Innovation of the Week: U.S. DOE’s Energy Innovation Hub Will Develop Fuel From Sunlight
Posted by: meikah | 29 July 2010 | 7:44 pm
This week’s edition of innovation update features the story about generating fuel from sunlight.
Spearheading this project is the Energy Innovation Hub of the U.S. Department of Energy. Fast Company features:
Want to generate innovation? Build a hub to make it happen. The U.S. Department of Energy is embarking on an ambitious plan to speed up energy innovation with a $122 million cash injection for an Energy Innovation Hub in California. Dubbed the Joint Center for Artificial Photosynthesis, the research center will do exactly as its name suggests–develop a solar energy fuel conversion system through artificial photosynthesis and bring it to commercialization.
Filed under: Innovation, Innovation Update, Sustainable Business
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JEA’s 2010 IQPC Award Winning Green Process Improvement Project
Posted by: meikah | 24 May 2010 | 8:46 pm
Listen to the video presentation of JEA as it talks to Genna Weiss of Six Sigma iQ and learn:
- Leveraged the SIPOC diagram to initially assess the company’s ammonia flow process
- Used a root cause investigation matrix to pinpoint the problem of this process
- Implemented and maintained the solution to the problem
- Created a performance dashboard to track the company’s ammonia consumption
Filed under: Processes, SIPOC, Six Sigma, Sustainable Business
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Catch the iSixSigma Live’s Energy Forum for Process Excellence
Posted by: meikah | 14 April 2010 | 9:35 pm
Be a part of the 200 leaders who will learn and network with executives and practitioners across the energy sector.
The agenda would be: Oil & Gas Upstream, Power Generation & Distribution, Internal Operations (Supply Chain, HR, IT, etc.), CI Program Management, Oil & Gas Downstream, and Service Providers.
Read more and register now!
Filed under: Six Sigma, Sustainable Business, iSixSigma
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Innovation of the Week: Cleantech, Silicon Valley’s Next Great Wave of Innovation
Posted by: meikah | 4 March 2010 | 7:32 pm
This week’s edition of innovation update features Cleantech, Silicon Valley‘s next great wave of innovation. This time Silicon Valley is working on clean and green technologies.
MercuryNews.com reports:
Silicon Valley earned its name and first great fortune as the cradle of the computer age. Then it built a launching pad for the Internet age. Now the valley has assumed a leading role in the global competition to develop renewable energy and other clean, green technologies.
Cleantech is poised to be the valley’s third great wave of innovation — not just the next big thing, but perhaps the biggest thing ever. Confronting the peril of greenhouse gases and climate change happens to be a multi-trillion-dollar business opportunity.
“Energy is the biggest opportunity Silicon Valley has ever seen,” declared T.J. Rodgers, the founder of Cypress Semiconductor and chairman of SunPower, a leading maker of photovoltaic panels to produce solar energy.
Filed under: Innovation, Innovation Update, Silicon Valley, Six Sigma, Sustainable Business, Technology
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SixSig Reference Feature: Building a Sustainable Ford Motor Company
Posted by: meikah | 24 February 2010 | 4:01 am
Here’s a transcript of the interview with Bill Ford, Ford‘s executive chairman.
In October 2009, Ford sat down with McKinsey’s Sheila Bonini, a consultant in the firm’s Silicon Valley office, and Hans-Werner Kaas, a director in Detroit, and discussed his views on sustainability, the new technologies for fuel economy, innovation, and overcoming resistance to change. The interview took place in Ford’s office at the company’s headquarters, in Dearborn, Michigan.
Filed under: Ford Motors, Six Sigma, Sustainable Business
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How IBM Dublin Implements Lean Six Sigma to Go Green
Posted by: meikah | 18 February 2010 | 6:52 pm
IBM has been very vocal about their green initiatives and using Lean Six Sigma for most, if not all, of their processes.
An article on Environmental Leader discusses how IBM goes green by using Lean Six Sigma. IBM initially:
- Formed a team of about 40 volunteers from around the world and from various groups across the organization to examine areas where improvements could be made – primarily in energy, packaging, solid waste and supplier environmental initiatives. The team members participated in this project in addition to their regular duties. Nearly all the ideas for improvements came from within the group – not from management – and over time we expanded the team to 100 and then 200 employees.
- The first-year results were impressive. Switching to lightweight, recyclable plastic packing material reduced packaging by 290 metric tons, incidentally lowering GHG emissions for outbound transportation. A variety of energy conservation initiatives in plant and office locations reduced power consumption by 6,300 megawatt-hours.
- for the second project, a Lean Six Sigma specialist at our Dublin, Ireland, facility learned about a concept developed at IBM Research to apply those principles to energy, water, waste and emissions. With the encouragement of his managers, he worked with the plant’s environmental, operations and process improvement teams to start a pilot project at the plant, using this methodology developed to collect and analyze energy data throughout the plant.
Source: iSixSigma News
Filed under: Environment, IBM, Lean Six Sigma, Six Sigma, Sustainable Business
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The SixSig Trivia
Posted by: meikah | 9 December 2009 | 9:00 pm
It’s 16 days before Christmas, and I’m sure by now, many of you have already Christmas trees in your homes. Do you get a real tree or those artificial ones?
When my mom was much younger, she would always make her own Christmas trees. Sometimes she would get a real one, other times, she would create a replica of a tree full of snow (soap suds, really). About 10 years ago, she resigned to putting up the same green plastic Christmas tree year after year, and adorn it with different balls or colored-paraphernalia each year.
However, according to the American National Association of Christmas Tree Growers, although artificial Christmas trees are more convenient, “real†trees are better for the environment.
They came up with this chart that shows Christmas tree preferences since 2002.
Source: http://www.christmastree.org/statistics_consumer.cfm#type
Via: PQ Systems eLine, Data in everyday life
Filed under: Data, Data Analysis, Environment, Six Sigma, SixSig Trivia, Sustainable Business
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Six Sigma and Managing the Environment
Posted by: meikah | 7 December 2009 | 9:39 pm
From iSixSigma articles:
The current ISO 14001:2004 standard for environmental management systems has explicit requirements for defining and establishing objective targets and measures as part of an organization’s commitment to sound environmental management. Meeting these standards can be made easier when Six Sigma is applied in complement to an organization’s environmental management system. The presence of a robust Six Sigma program – including work completed and documented during DMAIC projects – also can help demonstrate compliance to ISO 14001:2004. The following example illustrates the benefits of using Six Sigma to meet environmental goals.
*Photo fom Stock.Xchng
Filed under: Environment, Six Sigma, Sustainable Business
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Innovation of the Week: San Francisco Public Utilities Commission HQ
Posted by: meikah | 26 November 2009 | 7:28 pm
For this week’s edition of innovation update, I’m sharing with you how commercial innovations pave the way for greener homes or buildings.
As we witness extreme climate change and its devastating effects, more and more people are launching programs to preserve (what’s left of) the environment.
The headquarters of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission is making use of commercial innovations to be greener.
San Francisco Chronicles reports:
The latest poster child for green buildings is the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission headquarters, which broke ground last month. This 13-story glass tower intends to be “the greenest urban office building in the U.S.,” according to city officials.
The 277,000-square-foot building, topped by solar panels and wind turbines, will generate much of its own electricity. It will also recycle rainwater and the building’s own gray water from bathroom sinks. Positioning of windows and utilization of light-bouncing techniques will harvest daylight, which improves worker productivity and will complement internal lighting systems that turn on lights only when and where needed.
Filed under: Innovation, Innovation Update, Six Sigma, Sustainable Business
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Green Strategy with Lean Six Sigma
Posted by: meikah | 2 July 2009 | 8:36 pm
GreenBiz.com carries a story about a green strategy that pays off for retailers.
Based on the company’s white paper, Suzanne Long, the Retail Practice leader for the global operations consulting firm, SSA & Company, says, “Retailers spend millions of dollars on their green agendas, but never see the opportunity those agendas present to operate smarter, more efficiently, and with lower cost.”
This is true. Not many companies, in fact, know how to utilize improvement projects to save or cut on costs. What strikes me about the article is the recognition that green strategy can be successful with Lean Six Sigma.
SSA & Company was founded as the Six Sigma Academy in 1994. The firm works with businesses to develop green and other management strategies by using the principles of Lean Six Sigma.
