Today’s Solutions: December 18, 2025

Business

Looking for positive and inspiring business stories? From green operations to employee rights, from innovative corporate structures to diversity and inclusion, the Business section at The Optimist Daily has got the latest innovative solutions from the corporate sector.

Amazon rainforest from above

Can NFTs help save the Amazon?

Non-Fungible Tokens, commonly known as NFTs, are crypto-acquired assets in the form of digital art. These “one-of-a-kind” digital pieces rose in popularity last year, with plenty of influential personalities and celebrities purchasing them, often at exorbitant prices. Well, whether you’re Read More...

honeycomb solar panel

Ultrathin "honeycomb" solar panels achieve record efficiency

One day, cities and hopefully everything else will be powered by renewable resources like wind and solar. To do that, though, we will need to continue to improve on our renewable tech, like creating solar panels that can absorb solar energy in many different levels of sunlight. A new development Read More...

Sponge City

Sponge Cities: the future of flood resilience

The world’s cities and population centers are overwhelmingly located near water. This makes good sense since water is essential for living, and throughout history, people have built their settlements where water is accessible and in abundant supply. However, in recent decades the vital good that Read More...

The Human library

The Human Library: reading people instead of books

Have you ever heard about someone living with a condition and wished you knew more? Maybe you were streaming a drama about someone living with a rare disease, or you read a piece that mentioned a particular trauma. Your human empathy kicked in and you wanted to know what it was like living as the Read More...

Used electric car

Buying a used EV? Not a bad idea

Recently, The Optimist Daily published a story about a few things to keep in mind when buying an electric vehicle. Along with gas prices, the popularity of electric cars is rising, but EVs have been on the rise since before the crisis. Now, thanks to that demand, if you’re in the market for a new Read More...

Troy Kotsur poses for photo

Troy Kotsur becomes first deaf man to win an acting Oscar

Though Hollywood’s Academy Awards, also known as the Oscars, are often critiqued for their lack of representation, there has been progress in the most recent edition. This past weekend, we saw a beautiful example of inclusion during the 94th Academy Awards, as Troy Kotsur became the first deaf Read More...

Whales Iceland

As Iceland’s whaling industry decreases, its whale-watching increases

It’s nice when the economically responsible thing to do is also the right thing to do. Iceland announced in February its intentions to end whaling by 2024 because demand for whale meat has decreased significantly.  “There is little proof that there is any economic advantage to this Read More...

Broken solar panel

How do solar panels break? And how do we fix them?

At the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, Colorado, teams of scientists and researchers spend large parts of their day jumping on, twisting, smashing, and generally coming up with various ways of breaking solar panels.  It’s not malice, it’s not incompetence. It's not Read More...

People waiting for job interview

Fix these common mistakes to take your interview from good to great

Just like running, playing an instrument, or doing the math, if you haven’t had a job interview in a while, you may find you have fallen out of practice. Whether you’re a recent grad or an experienced professional, the key to a good interview is practice. This can help you gather your thoughts, Read More...

Carbon Crusher vehicle that crushes old roads for recycling

This startup uses a plant-derived material to make roads carbon negative

Similar to building new roads, repairing existing ones is not an environmentally friendly endeavor. One of the main problems is bitumen, a fossil fuel-derived binder that holds asphalt together. A startup in Norway is recycling old roads using a plant-based binder instead, a process that could Read More...