catching up do you have to do? How long do you think it will take, and what do you think is about? Julie Schilf: I have no idea. John Shegerian: Right. Julie Schilf: But I hear Allen saying earlier, when he was speaking earlier today, about how this is really up to the private sector, and while here as a federal government employee, I’m going to help facilitate that information across the private sector. John Shegerian: Right. Julie Schilf: So we really need haulers to step up. We need more facilities in Illinois. And the benefits are there will be more jobs. We will have more compost, which is a nutrient rich soil amendment. John Shegerian: The constituents – the people who live here in the great state of Illinois – are they excited about composting, and do you see change with regards to that? Julie Schilf: I do. I see change. I see it happening in our state legislature and, with thanks to the group I was saying earlier – the Illinois Food Scrap Coalition – they are really pushing that forward. John Shegerian: Other environmental scientists that work with the EPA and food recovery across America, do you all exchange information? Julie Schilf: We do. We have meetings every other week. John Shegerian: Wow. Julie Schilf: We talk on conference calls every other week. We’re One EPA. John Shegerian: Right. Julie Schilf: So we like to act as one. John Shegerian: What are the greatest messages that you want your audience to hear today during your remarks on your panel today? Julie Schilf: I want people to know that most of the food that you come in contact with every day – or don’t – is not really waste at all. It’s not food waste. I don’t like to refer to it as “food waste” because it’s not waste. It is wholesome edible food that could be either donated or composted, and I think that is really important for people to know and to think about. John Shegerian: And throwing away food is really something of the past. People shouldn’t – whether you’re on a macro basis – if you’re managing an arena – or on a micro basis -if you’re managing your household – that’s really not the way to go anymore. Julie Schilf: No. I think the trend is going to catch on and it’s going to catch on quickly. John Shegerian: I’ll leave you with the final thoughts today, Julie. We are so thankful you came on the show. What would you like to leave our listeners and our viewers with before we have to sign off today? Julie Schilf: Buy what you need. John Shegerian: I like that. Julie Schilf: Eat what you buy. John Shegerian: I like that. Julie Schilf: Store fruits and vegetables smarter. John Shegerian: Interesting. Right. Julie Schilf: Yeah. John Shegerian: And when you say “smarter,” what do you mean by “smarter?” Julie Schilf: We actually have developed a storage guide that can help consumers at the household and consumer level really understand how to better store their food so it doesn’t go bad faster. John Shegerian: Got you. And where can our listeners and viewers see that? Julie Schilf: At that webpage there. At www.EPA.gov/foodrecovery. John Shegerian: Got you. Julie Schilf: OK. John Shegerian: Great, Julie. It’s been an honor to have you on today. Julie Schilf: Thank you for having me. John Shegerian: For all our listeners and viewers out there, thank you for joining this edition with Julie Schilf, the environmental scientist really working on food recovery at the local EPA here in Illinois. And again, this is the Green Sports Alliance edition of Green Is Good. You can learn more about Green Sports Alliance at www.GreenSportsAlliance.org. Julie Schilf, you are truly living proof that Green is Good. Julie Schilf: Thank you. John Shegerian: Thank you so much.