the nature conservancy Archives - GreenMonk: the blog

And here is a round-up of this week’s Green numbers…

50% rise in companies using software to monitor sustainability performance, says new survey

The proportion of companies that use software to monitor their sustainability performance increased by 50 percent between 2006 and 2010, according to the results of a new international survey released today, Thursday 27 January 2011, by the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI).

Experts from GRI say this means that guidance for people producing sustainability reports should be kept up to date with emerging trends in software use and digital reporting.
Efficiency could cut world energy use over 70 per cent

Simple changes like installing better building insulation could cut the world’s energy demands by three-quarters, according to a new study.

Discussions about reducing greenhouse gas emissions usually concentrate on cleaner ways of generating energy: that’s because they promise that we can lower emissions without having to change our energy-hungry ways. But whereas new generation techniques take years to come on stream, efficiency can be improved today, with existing technologies and know-how.
AZ Republicans and Democrats Agree, Energy Efficiency Saves Billions

Much has been made in recent weeks of the stark political controversies that haunt Arizona politics. There, intense debates over immigration, over healthcare, over a host of issues, have led to a growing sense that Arizona?s politics have left the mainstream behind.

But there is another Arizona, an Arizona of bipartisan unanimity and progress hidden beneath the saddening headlines of late. That hidden story of Arizona reveals a state that is leading the country down the new and much-needed road to energy efficiency, with standards that are among the most ambitious in the nation. It is a story that has been lost. But it is a story that Arizonans of all political stripes deserved to be celebrated for and a story the rest of us need to hear.
Dow Moves to Make Nature Part of the Bottom Line

Dow Chemical and the Nature Conservancy (TNC) announced a partnership on January 25 during a press conference at the Detroit Economic Club to develop tools and demonstrate models for valuing nature in business. Dow committed $10 million over the next five years to the collaboration with TNC. Jennifer Molnar, manager of TNC?s Analysis Team, called the partnership a ?breakthrough.?

The partnership will use scientific models, maps, and analysis for biodiversity and ?ecosystem services?, a Dow press release states, and apply them to the company?s business decisions. The partnership will also ?inform Dow on setting new policies and approaches in the areas of land and water management, siting considerations, the benefits of natural resources on Dow lands and waterways, and more explicit management of biodiversity.?
GM takes $7 million stake in battery startup Envia

General Motors Co has invested $7 million in Envia Systems, a California-based start-up that has been developing more powerful and cheaper batteries for electric vehicles.

Newark, California-based Envia has developed cathode technology for lithium-ion batteries that it says will make them both cheaper and more powerful.

GM said Wednesday it also reached a separate licensing agreement to use the Envia cathode technology in future electric vehicles.
What I Learned in Two Years of Running GridWise Alliance

As I take my leave as president of the GridWise Alliance, I feel pride in our accomplishments and gratitude for having been involved in a period of enormous growth in the industry and organization. Alliance membership grew during my tenure from 70 to 150 members. These new members included stakeholder groups like the automotive and buildings sector that could join forces with the existing ICT, telecom, and manufacturing components and the utility and system operator member base.

We started building relationships with consumer groups and were founding members of the Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative, bringing together regulators, consumer advocates, and industry leaders.
EnerNOC Acquires M2M Communications and hundreds of megawatts of demand response capacity

EnerNOC, Inc., a provider of energy management applications, has acquired M2M Communications, a provider of wireless technology solutions for energy management and demand response.

According to EnerNOC, its solutions reduce real-time demand for electricity, increase energy efficiency, improve energy supply transparency in competitive markets, and mitigate emissions. Some of the energy management applications offered by EnerNOC includes DemandSMART for comprehensive demand response, EfficiencySMART for data-driven energy efficiency, SupplySMART for energy price and risk management, and CarbonSMART for enterprise carbon management.

By acquiring M2M Communications, EnerNOC plans to expand its portfolio of automated resources, thereby augmenting third-party automated demand response.
SAP reduces 2010 Greenhouse Gas Emissions despite double-digit revenue growth

SAP today announced its preliminary report of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions for 2010. The company?s worldwide GHG emissions for 2010 totaled 430 kilotons, a four percent decrease from the 450 kiloton level of 2009. In its third year of consecutive reductions, SAP has cut GHG emissions by 24 percent from its peak levels in 2007, putting the company well on track to achieve its target of reducing emissions to 2000 levels by 2020.

Using its own software to measure, report and reduce its carbon footprint, SAP can attribute the emissions decrease to a variety of efforts and investments in energy and carbon efficiency projects. Contributing factors to the company?s footprint reduction also include changes in employees? commuting practices and the purchase of renewable energy.

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I had a phone call recently with Patty Calkins. Patty is Vice President of Environmental Health & Safety for Xerox Corp. I knew Xerox had a good environmental record but until talking to Patty, I had no idea just how good!

To put this in context, let’s take a quick look at how long they have been thinking about their environmental impact, as a company –

Xerox invented double-sided copying in 1969
In the early 1970’s Xerox introduced the 1st post consumer recycled paper products
In early 1980’s Xerox introduced products which automatically powered down (before Energy Star program was conceived)
Xerox was a founder member of Energy Star
In the 1980’s Xerox started rolling out its supplier requirements program
In early 1990’s Xerox started focussing in on the end-of-life of products in the design phase – designing in end-of-life considerations for asset re-use.
In late 90’s Xerox established a waste-free platform to design waste-free products, to manufacture in waste-free facilities, to enable waste free customer sites.
Then Xerox initiated a cartridge return program so Xerox designed cartridges for remanufacturing
In the early 2000’s Xerox kicked off its carbon footprint reduction program – called Energy Challenge 2012. The initial goal was for Xerox to reduce its Carbon Footprint by 10%, over its 2002 base year, by 2012, in absolute terms. By engaging the workforce, Xerox managed to shoot right by that target and hit 18% reductions by 2006. Xerox then upped it’s CO2 reduction target to to 25% by 2012. As of 2010 blew past that goal achieving 30% reductions against its 2002 baseline. Now Xerox are in the process of re-baselining because of the acquisition of Affiliated Computer Systems in early 2010. Xerox will use its 2010 figures to establish a new baseline and will announce its next carbon reduction goal.

Given such a stellar record, I shouldn’t have been surprised at how seriously they take sustainability at Xerox, but I was. Why? The phone call with Patty was incredibly information dense but I’ll try to sum up some of Xerox sustainability highlights.

Most organisations have far more print capability than they need and the print devices they have have an average utilisation rate of around 1-2%. The rest of the time, they are still drawing power, requiing maintenance, etc. To help organisations with this issue, Xerox works with their clients advising them how best to replace stand-alone fax machines, printers and copiers with shared multi-function devices. Xerox took it a step further and developed their Sustainability Calculator – which allows companies to do before and after scenarios to see potential savings and also to subsequently qualify savings from ‘right-sizing’ their print infrastructure.

Xerox Sustainability Calculator

Again on the customer saving front, Xerox developed solid ink technology. This is where they supply ink for printers in solid waxy cubes. The ink melts in special wells in the printer and can then be printed onto paper. The advantage of the solid ink technology is there are no ink-jet cartridges, or laser toner cartridges to dispose of/recycle, and less packaging, transport and storage. In fact, solid ink generatres 90% less waste than laser cartridges. Over the product?s entire life, it actually consumes roughly 30% less overall energy and Earth?s resources than an equivalent color laser printer according to this peer reviewed report [PDF] on the lifecycle impact of solid ink.

Then around five years ago Xerox decided to take a step back to re-examine its aims and to see what is the ‘next plateau’ to reach for in this space.

Xerox mapped it’s complete environmental footprint, identified the significant environmental aspects, went out and tested it against various stakeholders, processed the data and organised it into newer sustainability framework which now consists of 4 planks (with associated goals):

Climate protection and energy with a goal to ultimately become carbon neutral (no date yet set so the top priority for now is to reduce energy consumption)
Preserving biodiversity in world’s forests by driving towards a sustainable paper cycle
Preserving clean air and clean water – 2 goals i) zero persistant bioaccumulative and toxic material and ii) to become water neutral and
Waste prevention and management with the goal of designing waste-free products, to manufacture waste-free facilities, to enable waste-free customer sites

According to Patty, Xerox have (funded by the Xerox foundation) spent millions on research into preserving the world’s biodiversity and turning that research into action in partnership with The Nature Conservancy.

And Xerox have been extensively researching the health impacts of human exposure to toner for the last 30 years. Perhaps unsurprisingly given it is Xerox they say it is not harmful – the difference here though is that they can back up this claim with peer reviewed studies on over 30,000 people over 30 years. Hard to argue with that!

The kind of commitment to sustainability which Xerox demonstrates is very rare. It should be the norm. Hopefully the more Xerox tell their story, the more they will inspire others to shine too.

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Photo credit Craig A Rodway