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And Sanyo is backing up its commitment with products we can buy. Japan leads the world in the production and installation of photovoltaic solar cells, and Sanyo has long been a global leader in the technology. I first observed the company’s widespread use of solar energy when I visited two of its facilities in Japan in 1979. Sanyo’s newest solar panels have a cell conversion efficiency of almost 20 percent, perhaps the world’s highest, and it is now producing double panels, which also capture solar reflections from the ground, increasing power generation by another 8 percent. In addition, Sanyo has developed an air conditioner, largely for developing countries, which is 99 percent free of chlorofluorocarbon gases; a washing machine that saves energy by using air, not water, to wash clothes; a self-recharging battery for hybrid vehicles (my Mercury SUV hybrid is powered by a Sanyo battery); numerous water conservation technologies that save energy as they conserve and reuse water; and, perhaps most amazing, the eneloop rechargeable battery, which is more powerful and longer lasting than traditional dry cell batteries of the same size and can be recharged one thousand times! More than 22 million ene-loops have been delivered in thirty-seven countries. If consumers buy these 22 million batteries and make full use of them, it will reduce the need to dispose of billions of dry cell batteries in the future, and will reduce greenhouse gas emissions from batteries by 98 percent, about the same amount absorbed by all the trees and vegetation in Yosemite National Park. As an added bonus, besides the regular plug-in recharger, there is a recharger that operates on solar power: you just place it in the window. As with compact fluorescent lightbulbs, these batteries and the little time it requires to recharge them will take some getting used to, but Sanyo is giving you another painless way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Swiss Re, the international reinsurance company, has taken a unique approach to involving all its more than ten thousand employees in combating climate change by supporting their efforts to reduce their own emissions. The initiative is titled COyou2—Reduce and Gain. Over the next five years the company will contribute 50 percent of the cost of any employee investment up to 5,000 CHF ($4,000). This will enable the employees in more than twenty-five countries where the company has operations to choose the CO2 reduction investment most suited to a particular location, from buying hybrid vehicles, to installing solar panels or heat pumps, to improving lighting and insulation. If all its employees cooperate, Swiss Re could invest more than $40 million, creating new markets and better prices for clean energy.

Cisco, the global information technology giant, has committed to reduce its CO2 emissions by 10 percent, primarily through a 20 percent company-wide travel reduction. It has also made a pledge with potentially far greater impact. The company will invest $15 million over the next three to five years to develop plans to reduce traffic congestion in cities, beginning with San Francisco, Seoul, and Amsterdam. Based on the projects, Cisco will formulate a Connected Urban Development program, which can be used to reduce congestion in other urban areas, lowering CO2 emissions and saving both citizens and local governments time and money.

At the 2006 Clinton Global Initiative, Sir Richard Branson pledged all future profits of his Virgin Group’s airline and rail business, an estimated $3 billion over the next ten years, to investments in renewable energy, and to becoming a carbon-neutral company through greater efficiency in energy use and investments in carbon offset programs. Virgin has already invested in several U.S. ethanol plants, including one in California designed to operate cheaper and greener than standard corn-based plants. Branson is also investing in a bio–diesel fuel for nonelectric trains, and has initiated production of bio–jet fuel, which, if successful,