Energy and natural resources sector

As interest in clean energy surges, used solar panels are going straight into landfill.

Identify, quantify, and manage the risks to your company’s reputation long before a problem or crisis strikes.

In many companies, sales forces and marketers feud like Capulets and Montagues—with disastrous results. Here’s how to get them to lay down their swords.

We’re confusing output with impact.

When a crisis forces outside directors to navigate major changes, investors and directors must adopt new roles. The largest such case to date provides some useful lessons. The Royal Dutch/Shell Group was a 60/40 joint venture between Royal Dutch Petroleum and Shell Transport and Trading. It was run by a five-person committee of managing directors […]

If so, it could embolden a new generation of activist investors.

An interview with Ian Bremmer.

The last official report on the April 2010 explosion at the Deepwater Horizon rig was issued on September 16th. And yet the ultimate question remains: what responsibility did boards of directors and senior business leaders have for the catastrophe in the Gulf? We may never know. The report fails to address this fundamental question, just […]

Firms need to understand the people and places they affect.

Trying to keep up with the world's insatiable appetite for energy, scientists and entrepreneurs are exploring six innovative concepts: high-altitude wind...

Thanks to the development of the Kyoto Protocol--an international plan to limit carbon dioxide and other so-called greenhouse gases in the atmosphere--global...

Like many manufacturers, DuPont traditionally has grown by making more and more "stuff." And its business growth has been proportional to the amount of...

New research suggests that Chinese companies' price advantage comes not from low-cost labor but from massive government subsidies. That finding has major...

OPEC’s oil supply now conforms to ‘producer logic,’ and the consuming nations must take positive steps to adjust to the situation

No one would run a business without accounting for its capital outlays. Yet in 1999, when this article was originally published, most companies overlooked...

There must have been an enormous sigh of relief among BP employees — from the front line to the boardroom — on Tuesday, when their CEO Tony Hayward’s finally resigned. However he was perceived — as villain, incompetent or, scapegoat — what’s clear is that Hayward was failing spectacularly as their leader almost from the […]

Climate change is a pressing concern for Bill Gates, who has just published a new book on the subject. He spoke with HBR's editor-in-chief about the need...

When we hear the words “Fukushima disaster,” most of us think of Fukushima Daiichi, the nuclear power plant wracked by three core meltdowns and three reactor building explosions following the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Without electricity to run the plant’s cooling systems, managers and workers couldn’t avert catastrophe: People around the world […]

The future looks bright, but not necessarily for utilities.

If you’re not careful, the dream of information integration can turn into a nightmare.