archiveApril 2023

Sustainability reports convey companies’ commitments but rarely the real, challenging work that goes into meeting these ambitious targets. To give sustainability campaigns substance they should be supported by business drivers, sustainability goals and marketing prowess, Don Hoyt Gorman, content strategist at The Frameworks suggests. Large companies face a profound challenge with their commitments to social and environmental change. We’re all familiar with greenwashing and empty promises: storytelling without substance. But companies that are genuinely doing the work are also struggling: they’ve got the substance but they don’t know how to tell the...

Inadequate data and inconsistent standards are the biggest obstacles to progress in reaching ESG targets, according to a new study. UK executives cite inadequate data as a top barrier holding back ESG progress while under one third of surveyed consumers feel they have enough data to make environmentally sustainable purchasing or employment decisions. A new global IBM Institute for Business Value (IBV) study, “The ESG ultimatum: Profit or perish,” of executives and consumers reveals that while environmental sustainability remains a top priority for consumers and business executives, inadequate data is a...

When asked to think about the topic of e-waste and recycling, our brains are likely to conjure up the image of mountains of surplus food or seas of single-use plastics, probably because this is what is often shouted about the most within the media. But what about other equally important waste streams such as waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE)? Over the last eight years, there have been an estimated 420.3 million metric tons of e-waste produced around the world and this figure is predicted to double by 2050. Given...

A new open-source software application reduces IT carbon footprint by 30 per cent by shutting down unused IT resources. The application, kube-green, was created by Mia-Platform’s senior tech leader Davide Bianchi to limit CO2 emissions for cloud-based applications as well as save costs. On average, kube-green can reduce CO2 emissions from IT infrastructures by 30 per cent. Early adopters are now beginning to report significant savings from using the application.   “We pay a lot of attention to using resources in a sustainable way,” said Lorenzo De Francesco, IT manager at fintech Step4Business. “Through...

Metal packaging should take precedence over plastic as it is easier to recycle and already has a strong recycling infrastructure. That’s the view of Michael Mapes, CEO of Trivium Packaging, who believes metal packaging can go a long way to reducing carbon emissions and plastic waste pollution. “As a material, metal can be recycled endlessly and processes have already been innovated to reduce the industry’s environmental impact,” Mapes said. “In the last 30 years the quantity of metal in a typical can have been reduced by 46 per cent while continuing...

The fashion industry produces double the amount of clothing that it did 20 years ago and has seen a comparable increase in plastic waste. Is the fashion industry making inroads necessary to cut its use of plastic and ultimately limit its impact on the environment? A report by WIRED earlier this year highlighted the fact that, annually, ‘the fashion industry uses 342 million barrels of petroleum to produce plastic-based fibres such as polyester, nylon or acrylic…equating to 1.35 per cent of global oil consumption.’ While major steps have been, and...

The circular economy of plastic packaging is a vital tool for combating climate change in supply chains and can save money. The EU wants 55 per cent of plastic packaging waste to be recycled by 2030, a big target for which companies involved in making and handling plastics have to follow from design to production and end-of-life. To meet the new targets economic growth and demand for raw materials must be decoupled from each other. To play a role in a circular economy plastic waste would have to be versatile...

A range of low carbon concrete options can be successfully deployed on projects as a like-for-like substitute for traditional concrete. That’s the result of a long-term research programme co-funded by Laing O’Rourke and Innovate UK and in collaboration with the University of Cambridge and Sheffield University’s Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC). Construction company Laing O’Rourke is now switching to low carbon concrete on all of its new UK projects. The exclusive use of low carbon concrete from 1 April this year will accelerate the company’s progress towards its net zero...

Australia must act now to mitigate rising land, sea and air temperatures and avoid more extreme weather events in coming decades. That’s according to the latest State of the Climate report by Australia’s National Science Agency (CSIRO) that found Australia’s climate has warmed by an average of 1.47 ± 0.24 °C since national records began in 1910. Sea surface temperatures have increased by an average of 1.05 °C since 1900. This has led to an increase in the frequency of extreme heat events over land and sea. The seventh biennial...

How does a $94 billion-a-year food company meet climate targets and comply with ever-stricter ESG regulations?  Dr Emma Keller, head of sustainability at Nestlé UK & Ireland, details the challenges and successes involved in a net zero journey that spans the globe. Nestlé is the world’s largest publicly held food company and markets 2,000 retail brands including coffee, confectionary, cereals, baby food, ice cream and pet foods. Two years ago the Swiss-based corporation announced an ambitious net zero climate roadmap and has been making significant progress on meeting its sustainability...