ICT for a Sustainable Planet

The Techné Verde Mission is to develop and implement new synergistic applications of Information and Communications Technology in a public service instrument that engenders holistic understanding of the relationship of government, business and civil society with the planetary ecosystem, and empowers the people and leaders of the global community to take actions that foster rapid development of sustainable human culture.

A project of the Buckminster Fuller Institute, Techné Verde is a clearinghouse and production group specializing in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) applications that serve the global sustainability movement.

With primary offices in San Francisco, California, the Techné Verde group combines advanced technical, design and “green intelligence” resources with vital relationships in the technology, media and sustainability fields. Techné Verde proposes to develop an Internet-based “Sustainable Culture Hub” as a widely recognized and endorsed public service resource that stands outside of political and commercial influences as a self-governed and self-generating system offering the general public and its institutions a central access point to global sustainability data and resources.

TECHNÉ VERDE TEAM

MICHAEL GOSNEY
Founder and Managing Director

Michael Gosney, based in San Francisco, is an expert on Information and Communications Technology applications for sustainable development, green technology and ecocity design. An early pioneer in new media publishing, he has produced multimedia projects in partnership with firms such as Apple Computer, Kodak, Toshiba, Peter Norton, Adobe and Microsoft, including the first multimedia CD-ROM in 1991, many instructional books on new media, Peter Norton’s PC Guru consumer CD-ROM and Internet business solutions for financial and technical clients.

Gosney began researching and publishing material on environmental sustainability in the early 1980s when his Avant Books released Deep Ecology, edited by Michael Tobias, After Eden by Michael Tobias, and Arcosanti by Paolo Soleri. Gosney joined the Board of Trustees of Paolo Soleri’s Arcosanti ecocity project in Arizona in 1995, and produced the Paradox Conferences at Arcosanti in 1997, 1999 and 2001, bringing together leaders in cyberculture and sustainable community development. In 2002, Gosney co-founded the Green Century Institute in San Francisco as a research project under the Rudolf Steiner Foundation to create educational initiatives on sustainable community solutions. GCI co-produced the Green Cities Expo during the June 2005 UNEP World Environment Day in San Francisco with Al Gore, Daryl Hannah; and the 2006-2008 Earth Day Digital Be-In events (www.be-in.com) with Paul Hawken, Janine Benyus and other sustainable culture and green technology leaders.

A respected speaker and cultural visionary, Gosney brings extensive knowledge and relationships in the high technology industry, the sustainability movement, and the media field to the Techné Verde initiative.

COLIN GRANT
Senior Consultant, Technology Partner

Colin Grant is the founder and CEO of Visible Strategies Software Inc. and has worked in the sustainability sector for over 15 years. He has extensive experience in providing strategic consulting to business, governments and non-profits worldwide including multinational corporations, Al Gore’s Live Earth team and leaders at all levels of local, national and international government. He is the primary developer of Visible Strategies’ "See-It" system, one of the leading tools worldwide for tracking and managing sustainability programs.

He received the British Government’s Millennium Products Award for developing and commercializing a process that allows naturally occurring organisms to consume toxic waste products. Colin is a board member of the International Centre for Sustainable Cities, a member of the Vancouver Mayor's Sustainability Council and the Vancouver Climate Leaders' Group.

PETER HOLLANDS
Senior Consultant

Based in London, Peter has over 20 years of experience as a senior architect of business solutions for Fortune 500 companies across Europe, working with Hewlett Packard, Sun Microsystems and Cisco.

He has provided Internet business solutions to non-profits such as Oxfam International, The United Nations Development Programme and The Eden Project.

At Oxfam, Peter developed web based solutions and won funding from Cisco Foundation for the Oxfam Dashboard – an Internet platform that improves collaboration among Oxfam's 12 affiliate organizations around the globe. Peter worked with the UNDP to scope, win funding, and implement the MDG Monitor (Millennium Development Goals Monitor), which was launched by Secretary General of the UN in November 2007. Peter developed the technical strategy and served as Interim CIO for the Eden Project implementing the strategy over 12 months.

Formerly, Peter was Director of Solutions in Cisco's Internet Business Solutions Group, providing advice to the boards of Europe's Fortune 250 organizations. Prior to Cisco, Peter was a senior director of Sun Microsystems (8 years) following his training with Hewlett Packard.

WARREN KARLENZIG
Senior Consultant

Warren Karlenzig has worked internationally with governments and business for 20 years on business and policy strategy, complex system information architecture and planning, knowledge management systems, and metrics. He is based in the San Francisco Bay Area.

His clients have included Chevron, General Electric, The European Union, TheWhite House Office of Science and Technology, the US Department of State, the US Department of Energy, the State of California, The David and Lucile Packard Foundation, and the Asian Institute for Energy, Environment and Sustainability.

Warren has led the business strategy, requirements development and system selection process for knowledgebases (Chevron Public Affairs, www.sustainlane.us), enterprise portals (Chevron; Brobeck, Phleger & Harrison) and intranets (Chevron enterprise internet).

He is author of How Green is Your City?: The SustainLane US City Rankings (New Society Publishers, 2007) and a chapter in Growing Greener Cities: Urban Sustainability in the 21st Century (Penn Press, 2008), and a chapter in the ASTD E-Learning Handbook (McGraw Hill, 2001).

Inquiries: michael@greencenturyinstitute.org

BRAD DeGRAF
Senior Consultant

Based in Seattle, Brad has been an innovator in computer animation in the entertainment industry since 1982, particularly in the areas of realtime characters, ride films, and the Web. He founded and/or managed several ground-breaking animation studios including Protozoa, Colossal Pictures Digital Media, deGraf/Wahrman, and Digital Productions. In 2000, Wired called Brad "an icon in the world of 3D animation."

Since 2000, he has concentrated on work at the intersection of media, technology, finance, and social change. In addition to his current role as co-founder and CTO of the Interra Project, that work has included a variety of consultancy roles focused on next-generation digital media technology, particularly lately in international development work with the World Bank's International Finance Corporation and the US Agency for International Development.

Other recent roles include executive producer of Youthgive, executive director of the Internet Bookmobile project , co-director for Moving Images at the Internet Archive, and senior analyst for Jon Peddie Research.

SARAH ISABEL PARRIOTT
Project Manager

Sarah Isabel Parriott has 10 years of International Business experience, including 3 years as principal of Sustainable Emergence, a boutique sustainability management consultancy in San Francisco. Currently Sustainability Project Manager with Paladin Law Group’s Sustainability Practice Group, Sarah Isabel has worked with public and private sector clients in the San Francisco Bay Area, offering triple bottom line services through innovative performance measurement and development of management systems for social, natural and financial capital.

Ms. Parriott has worked internationally and locally to coordinate various industries, government agencies, academic institutions and non-profit organizations, creating productive multi-stakeholder networks and sustainable development strategies for the state of California. Ms. Parriott’s consulting practice has included carbon accounting and environmental impact reduction strategies, quantitative analysis of environmental inputs/outputs, social impact measurement tools, renewables and energy efficiencies, green buildings (LEED), Environmental Management Systems (ISO), and sustainability auditing and reporting. Ms. Parriott also teaches whole system change at Dominican University of California in a Green MBA course, Systemic Thinking Labs.

JESSICA MORRIS
Marketing Specialist

Jessica helps complex institutions develop strategic communications plans that help them manage their reputation more effectively. Organizations she has worked with range from the UK’s National Health Service and Disability Rights Commission, to McDonald’s Restaurants, Lloyd’s of London, Dell Computers, Marks & Spencer, Centrica and Diageo.

Jessica moved to New York from London three years ago. She is currently working with the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs and UN Environment Program on a media plan for its work on sustainable consumption and production. Other clients include Brazilian NGO Akatu on conscious consumption and the Institute of Transportation Development Policy. She is also an Adjunct Lecturer at Columbia University’s School of International Public Affairs.

In the UK Jessica was the first head of corporate responsibility in a government department – Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs. She was the founding chair of The Sheila McKechnie Foundation, launched by the Prime Minister Gordon Brown in Downing Street in 2005, and designed to support campaigners and advocates.

Before going solo in 1999, Jessica was a Board Director of Fishburn Hedges, a top-twenty UK corporate and financial PR and design consultancy, now part of Omnicom. She joined Fishburn Hedges from the non-profit world, with positions at the UK’s homeless charity Shelter and the British Refugee Council. Prior to that, she spent a year picking coffee and building houses in Nicaragua.

LANDON ELMORE
Design and Online Marketing

For nearly 20 years, Landon Elmore has provided design and online marketing services to clients in a variety of sectors; Financial, Loyalty/Rewards, Retail, Medical, Technology, Entertainment and Education. He has worked in the conscious consumer marketing space for many years, including Conscious Consumer list aggregation for online marketing agency Beach List Direct, and design of one of the world’s first loyalty card programs for local businesses. His current practice emphasizes work with socially responsible products and brands.

Landon specializes in integrated design and marketing programs that encompass branding, website and microsite development, and email and social marketing campaigns for clients such as: National Discount Brokers (Financial), BondRewards (Loyalty/Rewards), Verbum (Publishing), Green Century Institute (Sustainable Development), Interra Project (Community Currency/Rewards), Earthdance Network (Conscious Entertainment), Ironweed Films (Progressive Film Club), WiserEarth (Online Sustainable Community and Database), and the Compassionate Action Network (Social Space).

With roots in traditional graphic design, Landon Elmore has been on the cutting edge of interactive design and Internet marketing since the early 1990s, originally based in the South Park technology hotbed of San Francisco, now located in Raleigh, North Carolina. Current clients include Rain Water Solutions (Sustainable/Rainwater Capture) and the new Raleigh Convention Center, a Silver LEED Certified 500,000 sq. ft meeting and convention space. More info: www.landonelmore.com

 

Back to Top