Sustainability : Featured Stories

What's the purpose of meetings, meetups, networking? New ideas, new opportunities, certainly. But for Craig and Patricia Neal, face-to-face gatherings can have a deeper purpose: the transformation of consciousness and, ultimately, of the way we live and do business. Their Heartland company was founded to prove the point.

Most of us in the Twin Cities are aware that we've become a great town for bicycling in recent years, but urbanist and author Jay Walljasper--an avid biker for decades--has been digging into the trend to find out the what and the why behind it. In this adaptation of an article he wrote for Bikes Belong, he fills in the story and gives us some impressive facts about the sheer scale and promise of our new two-wheel era.

The Twin Cities-based importer of hard-to-find European chocolate sees it as much, much more than a  confection. For her, the finest chocolate, like the best wine, has the power to change our lives for the better. That's why she's passionate about issues like cacao percentages, and why she pairs yoga and tai chi classes with chocolate tastings.

Inspired by his kids' toy building set, he designed a colorful modular carport that incorporates solar panels--and may soon become nothing but solar panels. Is this how we'll recharge the electric vehicles of the future?