Brisbane Airport lands clean energy deal on path to 100% renewables –

Brisbane Airport lands clean energy deal on path to 100% renewables –

ByThe Circular Economy Team

Brisbane Airport Corporation (BAC) has signed a power purchase agreement (PPA) with Queensland government-owned energy generator Stanwell which will supply up to 185 GWh of renewable energy a year to help power the airport’s operations.  The renewable energy will be contracted from the 200 MW Blue Grass Solar Farm being developed near Chinchilla in Queensland’s Western Downs region by Spanish renewables company X-Elio.  Stanwell will also source renewable energy from the 800 MW Clarke Creek wind project being built by Windlab northwest of Rockhampton in central Queensland. The project is part of a larger 1.2 GW project which will also comprise 400 MW of solar power and battery energy storage.

FreeGarden™ RAIN | :: Welcome to Enviro World ::

FreeGarden™ RAIN | :: Welcome to Enviro World ::

ByThe Circular Economy Team

A rain barrel is a system used by a homeowner to collect and store rainwater from the roof of a home. The water harvested is soft, fresh water that can be used for a variety of purposes, including lawn and garden watering, topping off pools, and washing cars. Water from home faucets is treated to a level allowing it to be safe to drink, while natural rain water has the pH level ideal for water and plant growth. Rain water harvesting helps to divert rain from storm drains, decrease the impact of runoff to streams, and minimize sewer overflows during heavy rainfalls.  Rain barrels allow homeowners to collect and store rainwater to be used at a later time. In doing so, homeowners use less water from the faucet, conserving both water and energy in the home as well as the energy needed for water facilities to treat the water that would have been consumed. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, lawn and garden watering make up nearly 40% of domestic water usage during peak summer months. Rain barrels save most homeowners about 1,300 gallons of water each summer, reducing the demand for clean water. Rainwater harvesting helps homeowners to reduce their water bills while conserving water and protecting the environment.

PSC

PSC

ByThe Circular Economy Team

Meet FBAUP Design Inc., a students association at FBAUP, the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto, and responsbile for PSC16’s image.  This year, we had to pleasure to work closely with Bruna Martins and Tiago Andrade, talented designers at FBAUP Design Inc., and they were available to answer a few questions about their work for PSC.

New technology creates carbon neutral chemicals out of thin air

New technology creates carbon neutral chemicals out of thin air

ByThe Circular Economy Team

The technology could allow scientists to both capture CO2 and transform it into useful chemicals such as carbon monoxide and synthetic natural gas in one circular process.  Dr Melis Duyar, Senior Lecturer of Chemical Engineering at the University of Surrey commented: “Capturing CO2 from the surrounding air and directly converting it into useful products is exactly what we need to approach carbon neutrality in the chemicals sector. This could very well be a milestone in the steps needed for the UK to reach its 2050 net-zero goals.  “We need to get away from our current thinking on how we produce chemicals, as current practices rely on fossil fuels which are not sustainable. With this technology we can supply chemicals with a much lower carbon footprint and look at replacing fossil fuels with carbon dioxide and renewable hydrogen as the building blocks of other important chemicals.”

Gartner Survey Finds 87% of Business Leaders Expect to Increase Sustainability Investment Over the Next Two Years

Gartner Survey Finds 87% of Business Leaders Expect to Increase Sustainability Investment Over the Next Two Years

ByThe Circular Economy Team

A new Gartner, Inc. survey revealed that 87% of business leaders expect to increase their organisation’s investment in sustainability over the next two years. Customers are the primary stakeholder group creating pressure for organisations to invest or act on sustainability issues, selected by 80% of executives, followed by investors (60%) and regulators (55%).  “Sustainability enables businesses to cope with disruption,” said Kristin Moyer, Distinguished VP Analyst, Gartner. “Economic uncertainty, geopolitical conflict and escalating materials and energy costs are forcing businesses to reexamine all forms of expenditure. This focus on essentialism, in combination with increasing stakeholder desire to see progress on environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals, creates new opportunities for enterprises to grow while mitigating cost and risk.”  The survey was conducted in June and July 2022 among 221 respondents in North America, Europe and Asia/Pacific. Respondents were executives in director roles or above within organisations with enterprise-wide annual revenue of at least $250 million for fiscal year 2021, which are currently engaged in sustainability-related activities. 

Fitwel — Fitwel Certifications | Certify Your Building or Site Project

Fitwel — Fitwel Certifications | Certify Your Building or Site Project

ByThe Circular Economy Team

Fitwel offers a pathway to track the health-related ESG impacts of your assets through streamlined measurement tools and expert guidance. Through Fitwel Certification, your building will be leading the industry on the next frontier of sustainability by improving social metrics and ensuring optimal health of your occupants and the surrounding community.  The end-to-end digital platform includes:  Visualization of your portfolio and performance trends based on unique health metrics.   Actionable gap analysis outlining opportunities for increased performance that you can share with project teams.

Ciena Solutions Challenge

Ciena Solutions Challenge

ByThe Circular Economy Team

The next generation of problem-solvers need more than technical skills and expertise. They need experiences that allow them to see the designed world and its impact on people, collaborate and empathize across differences, and leverage their skills to redesign the world around them to meet the needs of all people in their communities.  Digital Promise and Ciena are supporting educators and students to design solutions using Challenge Based Learning, a collaborative learning experience in which teachers and students work together to learn about compelling issues, propose solutions to real problems, and take action. Educators and students will navigate through the three phases of Challenge Based Learning—Engage, Investigate, and Act—to take positive action on a Sustainable Development Goal in their community.

ESG goals are urgent and require AI to enact, says Oracle • The Register

ESG goals are urgent and require AI to enact, says Oracle • The Register

ByThe Circular Economy Team

The pandemic has made people more concerned about sustainability than ever, and businesses are the focuses of their collective ire, with most saying they don’t take enterprise sustainability goals (ESGs) seriously. The solution, Oracle says, is to put AIs in charge.  Oracle’s 2022 ESG Global Study surveyed some 11,000 consumers and businesses, and its findings reveal a population overwhelmingly frustrated with a lack of progress toward sustainability initiatives (94 percent). Seventy-eight percent also say that they’re frustrated with the lack of progress businesses have made on the ESG front.  Consumers aren’t content to let businesses pat themselves on the back either: nearly half said that they believe businesses have more power than individuals or governments to affect change, and 89 percent said they need to see proof that progress is being made toward ESG goals.

Direct lithium extraction funding investment uptick • The Register

Direct lithium extraction funding investment uptick • The Register

ByThe Circular Economy Team

New techniques for producing lithium could play a vital part in making batteries for applications ranging from smartphones to electric vehicles that are more environmentally friendly than current methods of extraction.  According to a Reuters report, car makers, mining companies and investors including the US Energy Department are pouring money into direct lithium extraction (DLE) technologies that hold out the promise of boosting global lithium production, which is mostly sourced from just a handful of countries today.  There are a number of DLE technologies which all revolve around extracting the metal from brine in various ways, such as using filters, membranes, or ceramic beads. These are touted as more sustainable solutions than existing ways of obtaining lithium, such as pumping lithium-containing saltwater from underground lakes to the surface in desert areas of Chile or Argentina, and extracting it through evaporation in large basins.

Intel commits to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2040 • The Register

Intel commits to net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2040 • The Register

ByThe Circular Economy Team

Intel has committed to being net zero for greenhouse gas emissions across its global operations by 2040, and has set itself interim milestones for 2030 including 100 percent renewable electricity use and to identify greener chemicals with lower global warming potential.  The chip giant announced the move as part of plans to increase the energy efficiency, and lower the carbon footprint, of Intel products and platforms, and said it will work with customers and industry partners to create systems that lower the greenhouse gas footprint of the entire technology ecosystem.  Chief executive Pat Gelsinger claimed that Intel is taking “meaningful steps” to achieve this goal, even as it expands its global operations. “As one of the world’s leading semiconductor design and manufacturing companies, Intel is in a truly unique position to make a difference that extends far beyond our own operations,” he said.

Coldplay Announce 2022 World Tour

Coldplay Announce 2022 World Tour

ByThe Circular Economy Team

Coldplay have announced a world tour behind their Max Martin–produced album Music of the Spheres. After declining to tour the album’s predecessor, Everyday Life, for environmental reasons, the band have pledged to cut tour emissions by 50 percent and adopt a broad model for sustainability, with each show powered exclusively by renewable energy. Coldplay plan to eliminate “significantly more CO2 than the tour produces” with initiatives including the planting of one tree for each ticket sold. Ten percent of all tour earnings will enter a fund for “environmental and socially conscious causes,” according to a press release. Check out the dates below.

Microsoft releases 2021 sustainability report • The Register

Microsoft releases 2021 sustainability report • The Register

ByThe Circular Economy Team

Microsoft has published its annual sustainability report for 2021 [PDF], claiming to have reduced its own CO2 emissions by about 17 percent year-on-year, but with a bigger carbon footprint overall than it had last year, showing that “progress won’t always be linear”.  In 2021, Microsoft generated 14.072 million metric tons of CO2e, by its own estimation. That’s up from 11.58 million metric tons of CO2e the year before – an overall 21.4 percent increase.  Announcing the report, Microsoft president and vice chair Brad Smith said that the past year had provided the company with critical experience for its stated goal of becoming carbon negative by 2030.

EU Right to Repair resolution heads to plenary vote

EU Right to Repair resolution heads to plenary vote

ByThe Circular Economy Team

European lawmakers are voting in plenary on a Right to Repair resolution today amid calls for the initiative to go even further.  The draft motion for resolution [PDF] cited a survey that found 79 percent of EU citizens thought that manufacturers should make repairs easier, with 77 percent saying a repair would be preferable to replacement, and called for access to parts, repair information, and standardization among devices.  To that end, the motion emphasizes labels to indicate repairability and expected lifetime for products, access to parts and repair facilities, an extension to liability for defective goods beyond two years, and calls on the European Commission to “always take into account the highest possible level of consumer protection and consumer welfare.”

Raise a glass to sustainable winemakers with these picks | Metro News

Raise a glass to sustainable winemakers with these picks | Metro News

ByThe Circular Economy Team

From paper bottles to biodiversity methods employed at vineyards, many winemakers are making efforts to try to minimise the environmental impact of their industry.  Here we’ve selected six wines with some serious sustainability credentials for you to enjoy.  When In Rome Wine Paper Bottle Pecorino – When In Rome’s bottle is made from 94 per cent recycled paper.  Single-use glass bottles make up 39 per cent of the wine industry’s overall carbon emissions, which partly explains the recent popularity of boxed wine. When In Rome has taken it one step further with its paper bottle wine (think bag in a bottle, rather than box), which is made from 94 per cent recycled paper…

Inside Sabai Design’s Sustainability Approach to Building a Business

Inside Sabai Design’s Sustainability Approach to Building a Business

ByThe Circular Economy Team

It’s hard to overstate the importance of furniture in our lives.  We literally live our life on furniture, yet often don’t realize the impact our chosen furnishings have on the planet in terms of chemicals, greenhouse gasses, and material waste.  Phantila Phataraprasit learned about sustainability early in life and wanted to build the kind of sustainable brand she’d be proud to shop at, so she decided to do something about it and co-founded Sabai Design, a sustainable furniture company.  Featuring insights from Buffer’s Small Business, Big Lessons podcast episode seven, and the accompanying unpublished interview, Phantila shared how Sabai got started, what she and her team do to embed sustainability into every business practice, and how she builds trust with the Sabai community.

Working Smarter: Leveraging Machine Learning to Optimize CO2 Adsorption

Working Smarter: Leveraging Machine Learning to Optimize CO2 Adsorption

ByThe Circular Economy Team

Scientists employ artificial intelligence to guide the design of biomass waste-derived novel materials for CO2 capture
Biomass waste can be used to produce porous carbons capable of sequestering CO2 gas emitted from large point sources (e.g., power plants, cement industries). However, there are no general guidelines on how such high-quality porous carbons should be synthesized or their optimal operational conditions. In a recent study, scientists employed machine learning-based method to determine which core factors should be prioritized in biomass waste-derived porous carbons to achieve the best CO2 adsorption performance, paving the way to a circular economy. 

Alibaba makes 9 datacenter green energy patents available

Alibaba makes 9 datacenter green energy patents available

ByThe Circular Economy Team

Chinese tech giant Alibaba is joining a coalition pledging to freely distribute energy efficient and green technologies, and has made nine patents available as part of the deal.  The patents Alibaba is giving to the Low Carbon Patent Pledge (LCPP) mostly involve parts of its own in-house “soaking server” liquid immersion cooling system developed in 2015 that Alibaba claims reduced its datacenter energy expenditure by 70 percent.  Two of the nine patents were unrelated: one limits hard drive power consumption, and another was designed to improve hardware utilization rates.  Founded on Earth Day last year by HPE, Microsoft, and Meta, the LCPP promotes low-carbon technologies. A total of 544 patents have been pledged from 10 companies, including Lenovo, UPS, and the three founding organizations. “We believe technology innovation is a key driver in transitioning to the low-carbon circular economy of the future. As a pioneer and global technology leader, we are committed to taking broader social responsibility,” Alibaba Group VP and chair of the Sustainability Steering Committee Dr. Chen Long said. 

Why are you hoarding your old smartphones?

Why are you hoarding your old smartphones?

ByThe Circular Economy Team

When will electronics recycling become a priority for consumers, government, and business?  It needs to happen soon, given that if you piled the 5.3 billion old mobile devices currently in people’s homes on top of each other, you’d have a 31,000-mile-high tower — one eighth of the distance to the Moon.  (Don’t) take me to the Moon – The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Forum, an nternational nonprofit, estimates 5.3 billion of the 16 billion mobile devices in use today will become e-waste this year. Assuming each phone is 9mm thick (iPhone 14 is 7.8mm), if you piled them together the pillar would be higher than the International Space Station’s orbit.

Corporate execs confident on sustainability goals, admit more work needed

Corporate execs confident on sustainability goals, admit more work needed

ByThe Circular Economy Team

Most companies have hit their near-term goals for greenhouse gas reduction, and some have advanced circular-economy projects. But to get to net-zero emissions, suppliers, customers, and dedicated corporate teams will all be needed.  About six in 10 executives believe they can achieve their corporate sustainability goals over the next year, according to a recent global survey commissioned by Honeywell International. But only about 16% think they’ll do so primarily through technology-driven changes, such as upgrading or replacing existing systems with newer, more efficient or more sustainable technologies.  The vast majority of the 600 business leaders surveyed — 62% — expect to hit their short-term goals mainly by modifying or eliminating operational processes or business behaviors.