Search Results for: verbier

On the train towards Verbier

Ditto

W Hotel in Verbier

Desktop art

Wall art

Up the mountain

Chateau de Chillon at speed from train

Spent Friday and Saturday en route to, at and on way back from Verbier, Switzerland, keynoting the launch of the Verbier Institute.

Other speakers included Julia Groves of the Trillion Fund, Aleyn Smith-Gillespie of the Carbon Trust, André Schneider of the EPFL and the Danish artist Per Arnoldi.

Kudos to the Verbier Institute team: Anders Sjostedt, Robert Howe and Michael Mathres.

Some fascinating conversations along the way, during and after, especially with André. Among the things we discussed: the EPFL Blue Brain Project and the Venice Time Machine. Plus a bunch of other things.

Had read about them both before, but it’s amazing what interesting work is going on in some parts of Europe. Turned out that André is a Dr Who fan, too.

Had a quick-fire trip (with my case) up the mountains afterwards, with perhaps 10 minutes at the top before taking a cabine down to Verbier and then down into the valley, to catch the first of two trains back to Geneva. Gave a useful perspective on it all.

Fingers crossed that the Institute takes off.

I flew in to Dubai a couple of days back for the second World Green Economy Summit, invited by André Schneder of World Capital – who I first met last year in Verbier.

André chaired the first session today, where I spoke alongside Raphaël Domjan, of Solar Planet, who I had first heard of when he sailed his solar vessel, PlanetSolar, around the world. Titled ‘Green Development Visionaries,’ this was a highly enjoyable session. It was followed by a panel discussion on south-south partnerships. again chaired by André. My co-panellists this time were Edem Bakhshish of the UN Office for South-South Cooperation, Amal-Lee Amin of E3G, Lars Josefsson who chairs the World Economic Forum Global Advisory Council on De-carbonizing Energy, and Martin Hiller of REEEP (Renewable Energy & Energy Efficiency Partnership).

Having coined the term ‘green growth’ back in 1986 (SustainAbility was originally tag-lined ‘The Green Growth Company’), and having published The Green Capitalists in 1987 (with Tom Burke, now part of E3G, as a co-author), I have been fascinated to see how the whole field has evolved. But it was truly weird to go up to the 68th floor in the J.W. Marriot hotel with Sten de Witt of TNO, to down a glass or two of Malbec, and in his case beer, and to then see ‘sustainability’ so prominently featured among the cocktails. Not really sure what to make of that …

Meanwhile, Huffington Post published my latest blog today on the B Corporation movement.