Wicked problems. A class that I never thought I would get so passionate about. Helping one wicked problem could help affect the solutions to many more. A huge wicked problem that has affected our planet is the pollution from major buildings. This past week I read the NO article “Does the market work better than government at transitioning sustainability”. A section that I found interesting during this reading was the costs and benefits of a green building. A green building is basically a building that is environmentally stable and functional within designing the construction, how it operates and the cost. Many great features to a green building are increased energy efficiency which leads to lower utility bills, and increased air quality which leads to fewer sick days. All around these buildings save companies tons of money and are sustainable to the Earth.

            Social entrepreneurship is an approach where instead of their end goal being for money it is for helping social or economic problems. A company that has always stuck out to me is Lush bath products. I am a person who loves taking baths, so I am overly obsessed with this store and when I learned their values and mission I was even more intrigued. Their values are fresh cosmetics, 100% vegetarian, ethical buying, handmade, naked, and fighting animal testing. They thought that since there are millions of packaging waste going into the planet they came up with a solution to get rid of it all which was to get rid of all packaging. They also work with many charitable partners to help with animal conversation and human rights.  They created a lotion called “Charity Pot” that donates 100% of the profit to environmental and animal rights around the world. Since it was created it has raised 33,000,000 dollars to helping our planet.

            One wicked problem that I would love to get involved in is reusable straws. The amount of plastic waste from straws that goes into the ocean and on land is insane. I have always been really passionate about ocean littering and finding a solution to help it. Finding a solution to plastic waste like straws is a way to start. I would be awesome if on campus I could start a company where you can buy metal straws in return for turning in your textbooks or some idea for kids to get involved.