It seems everyone’s talking the green talk these days, but not everyone’s actually walking the walk.  EcoZone, an environmental media company in Miami and LA is putting its words into action. The innovative business just received the United States Conference of Mayors Excellence in Public/Private Partnerships Award.

Founded in 2002, EcoZone is unique in that it markets and promotes brands in ways that actually make a difference to the environment – it contributes up to 50 percent of each sponsor’s media spend toward funding environmental efforts. This gives clients content and advertising space on TV, new media, radio, print and billboards, but it also partners with city, county and state governments to sponsor projects that improve local communities and quality of life.

Some of its projects include greening the Long Beach Airport with solar panels and planting 1,000 trees at Miami’s Virginia Key Beach Park. In April of 2008 Miami’s City Hall became the first in a major city to be powered in part by solar energy through an energy efficiency and conservation makeover, which could reduce power consumption by 60 percent and carbon emissions by a half-million pounds over the life of the system. The EcoZone Advisor Board approves all projects, and is made up of leaders from EPA’s Energy Star program, the U.S. Green Building Council, mayors and other local officials.

Additionally, EcoZone has star power – former MTV VJ and model Daisy Fuentes hosts “The EcoZone Project,” a television series in which celebrities open their homes to the EcoZone’s team of green experts to give the celebrities’ homes green makeovers. If nothing else, history has shown that nothing sells more than sex appeal.

This is exactly the type of media marketing that can make money and a difference simultaneously. By partnering with public environmental projects, EcoZone provides much-needed funding to the public sector, which often doesn’t have the coffers to sponsor such initiatives. And it makes green cool and sexy in the process.