Derek Markham, Author at Ecopreneurist

Derek Markham

lives in southwestern New Mexico and digs bicycles, simple living, organic gardening, sustainable lifestyle design, slacklining, bouldering, and permaculture. He loves good food, with fresh roasted chiles at the top of his list of favorites. Catch up with Derek on Twitter, RebelMouse, Google+, or at his natural parenting site, Natural Papa!

Help Crowdsource the Most Sustainable Investment Fund on the Planet

January 27, 2015

by Derek Markham

If you’d like to help shape the direction of sustainable investments, without putting a dime of your own into the pot, here’s your chance. Oroeco, the company that believes that it should be “easy, fun, and rewarding to align our everyday lives with our core values,” is partnering with a few other like-minded organizations to create the world’s most sustainable investment fund, a diversified exchange-traded fund (ETF), called the Climate Impact Fund. And they want your help to decide who…

What Is the Cost of Sugar to the Planet?

January 26, 2015

by Derek Markham

Sugar seems to be popping up everywhere in packaged foods these days, which is a big health concern for those who consume a lot of it, but even aside from the issue of the health effects of sugar on the body, there’s another part of the story, which is the effect that growing sugar has on our planet, and on those who grow it. The practice of Fair Trade certification for foods such as coffee, chocolate, and bananas, is becoming…

Smarter Solar Irrigation Model Uses Centralized Solar, Distributed Pumps

January 20, 2015

by Derek Markham

In rural areas of Senegal, getting water for irrigating crops often comes with a hefty price tag, not only in terms of the cost to buy the fuel for it (about $1 per day for an average gas-powered irrigation pump), and the time necessary to procure it from the nearest gas station (which could be an hour away by car), but also in regards to the polluting emissions of the pumps themselves, which are not clean-burning or very efficient. Because…

Tackling the Global E-Waste Problem (Infographic)

January 16, 2015

by Derek Markham

Originally published on CustomMade. Last year, the world produced nearly 54 million tons of electrical and electronic products, but only a fraction of it was reused, refurbished, or recycled. With a relatively short lifecycle, e-waste now litters dumpsites all over the world, exposing humans and the environment to toxic materials. Some eco-conscious offices use industrial desks made mostly from recycled materials, while a number of homeowners have turned to reclaimed barnwood to create sustainable desks and entertainment centers. However, despite…

Green Business Ideas: Bicycle Café Franchise

January 12, 2015

by Derek Markham

Some of the ‘brick and mortar’ green business ideas we’ve covered before can also easily be scaled down and modified into a mobile business, especially in those markets where there’s already a proven demand, as well as plenty of room for a unique small business to differentiate itself. It can be a huge advantage to have the ability to pedal your business around to the customers (or to a busy location), and to be self-contained, and the low overhead of…

Doing Well by Doing Good: The Case for Corporate Sustainability

January 12, 2015

by Derek Markham

The movement toward starting greener, more sustainable, businesses isn’t new, because ecopreneurs have been making waves in the sustainable business world long before the word sustainable was used to describe them, but taking an existing business, especially a big one, and transforming it a company that values and supports environmental stewardship is something of a rarity. However, it can be done, as Ray Anderson demonstrated with his company, Interface, the world’s largest maker of carpet tile, which has made huge…