In some of the best stories, a supposed villain turns out to be a hero. Environmental campaigners are recovering from just such a surprise after hearing the Virgin boss Sir Richard Branson promise to commit all the profits from his transport companies over the next 10 years – a projected $3 billion (£1.6 billion) – to develop renewable forms of energy.

This giddy feeling is becoming more frequent. Not only has a former US vice president released a documentary on global warming, An Inconvenient Truth, but the current President, himself a former oil magnate, recently challenged his country’s ‘addiction to oil’ and pledged massive financial support for research into cleaner fuels. Meanwhile, a consortium of British big-business leaders has sent an open letter to the Prime Minister urging tougher regulation of carbon emissions.

People who understand big business are not so disorientated, however. Many of its representatives have been saying for some time that greater curbs on CO2 emissions would encourage innovation and increase their companies’ competitiveness in the global marketplace.

There is a secret here that those who align themselves uncritically with the green movement often fail to grasp: big business is generally only too willing to change the way it operates in accordance with the social and environmental concerns of consumers, because doing so increases its market opportunities. That is, after all, how big business stays big.

It’s also the reason why oil companies are no longer interested only in oil. Hydrogen energy is a major concern for Shell, and BP now stands for ‘beyond petroleum’. Car companies, similarly, are engaged in a frenetic race to develop cheap and reliable clean-fuel vehicles.

It’s not merely the depletion of oil reserves that motivates such companies. They want to get ahead of demand so they can capture new markets. They therefore regard regulation as a guarantee that, in the long run, their investment in green technologies will pay off.

Branson’s putative $3 billion is not a donation. It’s an investment in his renewable-energy business, Virgin Fuel. That’s why his announcement is good PR, even though it can’t be dismissed as merely PR.

Poachers are turning game-keepers as they discover the vision and commitment to convert an inconvenient truth into a convenient one. At the deepest level - as Christians understand - what is good also turns out to be what is good for us. In this sense, there is a transformative power in enlightened self-interest. And it is this that will save our planet.

Peter Heslam

Peter Heslam is associate faculty at LICC and director of Transforming Business at Cambridge University.

additional resources

Read the author’s ‘Towards a Sustainable Future’ in Globalization and the Good, edited by Peter Heslam (SPCK/Eerdmans), available from the LICC bookshop. Also, his ‘Enterprise Solutions to Climate Change’ in Spirit in Work, issue 7 (July 2006). Have a look, too, at Dr Heslam's website transformingbusiness.net.

The website of An Inconvenient Truth, climatecrisis.net, conveys Al Gore’s passionate desire to help to end global warming, which he believes is no longer a political issue but the greatest moral challenge facing our civilisation. His book of the same title is available at amazon.co.uk.

Both Gore’s film and his book are getting an enthusiastic reception from scientists, business leaders, journalists and politicians (on both left and right). For the response of Professor Eric Steig, an eminent earth scientist, see nationalgeographic.com.

For the story of how Sir Richard Branson was ‘converted’ over breakfast with Al Gore, go to abcnews.go.com. For Virgin’s announcement of what else he is doing to cut CO2 emissions, see virgin.com.

George W Bush made the comments referred to in his 2006 State of the Union address. The full text is posted at whitehouse.gov.

The Climate Change Technology Programme (CCTP), which is supported by the Bush administration, has just published its Strategic Plan - see climatetechnology.gov.

The Shell group’s company Shell Hydrogen, based in The Netherlands, can be found online at shell.com. Target Neutral is a scheme sponsored by BP which enables you to become a ‘CO2-neutral’ driver. Go to targetneutral.com.

The World Business Council for Sustainable Development is a group of 180 international companies with a commitment to sustainable development as well as to economic growth. For a recent speech by WBCSD’s president, Björn Stigson, at the Carbon Trust in London, visit wbcsd.org.

The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies is a centre for advanced research into energy issues - see oxfordenergy.org.

The Acton Institute has put together an impressive list of US-based Jewish and Christian environmental organisations, at acton.org. Christian Ecology Link has done the same for Christian environmental organisations in Britain - see christian-ecology.org.uk.

Leading British environmental scientists who are Christians include Professors Sir John Houghton and Sir Brian Heap, both of whom are international authorities, prolific authors and key opinion-formers.

That ought to keep you busy for a while.