Opportunity Green Conference 2009 Speakers

Marc Alt

President
Marc Alt + Partners
Marc Alt is president of Marc Alt + Partners, a design, research and brand strategy agency dedicated to sustainable innovation. Current clients include MINI USA, Bloomberg LP, The Green Electronics Council, The Consumer Electronics Association, and Lippincott Mercer. As an advocate of business transformation, Marc develops conferences that attract the leading minds in the fields of sustainable development, corporate social responsibility and social innovation.
Fridolin Beisert

Associate Professor
Art Center College of Design
Fridolin Beisert is a practicing design professional who also conducts workshops and lectures for global corporations and executive education institutions. He received his Master’s of Science in Industrial Design on the topic of “Creative Strategies”, which consists of a set of learning techniques that stimulate and liberate the creative potential of individuals to help them apply new conceptual thinking into their work. Currently, Fridolin is an associate professor at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena with a focus on teaching creative problem solving, design thinking methodologies, cross-disciplinary team projects and sustainable design strategies. Prior to this role he worked in Tokyo developing futuristic game titles for Sony, formed an international concept design consultancy, played as an underground DJ in clubs on 3 continents, wrote a book on learning design using 3D software and also studied traditional papermaking from a Japanese national living treasure.
Peter Diamandis

Founder
X Prize Foundation
Peter Diamandis is the founder of the X Prize Foundation, a nonprofit whose mission is simply "to bring about radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity." By offering a big cash prize for a specific accomplishment, the X Prize stimulates competition and excitement around some of the planet's most important goals. Diamandas' background is in space exploration -- before the X Prize, he ran a company that studied low-cost launching technologies and another company that took civilians on rides into the upper atmosphere. But though the X Prize's first $10 million went to a space-themed challenge, Diamandas' goal now is to extend the prize into health care, social policy, education and many other fields that could use a dose of competitive innovation.
Julie Gilhart

SVP, Fashion Director
Barneys
As fashion director of the most forward-thinking big store in the city, Julie Gilhart is responsible for feeding customers a constant diet of the new and lust-worthy. She does this by trekking to designers' studios and then championing those she thinks have the proper balance of real design skill and luxury. She's promoted Alber Elbaz (now a star at Lanvin after a rocky few years), Proenza Schouler, Olivier Theyskens, Goyard, and Project Alabama, to name a few. And with Barneys expanding across the country, Gilhart's effect is going national.
Chris Hacker

Chief Design Officer
Johnson and Johnson
Chris Hacker leads all creative processes for brand identity, packaging design and brand imagery at J&J Consumer. Hacker’s passion is bringing awareness to designers of their power in the business world to make sustainable design a key paradigm of design process.
Trudy Hardy

Manager of Marketing Communications
Mini Cooper
Trudy Hardy was named Manager of Marketing Communications for the MINI brand within BMW of North America, LLC, effective May 1, 2005. She is responsible for brand positioning, research and strategy for all consumer marketing communications in the United States. She has been with the MINI brand since 2001 when she was recruited as Brand Communications Manager of the MINI division. In that position she was tasked with launching the marketing communications for the MINI brand in the United States. Ms. Hardy earned her bachelor’s degree in marketing from Ramapo College of New Jersey. She is also an active member of the alumni advisory board for the Anisfield School of Business.
Chris Jordan

Photographic Artist, chrisjordan.com
ChrisJordan
Chris Jordan is an internationally acclaimed artist and cultural activist whose work explores the frightening waste of our mass culture. His compelling, intricately detailed photographs reveal the staggering weight of statistics, inviting the viewer to see every detail as a metaphor for the role of the individual in our hypermodern society. Jordan’s work is exhibited widely in the US and Europe, and has been featured in print, online, and in film and television all over the globe. He has exhibited and spoken about his work to more than fifty audiences in North and South America, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.
Joe Laur

Vice President of Content
Greenopolis
Joe Laur is Vice President of Content for Greenopolis, a web based social network, media and educational center, marketplace and playground fostering learning and collaborative action on green issues. Joe was a founding partner of SEED Systems, a consultancy dedicated to learning and action for sustainable enterprise, applying systems thinking, scientific frameworks and organizational learning to foster innovation in companies engaging with environmental and social issues.
Annie Leonard

Producer, Writer, Founder
The Story of Stuff
Annie Leonard is an expert in international sustainability and environmental health issues, with more than 20 years of experience investigating factories and dumps around the world. Coordinator of the Funders Workgroup for Sustainable Production and Consumption, a funder collaborative working for a sustainable and just world, Annie communicates worldwide about the impact of consumerism and materialism on global economies and international health.

Alexis Madrigal

Clean Technology Writer
Wired.com
Alexis Madrigal is a newsman following energy and science at Wired.com. His work also appears in Dwell, Earth2Tech, and Arcade. He's interested in defining how technology is changing human beings' brains, consumption patterns, and environments. His mom is still happy that Madrigal graduated from Harvard.
Heidrun Mumper-Drumm

Director of Sustainability Initiatives
Art Center College of Design
A graphic designer and letterpress printer, Heidrun Mumper-Drumm is an associate professor and the Director of Sustainability Initiatives at Art Center College of Design. Since 2003, her focus has been on the incorporation of sustainability principles into design education and the design process. As a former environmental engineer for Bechtel and Parsons Engineering, her background includes nuclear, geothermal, solar and wind energy projects, as well as environmental management for NASA and the US Air Force. She has been applying this experience, as well as current thinking about sustainability, to reframing the design process to enable designers to create more sustainable products and services. This 'lifecycle design' approach expands the definition of design beyond form and function, to the goal of form, function and sustainability.
Leilani Munter

Race Car Driver & Environmentalist
Carbonfreegirl.com
Leilani holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Biology specializing in Ecology, Behavior and Evolution from the University of California San Diego. While attending college she worked as a volunteer at a wildlife rescue and rehabilitation center. She started racing cars in 2001 and quickly began making a name for herself in the racing world. In 2006 she set the record for the highest finish for a female driver in the history of Texas Motor Speedway when she finished fourth. In 2007 Leilani became the fourth woman in history to race in the Indy Pro Series, the developmental league of IndyCar. She qualified 5th for her open wheel debut in August 2007 and earned praise from many in the IndyCar community including four time Indy 500 Champion Rick Mears.
Jonah Sachs

CO-Founder/Creative Director
Free Range Studios
Jonah's pioneering communications work has helped hundreds of progressive organizations break through the media din with strategic, inspiring messages. He is widely considered a leader in the powerful movement to spread progressive political and social messages through use of the Web. Jonah's visionary use of viral marketing has been featured in dozens of top TV networks (CNN, Fox News, MSNBC) radio outlets (NPR, CBC) and newspapers (e.g. The New York Times, Washington Post, LA Times). In 2001, Jonah was named one of "The Thirty People Cleaning up the Earth" by Shift magazine.
Len Sauers

VP, Global Sustainability
Proctor & Gamble
Len is Vice President for Global Sustainability at P&G. Based in Cincinnati, Ohio, he leads the company’s overall sustainability efforts. Len is a 23-year veteran of P&G with broad-reaching experience in human safety, regulatory affairs, and environmental science. In addition to his Global Sustainability leadership role, Len also leads the Human and Environmental Safety, Regulatory Affairs, and Corporate Biotechnology organizations worldwide. These groups are responsible for conducting human and environmental risk assessments for new products and ingredients, ensuring regulatory compliance, and conducting upstream basic research. Prior to joining P&G, Len served in the US Army as part of the Medical Research and Development Command. He was stationed at the Letterman Army Institute of Research in San Francisco.
Auden Schendler

Executive Director, Sustainability
Aspen Skiing Company
Auden Schendler is Executive Director of Sustainability at Aspen Skiing Company. He worked previously in corporate sustainability at Rocky Mountain Institute. Auden has been a trailer insulator, burger flipper, ambulance medic, Outward Bound instructor, high school math and English teacher, freelance writer, and Forest Service goose nest island builder. An avid outdoorsman, Auden has climbed Denali, North America’s highest peak, and kayaked the Grand Canyon in winter. His writing has been published in Harvard Business Review, the L.A. Times, Rock and Ice, and Salon.com, among other places, and his work has been covered in Outside, Fast Company, Travel and Leisure and Businessweek.. In 2006, Auden was named a global warming innovator by Time magazine. His new book Getting Green Done: Hard from the Front Lines of the Sustainability Revolution came out in March, 2009. He lives in Basalt, Colorado with his wife Ellen and their children Willa and Elias.
+Host

Boise Thomas

Alter Eco/Planet Green/Discovery Channel
Boise Thomas is the fresh face of Adrian Grenier's Alter Eco, an environmentally-focused lifestyle show on Discovery Communications' new eco-focused channel Planet Green.
Helen Walters

Editor, Innovation and Design Channel
BusinessWeek.com
Helen Walters is the editor for BusinessWeek.com's Innovation and Design Channel. She is also a contributing editor to design magazine Creative Review. Walters is the author of several books, including a survey of experimental animation, a monograph of a Brooklyn design agency, and a series of titles featuring contemporary T-shirt graphics.