Month: February 2013

We are excited to announce the addition of a new service to our Advisory Services offerings—a standardized packaging design assessment. Companies interested in designing more sustainable packaging can now take advantage of this service to receive an environmental life cycle profile of new packaging formats or an overall assessment of their current packaging portfolios in order to identify opportunities for improvement. GreenBlue will leverage its COMPASS® (Comparative Packaging Assessment) software tool to perform these assessments.
“While companies can purchase COMPASS licenses for use by their internal design teams, this new Advisory Services option offers a convenient alternative to companies that do not have large packaging portfolios or do not have internal life cycle assessment capabilities but want to take a holistic approach in their design decision making,” said Katherine O’Dea, GreenBlue’s Senior Director of Advisory Services and Innovation.
The new package design analysis service is being offered for primary or secondary packaging options. Using validated, generic industry life cycle data, the assessment will account for environmental impacts associated with the materials and processes used to bring packaging to market, while allowing decision makers to incorporate environmental parameters alongside economic factors. The confidential assessment will be based on a set of consumption, emissions, and packaging attribute metrics. The report generated, which will include a brief comparative sustainability assessment with dashboard graphics of up to four proposed designs, will provide an excellent tool to educate customers about a company’s sustainability efforts.
“The COMPASS assessment method and data have been thoroughly vetted by independent verification and member companies of GreenBlue’s Sustainable Packaging Coalition, and are supported by the U.S Environmental Protection Agency. COMPASS helps incorporate life cycle thinking into the packaging decision process,” said Minal Mistry, GreenBlue’s Senior Manager for Sustainable Solutions and the tool’s primary architect.
GreenBlue Advisory Services helps business leaders embrace sustainability by applying a deep understanding of sustainability to each company’s particular needs to develop innovative yet practical sustainability solutions. Launched in 2010, Advisory Services complements GreenBlue’s sector approach to making product’s more sustainable. While that industry approaches allows GreenBlue to drive broad change, its Advisory Services engagements allows the organization to deepen its impact on industry by providing one-on-one sustainability guidance to companies. Under O’Dea’s leadership, Advisory Services clients to date have included major brands like Clorox, Coca-Cola, NASA, Nike, and SC Johnson.
Companies interested in learning more about this new packaging design assessment service should contact O’Dea at katherine.odea@greenblue.org or 434.817.1424 ext. 329. This service will be available starting February 25, 2013.
 

GreenBlue Veteran Joins in New Capacity to Help Lead Organization into Next Phase
CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA, February 13, 2013 – Sustainability nonprofit GreenBlue has announced the appointment of Katherine O’Dea as Senior Director, Advisory Services and Innovation. O’Dea has been an integral part of GreenBlue for the past six years as a Senior Fellow and Director of Advisory Services. While O’Dea will continue to build GreenBlue’s Advisory Services program under this new role, she will also take a lead in mobilizing and coordinating the organization’s innovation efforts.
“I am very pleased to have Katherine in this new leadership role to develop opportunities for GreenBlue to shape the business of sustainability,” said Nina Goodrich, GreenBlue’s Executive Director. “Katherine is the perfect choice to explore new opportunities that will enable the organization to bring strategic sustainability thinking to new industry stakeholders.”
O’Dea brought nearly two decades of experience and leadership in corporate sustainability with her when she joined GreenBlue in 2007 as a Senior Fellow. In that capacity she contributed to various projects for the Sustainable Packaging Coalition, GreenBlue’s flagship project, including the Sustainable Packaging Indicators and Metrics Framework, which later served as the baseline for the Global Protocol for Packaging Sustainability. She also authored practical guidelines for the incorporation of recycled content into both plastic and fiber-based packaging formats.
More recently, O’Dea spearheaded the launch of GreenBlue’s Advisory Services program in 2010, which complements GreenBlue’s industry sector approach but allows it to deepen it’s impact by providing customized sustainability guidance to individual companies. Advisory Services helps business leaders embrace sustainability by applying a deep understanding of sustainability to each company’s particular needs to develop innovative yet practical sustainability solutions. Under O’Dea’s leadership, Advisory Services clients to date have included major brands like Avery Dennison, Coca-Cola, Cadbury, NASA, Nike, and SC Johnson.
In 2013, GreenBlue’s Advisory Services will be rolling out new “off-the-shelf” offerings, including an affordable package design analysis using GreenBlue’s life-cycle based COMPASS® tool. In addition, the program’s material assessment capabilities will be enhanced with the upcoming launch of GreenBlue’s Material IQ™ database, which will help companies better understand the tradeoffs and implications of their material choices.
“I have had the pleasure of working for and with a number of interesting environmental and sustainability organizations in my career, but my work with GreenBlue has been particularly rewarding,” said O’Dea. “It is an organization that is continuously pushing the envelope, and the current leadership team I am joining is highly motivated, energized, and creative. It is also an exciting time for GreenBlue as we are rolling out a new five-year strategy, launching some new tools and resources, and expanding our educational programs internationally.”
About GreenBlue
GreenBlue® is a nonprofit that equips business with the science and resources to make products more sustainable. GreenBlue currently works in three program areas: chemicals, packaging, and forest products, as well as working one-on-one with companies through GreenBlue Advisory Services. The organization’s initiatives include the Sustainable Packaging Coalition®, CleanGredients®, Forest Products Working Group, Environmental Paper Assessment Tool® (EPAT), COMPASS®, and the Paper Life Cycle.
About Katherine O’Dea
Katherine O’Dea joined GreenBlue in July 2007 as a Senior Fellow with over 18 years of experience in sustainability in both the private and nonprofit sectors. Katherine was previously Executive Director of INFORM, Inc., an environmental research and education nonprofit, Chief Operating Officer for the Nantucket Conservation Foundation, Vice President of Business and Environment Programs at Business for Social Responsibility, where she managed BSR’s Apparel Working Group and launched the Clean Cargo Working Group, as well as Founder and Principal Consultant of Ecologistics. Over her career, Katherine has worked on numerous sustainability projects for leading organizations such as The Coca Cola Company, Dell, Dow, DuPont, Ford Motor Company, Johnson & Johnson, McDonald’s, Nike, and SC Johnson, among others. Katherine hold a BA degrees in Philosophy and English from Emmanuel College and has also completed graduate work in Philosophy and Organizational Psychology at Harvard University and earned a certificate from the Prince of Wales’s Business and Sustainability Programme at the University of Cambridge.
Contact
Ashley Holmes
GreenBlue Development and Communications Associate
434.817.1424 ext. 323
ashley.holmes@greenblue.org

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