I’m heading home from an eight-day, action-packed vacation in Alaska. Hiking, biking and sea-kayaking, I saw snow-capped mountains, the largest ice field in North America, a couple of glaciers, countless bays and rivers, abundant and beautiful wildflowers, salmon swimming upstream, bald eagles, seals, a sea otter, marmots, a porcupine and bears (three!) – all in one corner of the state, the Kenai Peninsula. But what really impressed me was the women. There are surely more women who call themselves feminists on New York’s Upper West Side than there are in, say, Anchorage. But women in Alaska — at least the ones that we met – are plenty strong and self-reliant. Of the 199 runners who completed the grueling Crow Pass marathon this past Saturday, twenty-eight were women. I

The plastics industry is dealing with a nightmare these days when it comes to potentially toxic chemicals. Because so many people no longer trust big business or federal regulators to protect them and their health—perhaps with reason, perhaps not—companies are vulnerable to campaigns by activist groups, politicians and trial lawyers who want to get alleged dangerous toxics off the market. The latest example: Bisphenol-A, the chemical used in polycarbonate bottles, including baby bottles, and in the linings of aluminum cans and in many, many other products.I’ve spent a fair amount of time—more than I’d intended to—looking into the controversy around BPA. The result is a column that was posted today on fortune.com and cnnmoney.com. The FORTUNE websites is also running a video

There’s no doubt that buying and eating local food is a hot trend. But is it good for the environment? Recently, I got a press release from Wal-Mart saying that Partnerships with local farmers have grown by 50 percent over the past two years—one example of the company’s efforts to support local economies, cut shipping costs and provide fresh food offerings. For the 4th of July, a Wal-Mart Supercenter in DeKalb County, Ga., featured Georgia-grown Vidalia onions for burgers, Georgia cantaloupes and watermelons for fruit salad and Georgia peaches for cobbler, the company said. Meanwhile, Chipotle Mexican Grill reports that it has stepped up its efforts to buy local produce. The fast food chain says it is the first and only national restaurant company committed to buying local

CEO Neville Isdell is an environmentalist, but making The Coca-Cola Co. sustainable is harder than it looks.