How "green" is the Evergreen State? We asked companies, nonprofits and other organizations in the state to tell us about their best practices for environmental sustainability. We then assembled a panel of distinguished members of the environmental community to judge the entries for our first Green Washington Awards.

 We were overwhelmed, happily so, with the response ? close to 140 submissions ?and we were impressed by the depth and breadth of best practices among those entries.

From Paradisos del Sol, a small winery in Zillah whose farm vehicle is a mountain bike and company transport is a Geo Metro (50 mpg), to mammoth Puget Sound Energy, with a host of commendable energy--saving and sustainable practices, corporate executives, small business owners and government leaders are recognizing that sustainability efforts will be rewarded with improved consumer and employee loyalty.

Far more important is the growing understanding that unless we heed the warnings of leading scientists and researchers, life on this increasingly crowded planet will be dramatically different for future generations ? our children, grandchildren and those who come after them.

 While pundits, cable channel screamers and advocates on the left and right slog in divisiveness and polarization, our Green Washington entrants demonstrated that they have accepted the inevitability of climate change and the understanding that world population growth and competition for scarce resources are issues that must be dealt with, collectively and individually, worldwide and nationally, in the state, community and neighborhood.

It's good business. It's good sense. It's the right thing to do.

In his highly solution--oriented book, Common Wealth, Jeffrey Sachs, director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University, reinforces what many others have said: The world's current ecological, demographic and economic trajectory is unsustainable. Sachs cites four reasons:

·         "Human pressures on the Earth's ecosystems and climate, unless mitigated substantially, will cause dangerous climate change, massive species extinctions, and the destruction of vital life--support functions." In effect, he's talking about our ability to meet the demands for food, fiber, fuel and other natural resources.

·         "The world's population continues to rise at a dangerously rapid pace, especially in regions least able to absorb a rising population." Population growth is exponential. The earth had 230 million people as of AD 1 and reached the 1 billion level in 1830. By 2005, 175 years later, it had grown to 6.5 billion.

·         "One sixth of the world remains trapped in extreme poverty unrelieved by global economic growth, and the poverty trap poses tragic hardships for the poor themselves and great risks for the rest of the world." The ratio of world population to each food--producing acre is rapidly declining.

·         "We are paralyzed in the very process of global problem solving, weighed down by cynicism, defeatism and outdated institutions." Sachs suggests a new approach to solving global challenges that includes" the dynamism and creativity of the nongovernmental sector." That includes rallying the forces of business and the free market.

 While Sachs' global rationale extends far beyond the scope of Washington CEO Magazine's examination of sustainability, it's clear from the caliber of entries that there is understanding of the inter-related, global nature of the challenge, a passion to reach solutions and a growing impatience with those who drag their feet.

Businesses across Washington can contribute to global sustainability. Each has its own set of core values, employee skills, technological capabilities and brain power. Customers, suppliers, competitors and employees will all embrace the effort.

All realize that the sustainability issue extends far deeper than mere branding. Its definition has ecological and social components that extend to the core of our economic system: Wealth creation, employment, support for government and education, quality of life.