A High Chess IQ? Implementing Biofuel and Biodiesel Sustainably

Problem solving includes looking forward, employing what we at GRIPS call “Chess IQ.” Chess IQ is a person’s ability to think ahead. A person who acts by thinking only one step ahead has a low chess IQ. A person who acts, thinking of possible outcomes and consequences three steps ahead has a relatively higher Chess IQ.


Building a business is challenging but building a sustainable business with consideration of your business impact on the environment, social strata, and longevity requires a significant investment in commitment, thinking, research, planning, and metrics. A sustainable business plan is not written and placed in an investor binder, never to be consulted again. Instead, it must be referred to continuously as the benchmark for all business decisions. Thus, the commitment, thinking, research, planning, and metrics chain is a constant loop serving as a guide for daily business operations and strategy.

The Corn-Soy biofuel experiment is a recent example of a strategy that gained significant investment, commitment, and publicity but the overall plan demonstrated a low Chess IQ. In retrospect, we see that stop-gaps were not put into place and little consideration seemed to be given to basic economic principles such as supply and demand in the food-fuel cycle, and land use displacement, or what the International Union of Conservation of Nature (IUCN) refers to as Indirect Land Use Change – (ILUC).

IUCN’s well produced, animated video leads the viewer along a high Chess IQ path, using the bio food-fuel model as a demonstration. The video takes into consideration efficiency, land use displacement, and distribution – all three considerations are normal business supply-chain considerations. This video is an excellent teaching tool to help people begin to think about development a sustainable approach to biofuel energy solutions.

Allison Frederick is an Intellectual Property Educator and Innovation Marketing Consultant for GRIPS - GReen Idea Protection and Sales. She offers risk management assessments for renewable energy and green energy technology companies and her company also provides technology companies effective, affordable marketing strategies to produce attractive requests for proposals, investor materials, product manuals, and product promotion materials.

Mona's Restaurant Denver: Review

If you are a regular shopper of a natural grocery and if you've cut out trans fats and other preservatives out of your pantries at home then you may find that going out to eat often makes your stomach churn and leave you feeling sluggish. Even though I love going out to eat I've noticed that I have to be even more careful of the choices I make or else I will feel awful afterward, even if the food is delicious. Breakfasts are an even greater challenge as the oils restaurants use to make eggs are often incredibly greasy and rancid.

I am pleased to say that Mona's Restaurant in Denver offers a great, healthy, simple gourmet menu. I went to the new location on South Broadway a few Sundays ago. A friend of mine suggested the place. I took a look at their menu online but didn't find it too exciting at first glance. They have a seemingly basic menu and I braced my gut for the usual dinner fare.

I was in for a nice surprise. We didn't have to wait for a table at 11:30 on a Sunday morning.
I chose the Davinci's Crab Cake Florentine and was pleased that the muffin was replaced with a bed of steamed spinach. My breakfast was delicious. They also support local ranches by offering free range chicken, and meat without antibiotics and added hormones. It isn't easy to find restaurants that are making that commitment here in Denver. Their eggs are also free-range, antibiotic free. Even though I eat organic, grass fed meats at home, I've become vegetarian when I go out so that I can avoid corporate farmed meats so it was a refreshing change to be able to choose for any of the meat items on the menu.

Colorado Green Living - Green living for your health not just for our beautiful Colorado environment.

Shades of "Green"- Deciding Who is Eco-Friendly

Today I read a newspaper article criticizing Whole Foods shopping market. One criticism is that they shouldn't sell produce from other countries, presumably because of the fuel it takes to bring such a shipment to the United States and then distribute it to other stores. While this is a sound argument, it makes me think that we should keep in mind that going green is subject to interpretation. Each person and company decides to what degree they want to help save the environment.

Some people make seemingly drastic choices like giving up their automobile. We may think they are noble because of their choice (or crazy). They offset their carbon footprint but then someone else that is even more devoted to environmental responsibility will argue, "Yes, you gave up driving but you still use fossil fuels when you take the smog producing buses and trains. You should give that up entirely and ride a bicycle, like me." This more eco-friendly person smugly commends himself for how earth-sensitive he is.

Then, his woman friend decides he is too proud of himself and she condemns his choices because his bicycle is made by adorable, poverty stricken children in factories insensitive to fair-trade agreements. And what is worse; consider the amount of fuel it took to ship his bicycle to him. What a waste of natural resources. "What you should do is walk everywhere, like I do," she loftily proclaims. I can see the reasonableness of her argument too but what about the shoes she uses to walk around in? Where did they come from? How many parts and from which places did the materials come from? What environmental impact did the dye residues have that were used to make her trendy "earth-friendly" turquoise shoes?

There is an ideal, eco-friendly society, and then there is where we truly are. Our societies are so far removed from native earth living, that it is honestly unrealistic to expect that everyone must completely revert back to that lifestyle. If someone would like to join an earth commune then that is great but to judge others and dismiss their own efforts at environmentally sensitive living or criticize companies that are bringing organic foods to the masses is juvenile and egotistic.


We wrap up our criticism in a stifling environmental blanket that thinly disguises the American love-hate relationship with success. Most all of us want to be successful and often that success is measured in freedom and some degree of wealth and fame. But when someone becomes too successful, we act like a blood thirsty crowd in old black and white films, yelling and swing pitchforks and torches, claiming "Kill that profiting (successful) beast!"

I believe in living in harmony not only with the earth, but with each other and with our selves. If you personally believe it is wrong to eat produce from other countries because of the fossil fuel costs, then you can chose to only buy local foods rather than criticize the companies that provide both options. The beautiful thing about America is that the choice is entirely up to you. I hope we will always have that choice.

Safe Green Living, Examining the controversies and misleading information about going green and earth-friendly living.