Size: 700 hectars; 40,000 residents; US$ 22 Billion

Completion Date: 2025

Size: More than 125 Gigawatts; €400 Billion

Completion Date: 2050

An article in today’s Globe & Mail describes the recent woes of oil sands investors.  High labour costs, regional markets, and pipeline protests are all spelling trouble for companies that have been expanding at rates that are hardly sustainable (by any definition of the word). And the article doesn’t even mention China’s new carbon tax that could change the geopolitical game on climate change.

This portfolio is simple, with a positive environmental impact.  It is very diversified, yet places a strong bet on the emergence of a low-carbon economy.  The total annual cost of this portfolio is 0.45%.

I’m getting ready for my first class of Introduction to Economics, and coming up with creative ways to teach the fundamental concept of ‘opportunity cost’.  For those of you needing an Econ101 refresher, opportunity cost is defined as 'the cost of an alternative that must be forgone in order to pursue a certain action'.  For example, right now I’m spending an hour writing this blog.  If I wasn’t writing this blog, I’d be building a financial plan or doing some research for a client.  Since my fee amounts to $150 per hour, the opportunity cost for me to write this blog is $150.

This week, I attended the Toronto Sustainability Speaker’s Series event on Capitalism 2.0. In a room with 80 of Toronto’s sustainability leaders, we discussed how a new economy is emerging. A colleague challenged us to define what the heck Capitalism 2.0 looks like, so here is my attempt.

The world is in trouble, I hope we can all agree on this point. We’re facing an economic crisis (first-world problems), a social crisis (third-world problems), and an ecological crisis (everybody’s problem). I’m always on the hunt for policies that address multiple inefficiencies, and that will get us moving towards a more sustainable economy. One such policy being discussed these days is called the Robin Hood Tax. This tax addresses two critical crises in the world right now: poor support from governments for global development projects and rampant currency speculation by the financial industry.

We’ve known it for years: climate change is one of the most pressing issues facing the future of our economy, society, and planet.

But for some reason, Americans in large part were in denial.  Perhaps it was the overt skepticism promoted by the Heartland Institute.  Maybe it was rebellion against Al Gore and his holier-than-thou whilst guilt-ridden messaging.  Ah forget it, let’s just blame the Koch Brothers and be done with it.