The unexpected or improbable happen, sometimes for good, sometimes for bad. We can only hope for the former. Heck, maybe we’ll see a true breakthrough in that elusive goal of nuclear fusion power production – you just won’t see me predicting it here. That said, certain sustainability themed events in 2014 do offer a sense of what we can reasonably expect to witness in 2015, even if based on momentum alone. Here are a few to consider:

Keystone dies

Despite confident talk out of TransCanada chief executive Russ Girling, the Keystone XL pipeline project will likely get the official thumbs down, to the delight of critics such as billionaire Tom Steyer. The United States, for one, is flush with domestic shale oil and doesn’t need Canada’s oil as much anymore, and some of Obama’s final comments in 2014 suggest a rejection is coming. For example, speaking on The Colbert Report in early December, Obama called Keystone a potential contributor to climate change and said there “aren’t a lot” of jobs likely to be created from it. “Essentially, this is Canadian oil passing through the United States to be sold on the world market,” explained the man who can veto any attempts to get Keystone built. “It’s not going to push down gas prices here in the United States. It’s good for Canada.” Since when has a U.S. president approved something just because it’s good for Canada?

Pope pumps up Paris

There’s a general sense out there that the UN climate summit in Paris (COP21) won’t be just another bureaucratic gabfest leading to nothing. Progress was made at the Lima conference in December, and the chorus of influential stakeholders urging action – political, business and religious leaders of all stripes, as well as major international institutions and institutional investors – has grown substantially louder. The U.S.-China climate deal, despite its flaws, carried tremendous symbolic weight and the voice of climate skepticism has faded into irrelevance. The voice of the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics, on the other hand, is expected to grow substantially after Pope Francis issues a clarion call to action in the lead-up to Paris. As reported in the Guardian, the Pope is also expected to address the UN general assembly and meet with leaders from the world’s other main religions to build support for his message. On the ground, public calls for climate action have grown increasingly intense, as demonstrated by the People’s Climate March in September. All forces appear to be aligned and determined. Obama has even made it a ballot issue in the 2016 election.

Demands on disclosure

Investors, meanwhile, will grow increasingly aware of “carbon bubble” risks in 2015 as more of the world’s central bankers – following in the footsteps of the Bank of England – recognize such risks as both real and material. As momentum builds on climate action, so too will pressure on companies to be more transparent about climate risks and on major asset owners to disclose both the carbon intensity of their holdings and their exposure to climate risks – from resource scarcity to extreme weather to regulation and carbon pricing. The spotlight is shining particularly bright on the spending of oil companies.

Green bond breakout

The flipside of climate risk is climate opportunity, and nowhere is this clearer than in the area of green bonds. The market more than tripled in 2014 and could triple again in 2015 to nearly $100 billion. That’s still a tiny portion of the $80 trillion global bond market, but it’s a psychological milestone that gives green bonds some much-needed credibility beyond niche circles. Expect more governments – federal, subnational and municipal – to embrace green bonds as a way to fund low carbon, climate-resilient infrastructure, and a double-downed commitment from international lending agencies such as the World Bank. For an in-depth overview of the green bond market, check out Bernard Simon’s special report this month in Corporate Knights magazine and online.

EVs proliferate

A look-ahead piece wouldn’t be complete without some sort of comment on low-carbon transportation, particularly electric vehicles. Sales in 2014, of both plug-in hybrids and pure electrics, didn’t live up to projections. In the U.S., for example, Obama set a target of one million cars by 2015. But by the end of 2014 there were only about 270,000 plug-in vehicles on U.S. roads. Annually, such vehicles still represent less than 1 per cent of total vehicle purchases. EV critics will point to that as failure, but haters gonna hate, right? Fact is, plug-in vehicles at this stage in their development are outpacing the growth of hybrid vehicles, and in 2015 carmakers will continue to expand the number of models that are commercially available. Deutsche Bank analyst Rod Lache recently said battery costs for EVs continue to fall, choice in the market continues to climb, and compliance with efficiency regulations will make internal combustion engines more expensive. As climate regulations tighten, countries will lean more on the potential of using low-carbon electricity to power transportation. Low gasoline prices, meanwhile, are a blip that will not derail the long-term trend. I’ll go out on a limb, however, and declare there will be a big announcement regarding energy storage in 2015, and it won’t come from Tesla. I’ll also declare attempts by Hyundai, Toyota and Honda to introduce fuel-cell vehicles in 2015 will fall flat – again. And expect electric utilities to more actively support EV growth in 2015. As this Edison Electric Institute report concludes, their survival depends on EV proliferation.

Crowdfunding jumps shark

Crowdfunding sites were all the rage in 2014, so much so that it’s quite possible general-purpose crowdfunding sites such as Indiegogo and Kickstarter will jump the shark in 2015. Such sites have become dumping grounds for projects that haven’t been able to get funding support anywhere else – and for good reason. Sure, there are some good quality projects hidden within the garbage, but finding them has become too time consuming. As well, the number of crowdfunding promotional e-mails entering inboxes has grown exponentially, causing crowdfunding fatigue to set in. Not that crowdfunding doesn’t serve a noble purpose, but the novelty is wearing off. If I’m right on this, we’ll see the crowdfunding marketplace become increasingly fragmented in 2015, with more sites emerging that target a particular type of funder. This means increased reliance on Google-style tracking as part of efforts to build loyal networks that support well-defined causes. We’re already seeing this with some sites supporting serious scientific research and renewable energy projects.

Smart home delivers

Could 2015 be a pivotal year for the smart home? Based on observations while shopping this holiday season, it looks like smart home technologies are ripe and ready for mainstream adoption. You can sense it by reading the weekend flyers from Best Buy, or walking through Home Depot. Intelligent LED light bulbs, switches, thermostats and sensors are cheaper and easier to install. There’s more selection. They synch easily with your home’s existing Wi-Fi and you can control them with free iOS and Android apps downloaded to your smart device. I recently purchased an IP security camera for $99, connected it to my home Wi-Fi in minutes, and effortlessly downloaded an app that lets me watch my dog while I’m at work. While not a sustainability app per se, it’s an illustration of the ease with which these technologies can be installed and used. Expect choice on the market to explode in 2015, costs to fall, and adoption to rise substantially – and not just because we’re driven to make our households more efficient. There’s a reason why Google purchased Nest, the “learning thermostat” company, last January. When it comes to the “web of things” the bottom line is that people love their gadgets, perhaps even more than saving money.

Canada: Benchmarking buildings, pricing carbon

Closer to home, expect at least two Canadian municipalities in 2015 to embrace mandatory energy reporting for large public and commercial buildings, starting with Toronto. Mandatory reporting has been in place for several years now in a dozen or so U.S. jurisdictions, including New York City, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., and is widespread in Europe. Evidence suggests it is quite effective at reducing the carbon footprint of a city’s building stock – on average, buildings see a 7 per cent annual reduction in energy use after three years. Also, expect Ontario to reveal details of plans to introduce a carbon tax in the province, a move that will stimulate province-led discussions of a national carbon pricing strategy. For a look at where Ontario may be heading, look to our January 22 issue of Corporate Knights.

And who knows? Perhaps in 2015 there will be a few black swans, such as bi-partisan support in the U.S. for a carbon tax. Pleasant surprises are always welcome.

The post Look ahead: What to expect in 2015 appeared first on Corporate Knights.

But the lowly pallet is an essential link in the global supply chain. One could say the global economy rides on its ubiquitous back.

By 2017 it’s estimated there will be nearly 10 billion shipping pallets in global circulation, half being newly purchased each year. Between now and then, the market is expected to grow by an average of 5 per cent annually and reach a value of $52 billion (U.S.), according to The Freedonia Group.

Needless to say, what those pallets are made of, how often they’re reused, and how they’re managed will become increasingly important in a low-carbon economy. That’s what attracted auto parts executive Richard MacDonald to the market.

In 2010, after 23 years working his way into senior roles at auto parts giant Magna International, MacDonald decided to take what he learned in the car manufacturing business and apply it to the art of skid making.

“We basically did automotive engineering on a pallet,” said MacDonald, one of three co-founders of Vaughan, Ont.-based Axios Mobile Assets, where he is president and chief executive. “

For example, Axios makes its pallets out of calcium carbonate – that is, common chalk – the same material that Magna uses to manufacture some of its composite car parts, such as fenders and hoods for Vipers and Corvettes. The non-toxic calcium carbonate is mixed with a soy-based resin and biofibres to create a kind of “eco-pallet” that Axios says is 30 to 40 per cent lighter than wood pallets.

Currently, slightly more than 90 per cent of all pallets produced today are made from wood, while about 4 per cent are manufactured from plastics and 1 per cent from metal, such as aluminum. Each has its own strengths and weaknesses.

How they stack up

Wood pallets may be the cheapest, but they don’t last very long, are susceptible to insects and rot, represent a fire hazard, can carry contaminants that pose a risk to health, and are difficult to clean. They absorb water when wet, adding weight – and cost – to shipping. Nails and splinters also have potential to harm workers, tear packaging and damage product.

There’s also an ongoing debate over the contribution of wood pallets to deforestation and climate change. The Union of Concerned Scientists, for example, cites the fact that 30 per cent of total hardwood produced in the United States each year is used to make wood pallets and containers that are typically used once and then discarded, often in landfills. It estimates that wood pallets represent up to 3 per cent of all waste that ends up in U.S. landfills.

However, groups like the Canadian Wood Pallet and Container Association counter by pointing out that pallets are largely made from otherwise unmarketable lumber that’s left over after trees are harvested for building materials, furniture and flooring. “Trees are rarely harvested with the sole purpose of making pallets,” the association says.

A single wood pallet is said to represent about 27 kilograms of carbon. What happens at the end of its short life determines its impact on the climate. Sending it to landfill is worse than recycling it into other wood products or even burning it for energy. One example: Viridian Wood Products of Portland, Oregon, reclaims and upcycles wood from shipping pallets and crates that have been discarded at local shipyards, turning them into high-value flooring, decking and panelling products.

Plastic pallets, on the other hand, are more expensive but have gained favour because, compared to wood, they’re pest resistant, lighter, longer-lasting, recyclable, and often made from recycled materials. They can also be cleaned and sanitized fairly easily, though because they are made from a fossil fuel they are a fire hazard. This is why the plastic used must often be embedded with fire retardant chemicals such as decabromodiphenyl ether, which has caused concerns about the potential for contamination in the food industry.

And metal pallets? They have most of the benefits of plastic with the added advantage of ruggedness. Problem is, they’re significantly more expensive and typically heavier, which leads to increased transportation costs, fuel consumption and associated emissions. This is why they are used mostly for the heaviest cargo and niche markets.

Striking the right balance

MacDonald believes his company’s calcium carbonate-based pallets strike the best balance between cost and benefit. Like plastic pallets, they tend to last 10 to 12 years compared to up to a few years for wood – assuming the wood pallets aren’t prematurely discarded. And they’re 30 to 40 per cent lighter than comparable wood pallets, which translates into lower cost and a reduction in transport-related emissions.

Bugs and water can’t penetrate them, they’re easy to thoroughly wash after each cycle of use, and they can be recycled. Where they part with plastic, however, is that they are inherently fire resistant, meaning no chemical additives are needed – appealing to food and produce shippers and buyers. “We’re less cost with higher value,” MacDonald said.

From a greenhouse-gas emissions perspective, however, what the pallets are made of is only part of the story. A core part of Axios’ business is a service called pallet pooling. In essence, it rents out its pallets as part of long-term contracts. Through such contracts, it manages and tracks the movement of the pallets, cleans them, and stores them when necessary.

Each of its pallets contain four radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags and a bar code that allows the company to track the pallets – and the goods loaded onto them – through every step in the supply-chain cycle. Sensors that measure temperature, shock, and even CO2 exposure and humidity can also be added to both the pallets and the trailers used to transport them. Handlers equipped with electronic wands simply scan each pallet as they’re unloaded and loaded.

“We’re the Internet of things as it relates to the $12 billion (U.S.) pallet market,” said MacDonald.

With this ability to so closely and accurately track pallets as they move through the supply chain, Axios says there’s room to drive logistical efficiencies. The software behind its pallet management service can also calculate what the reduction in GHG emissions would be relative to using wood pallets that aren’t tracked. This calculation takes into account such metrics as distance travelled and pallet weight, and translates them into a carbon credit value.

In its first pallet-pooling project earlier this year, Axios supplied 4,000 pallets to Trillium Farms of Ohio and Centrum Valley Farms in Iowa, which used the system to manage and track egg shipments destined for retailers such as Walmart. After four months, they calculated that the carbon-equivalent of 26.6 tonnes of GHGs had been offset, the equivalent of not burning nearly 29,000 pounds of coal.

“For retailers or vendors who use millions of pallets and transport their products millions of miles over the course of business each year, significant verified carbon reductions can be applied against a business’s carbon footprint and in some cases monetized,” the company said in a statement after releasing its findings.

Consider if this approach was applied to the billions of wood shipping pallets in circulation around the world. The U.S. egg industry, which transports 90 billion eggs annually, requires on its own more than a million pallets handling 15 to 20 shipment cycles a year. The carbon benefits would quickly add up.

Sylvain Charlebois, a business and economics professor who researches food safety and traceability systems at the University of Guelph, was briefed on the Axios pallet system earlier this fall and walked away impressed.

“It’s a great product and they have a sound strategy,” said Charlebois, adding that the approach makes good sense from a sustainability perspective. “That said, it will be a challenge for Axios to change entrenched habits in the industry, particularly in the food industry where traditions are king.”

But the interest is there. MacDonald said his company now has contracts in place to put 30,000 of its pallets into circulation, assuming he can overcome one substantial barrier. “We’re having trouble raising the capital to expand our pallet fleet,” he said, pointing out that over the next year up to 150,000 pallets will need to be manufactured to meet expected demand.

The problem? The $3 million Axios is looking for is a lot of money, and investors don’t get very excited about pallets, even those based on the same materials used to make Corvettes. Mention “pallet” in your pitch and venture capitalists yawn. Banks tune out, even if the payback on each pallet is under a year.

But they may well want to pay attention. As Charlebois said, more non-food retailers such as Walmart and Costco are doing well in the food space. “They are more inclined to embrace new technologies which may be consistent with their core competency, which is logistics,” he said.

The post Making climate-friendly pallets palatable appeared first on Corporate Knights.

Rob Ford was the antithesis of an environmentalist. He never spoke of climate change or carbon emissions. The words “green energy” and “energy efficiency” weren’t in his vocabulary. When he talked about boosting public transit, it was in the context of improving life for people who drive. Indeed, he was determined to end what he called the “war on cars.”

I remember moderating a mayoral debate on the theme of “green government” during the 2010 campaign. Other than when he was slamming green energy for being too expensive – eliciting boos from the audience – Ford had this unique ability to not answer any of the questions directly or on theme. It was like we had four candidates seriously debating green issues and then, in the corner, was Rob Ford talking to himself about tax cuts and gravy trains.

Once Ford was elected, it was must have been a culture shock to bureaucrats who worked under previous environmentalist mayor David Miller, now chief executive of WWF Canada. Under Miller, Toronto became known internationally for its environmental leadership. Under Ford, Toronto became known internationally as the city with that crack-smoking, homophobic mayor that makes racial slurs.

A New Chapter

Now that John Tory is Toronto’s new mayor, what can we expect from him on the climate and environment file over the next four years?

For one, the words “environment” and “climate change” are again being spoken with what appears genuine concern and conviction. During his campaign, Tory talked about making Toronto a more sustainable community by boosting the city’s tree canopy by 3.8 million trees over the next 10 years. (Not to compare or anything, but motorcycle maker Harley-Davidson just revealed it aims to plant 50 million trees by 2025). Tory also wants to expand and improve maintenance of city parks, increase the number of green spaces, and revive the city’s 44,000-acre system of ravines – what he has referred to as hidden “crown jewels.” All welcome initiatives.

On energy, he has committed to creating a sustainable energy advisory board made up of local green energy, cleantech and sustainability leaders (Hey John, pick me, pick me!). The idea here is to get top advice on how to unlock energy efficiencies and where to embrace renewables as part of a plan to mitigate the city’s climate impacts. Toward that end, according to Tory’s environment policy, he would “work with other levels of government, partners and other jurisdictions on tackling climate change and its effects.”

One idea he has already put forth, long advocated by environmentalists, is the use of underutilized city assets and rights of way as locations for district thermal energy systems – e.g. geothermal, solar thermal or co-generation (biomass, natural gas). These systems could provide shared heating to buildings that are clustered closely together, and when developed across the city they would represent what Tory calls a “smart energy network.” It’s a more efficient way to supply heating, as countries such as Denmark have learned, and it has worked well in nearby communities such as Markham.

Also of particular interest is his plan to appoint an “environment advocate” for the city. This person’s job will be making sure environment policies are consistently applied – and coordinated – across all municipal departments, agencies, boards and commissions. The advocate will also have the task of developing a comprehensive climate adaptation plan for the city and its infrastructure, and a “realistic” and “achievable” plan to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions from municipal assets, improve waste diversion, and lower the amount of toxins released within city boundaries.

Best of all, progress on all of this is supposed to be documented in a “Sustainable City Report” to be released annually. Tory has promised to present this report himself to city stakeholders. It will be important to hold him to it.

Transit Challenges

It is on transit, however, that Tory has attracted the most attention – partly because there’s a big question mark over how he expects to pay for his plan, named SmartTrack. It targets the creation of a new 53-kilometre, 22-station aboveground subway service, one that would basically piggyback an existing regional rail corridor that is already targeted for electrification. He ambitiously claims he can get this ready within seven years, and that it would make it easier for people living in the suburbs – e.g. Markham, Scarborough, and northwest Etobicoke – to ditch their cars in favour of public transit.

Environmentalists like portions of Tory’s plan, but say it doesn’t go far enough. They preferred candidate Olivia Chow’s plan to significantly expand bus service, which would increase transit options to more areas and do it faster and at less cost. An open question is whether Chow’s approach would have reduced or led to more emissions compared to Tory’s plan, given that most Toronto buses run on diesel fuel.

Tory was also criticized by what some described as an unambitious plan to boost cycling infrastructure in the city. He called for more separated on-road bike lanes, more spaces to park bicycles, and more money for maintenance of existing lanes, but he didn’t provide a sense of how much he would expand the network.

Chow, on the other hand, pledged to create more than 200 kilometres of new bicycle lanes, which would roughly triple existing on-road lane infrastructure. True, Tory didn’t put a number on kilometres, but his openness to cycling as part of a strategy to reduce congestion and emissions is still a good sign. He can be pushed on this.

As a city cyclist, my own thought is that downtown Toronto is a chaotic, terrifying place to ride a bicycle. More separated bike lanes would help, but the real problem is rampant, uncoordinated condominium and road construction that gives little, if any, consideration to the impact on cyclists and their safety.

Creating a Smart City

Throughout his campaign, Tory spoke frequently about building intelligence into the way the city operates. He’s a big fan of intelligent building management systems, smart traffic management, and other technologies that collect and make sense of data that can reduce congestion, lower building energy costs and make the city, its residents and its businesses operate more efficiently. “Toronto should be at the forefront of the implementation of these technologies,” stated Tory’s economic plan, in which he outlined his intention to use the “market pull” of the city to turn Toronto into a global research and development hub for “smart city technology.”

One problem, in Tory’s opinion, is that the city hasn’t been taking advantage of the massive amounts of data it currently collects, most of which isn’t available to the public. He has cited that New York City releases 10 times more open data sets to the public compared to Toronto. “We should work to double the available data each year for the next 10 years until we are truly a global leader,” according to his economic plan.

The saying “you can’t improve what you don’t measure” is probably etched in Tory’s mind after his years as president and chief executive of Rogers Cable, where keeping the cable firm’s high-speed Internet service competitive with offerings from Bell Canada meant constant number crunching and analysis in search of efficiencies and a market edge. It’s why Tory plans to push for real-time energy monitoring for all municipal buildings, where he says he will find $22 million in annual savings by his fourth year in office. On top of that, “we will see additional new opportunities for energy retrofits, based on solid, real and measurable data.”

Unfortunately, Tory doesn’t appear ready to support a call for mandatory energy benchmarking of private commercial buildings, despite movement in this direction from city council staff and recommendations from the Toronto Atmospheric Fund. Tory feels private building owners and operators will do this voluntarily if the municipality itself shows leadership on its own buildings. This is highly doubtful. There’s a reason why cities such as New York, Chicago, Seattle, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. all require commercial buildings over a certain size to report their annual energy use, and that’s because most of them – especially the laggards – won’t do it voluntarily.

We’ve had voluntary reporting for a few years in Toronto and it can only go so far. For energy benchmarking to be truly effective as a way to find efficiencies, we need all commercial and public buildings of a certain size playing by the same rules. Here’s hoping Tory has a change of heart on this issue, and supports doing in Toronto what world-class cities south of the border are already doing, with great success.

Will He Deliver?

I know Tory reasonably well. As a technology and telecom reporter at the Toronto Star when Tory was CEO of Rogers Cable, I had many opportunities to chat with him. We kept in touch when he was leader of Ontario’s PC Party and later when he was talk show host for Toronto radio station CFRB 1010. He invited me on his show a few times to talk about energy and technology issues.

From these interactions, I can comfortably say one thing: Tory is not a No Man like Ford. He’s a consensus builder. He has opinions on various energy and environmental matters, but he isn’t dogmatic about it. He doesn’t like to throw money into a burning house. At the same time, he seems to keep an open mind, and is willing to change his position when he hears a sound argument for doing so. He’s a fiscal conservative, but he’s thoughtful enough about matters that he knows that solving social and environmental problems can’t always been done using Bay St. metrics. Sometimes situations call for patient capital. Sometimes payback can take several years. Tory appreciates this – it’s even an approach his former boss Ted Rogers took when building, at huge expense, the country’s first national mobile phone network.

This, in my view, is encouraging.

As one Toronto environmentalist told me, “Overall, this is a very solid opportunity that we should all jump on.”

We’ll learn more over the coming weeks and months. Exactly who he selects as his “environment advocate” will offer key insights, as well as who makes up his sustainable energy advisory board. Tory’s first-annual “Sustainable City Report” will tell us if he’s serious or not, as will his demonstrated willingness to push Toronto Hydro into moving more aggressively on conservation and district energy.

This editor will be watching closely.

The post Did Toronto just elect a green mayor? appeared first on Corporate Knights.

Last year students at the University of British Columbia voted 4-to-1 in favour of having their school divest from fossil fuels. Now, nearly 200 university faculty have thrown their support behind the students by signing a petition calling for divestment. “Some are concerned divestment might hurt the income UBC receives from the endowment, but this need not to be the case,” states an open letter. “There are many opportunities in the market for an endowment to make equivalent or better returns, and studies designed to measure the impact of divestment have found little or no impact on returns.” The university’s faculty association is expected to decide on Monday if it will hold a referendum on the matter. Specifically, the open letters calls for immediate suspension of future fossil-fuel investments and divestment of existing holdings within five years.

We need a market for water: Brookings paper

The Brookings Institution has released a discussion paper that argues for more use of market forces to reduce water shortages in the U.S. west, a problem that is worse than most originally thought. Indeed, NASA research recently reported that the Colorado River Basin – which supplies 40 million people in seven states – is getting sucked dry. Population and economic growth and water overuse are all contributing to a problem exacerbated by dry, low-rainfall conditions brought about by climate change. Resilience needs to be brought into the water systems, argues the paper. “Western states can take an immediate step to enable more-flexible use of water resources by allowing simple, short-term water transactions,” it states. “Water policy should allow someone who needs water to pay someone else to forgo her use of water or to invest in water conservation and, in return, to obtain access to the saved water.” It also argues that state and local governments have a responsibility to establish essential market institutions, such as water banks, “that can serve as brokers, clearinghouses, and facilitators of trade.”

Is “pharming” sustainable?

Corporate Knights editor Tyler Hamilton has a feature today on the risks and rewards of genetically modifying plants to produce vaccines and a range of other drugs, such as a recent treatment for Ebola-infected U.S. aid workers that was derived from tobacco plants. The approach is proving simpler and less expensive than traditional methods, which rely on complicated bioreactor vessels that grow bacteria and animal cell cultures. Using plants also speeds up the drug discovery and production process, and products created can be designed to be edible and stored without refrigeration – a big benefit for developing countries. But the long-term risks, such as cross-crop contamination and pollen exposure to humans, animals and insects, remains a big sticking point for environmentalists and food industry groups who urge caution. What do you think?

Europe does it: tightens noose on GHG emissions

The European Union has historically led the world on efforts to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, but that didn’t stop member country leaders from raising the bar on Friday. The EU did, in the end, agree to a climate change pact that obligates members to collectively cut GHG emissions by at least 40 per cent below 1990 levels by 2030. As of 2012, the EU cut its emissions by about 18 per cent. This means it will have to make similar progress over the next 15 years. It’s an ambitious goal, but some environmental groups were disappointed that specific national targets are not binding. Other targets include renewable energy having 27 per cent market share on a EU-wide basis and energy-efficiency improvements of 27 per cent – the latter optional. Germany and some others were lobbying for a 30 per cent target for both, but countries such as the U.K. and Poland resisted that push.

Beware fake awards

As a public service to Corporate Knights’ readers, many of them representatives of corporations and startups in the social innovation space, we would like to alert you to an e-mail going around promoting an event called the “2015 Social Innovation Awards.” The e-mail, sent by a person named Sarah Khara, who is identified as a director of the awards organization, outlines nine categories to which organizations can submit applications – with each submission costing $450. Corporate Knights does not know for sure if this award or organization is legitimate, but what we can say is that a Google search reveals no background information about the awards or Sarah Khara. The website supplied in the e-mail – www.socinnovationawards.com – looks well designed, but lacks crucial information about the contest, its history, Khara and other staff, who the judges are, and the judging process. Furthermore, the URL for the website was only created on October 20, and the New York City address given at the bottom of the promotional e-mail appears to not exist. For this reason, we urge all readers who receive this e-mail to proceed with caution. We e-mailed Khara requesting an explanation. We have not yet received a reply.

The post October 24, 2014 appeared first on Corporate Knights.

Nearly 6,000 clean technology companies from 60 countries were nominated for consideration, so the fact that Vancouver, B.C.-based General Fusion made it onto such an elite list begs the question: After more than half a century of trying, is commercial-scale nuclear fusion finally just around the corner?

The list was created with the input of an 84-person expert panel, so it’s not like a couple of people in a room arbitrarily picked their favorites over a beer. General Fusion was compared against thousands of companies with far less risky and ambitious goals, but it still rose above. Not to suggest it wasn’t a controversial pick among the judges. The company also made it onto the Marmite list – like the English breakfast spread, you either love it or hate it.

“Many panelists admire the company for ‘attempting something so audacious,’” the report’s authors pointed out. “Will it be commercial in the next 10 years? Is it too dependent on fickle government regulations? Conclusion: The company has the potential to revolutionize power generation if it can succeed with its technical milestones. A binary bet, it seems.”

I’ve been a close observer of General Fusion for a decade now, having written a chapter about the company in my book Mad Like Tesla. Corporate Knights also mentioned General Fusion last year in a series on the future of nuclear. So like Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, who is an investor in General Fusion, I may be biased. I hate Marmite, but I like General Fusion.

Canada Doesn’t Gain, or Slide

Canadian companies continued to do relatively well on the 2014 Cleantech 100 list. Like the lists from 2013 and 2012, five companies made it onto this year’s list – three of them returning, two of them new.

In addition to General Fusion, water treatment company Axine Water Technologies, also from Vancouver, is a newcomer to the list. In fact, three of the five Canadian companies on the list are based in and around Vancouver. Axine has developed a chemical-free system that can treat high concentrations of toxic compounds that are otherwise difficult to chemically break down. Its system can be scaled up, and is currently being aimed at the treatment of oil and gas process water.

The other Vancouver-based company on the list is Ostara Nutrient Recovery Technologies, which has been a permanent fixture on the list for the past five years. Ostara recovers phosphorus and nitrogen from municipal and industrial water streams and transforms them into eco-friendly fertilizer products that can boost food production.

Also in the 2014 group is Montreal-based Enerkem, which uses a thermal-chemical process to turn non-recyclable municipal solid waste into biofuels and other chemicals. The company launched its first full-scale commercial facility in Edmonton in June

The final Canadian company is Calgary-based FilterBoxx, which, like Axine, has technology for treating process water from oil operations – specifically from enhanced oil recovery and unconventional drilling projects.

Other Observations

Three scientists – two Japanese, one American – won the Nobel Prize in physics on Tuesday for inventing blue light-emitting diodes (LEDs), so it’s fitting to point out that three companies on the 2014 Cleantech 100 list are LED innovators: Glo from Lund, Sweden, a developer of nanowire-based LEDs; Digital Lumens of Boston, a designer of intelligent LED lighting systems for industry; and Dutch company LUXeXcel Group, which uses 3D printing technology to make LED optics.

Why is the development of blue LEDs important? We know LEDs are super-efficient and long-lasting forms of lighting, but until the development of blue LEDs all we had was green and red – that is, an important part of the light spectrum was missing. By adding blue to the mix, white LED lights could finally be created, in effect opening up the possibility for LED technology to go mainstream as a high-efficiency lighting standard.

Overall, 17 countries are represented on this year’s Cleantech 100 list, though the United States dominates with 62 companies. The most popular and fastest-growing sector appears to be energy efficiency, which is represented by 24 companies. Solar made a bit of a comeback with nine companies, up from six companies in 2013.

Cleantech Group, the organization that produces the Cleantech 100, identified the following six “mega themes” from this year’s batch:

• Growth of consumer-centric business models.
• A focus on emerging market demand and the next go-to markets.
• Intensification of cleantech applications for use in the oil and gas industry.
• A trend toward more decentralized energy services and “downstream” solar products and services.
• A continuing push to transform waste into wealth.
• A rise in big data solutions for utilities.

Cleantech Group also found that large corporations are more active than ever as partners with cleantech startups, whether through investment, licensing, or acquisition. General Electric was identified as most active, followed by Siemens, Google, BP and utility E.ON.

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Over the next decade, investment across 15 cleantech sectors in developing economies is expected to exceed a jaw-dropping $6.4 trillion (U.S.), the bank reported. Of that, about $3.6 trillion will be in water technologies, including wastewater.

Renewable energy technologies – wind, solar, small hydro and geothermal – are expected to capture another $1.9 trillion, with the rest spread across waste technologies and low-emission transportation, including electric vehicles.

Big multinationals like General Electric and ABB are expected to grab a lion’s share of the market, but the bank said about $1.6 trillion will be accessible to small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) that can adapt technology, processes and financing to local conditions and needs.

“Opportunities are available for SMEs across the entire clean technology value chain, but are particularly prevalent in minor equipment manufacture, installation, civil works, retailing, and operations and maintenance activities,” according to the report. “Knowledge of local markets, the need for specialization, and lower financial and technical barriers to entry make these activities especially accessible to SMEs.”

The bank said government support such as loan guarantees and tax credits will be key, particularly R&D grants. The payoff is local job growth, as well as jobs that are more skilled, safer and better paid.

But it urged governments to craft that support wisely by building on local strengths. “Policy makers are advised to take into account their national circumstances and focus attention on developing policy interventions on ‘fertile ground’, as opposed to supporting technologies and sectors that do not have the support of already existing human and natural resource capacities.”

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In a report released on Monday, the NHL urged anyone who cares about the future of the beloved sport to take action to stop climate change.

“As hockey fans, it is imperative that we take the time to understand these issues and make an effort to become strong environmental stewards. The future of our sport, and your local pond hockey game, depends on all of us,” said Mike Richter, a former U.S. goaltender and Hall of Famer, in the report.

And, as the great unifier, sport could take the politics out of the climate change discussion and focus it on the realities of what life could look like on a warmer planet—including one without hockey.

“Hockey is not political, it’s non-partisan. This is really a mainstream affirmation that we have a challenge that needs to be addressed by business…. Climate deniers can attack the Environmental Protection Agency, but they can’t attack the NHL,” says Allen Hershkowitz, a senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) who has been working with the NHL over the last four years to develop their environmental protocol.

The NRDC is behind the “sports greening” movement, which started in 2004. The organization advises all professional sports leagues in North America to develop environmentally friendly protocols across their global supply chains, while educating millions of fans on how to take care of the environment.

The 2014 NHL Sustainability Report is the first environmental report to be released by a major sports league, and is uniquely frank about the risks climate change poses to the existence of the NHL, says the NRDC website.

The report cites a paper published by the Institute of Physics’ Environmental Research Letters in 2012 that confirms a hockey-lover’s worst fear: global warming has reduced the skating season in Canada by as much as 30 percent over the last 50 years.

A report released by the David Suzuki Foundation in 2009 called On Thin Ice: Winter Sports and Climate Change warned Canadians that climate change would wipe out most of the country’s winter sports culture if measures were not put in place to reduce carbon emissions.

To counteract these risks, the NHL has purchased renewable energy certification, carbon offsets and water restoration certificates. Combined with other efforts, the NHL says it has reduced its carbon emissions by more than 38 million pounds since 2012.

The NHL realizes that measuring energy use and carbon emissions is good business management, and the National Basketball Association and Major League Baseball will soon follow suit with similar reports, says Hershkowitz.

At the end of the day, political affiliation is not important to the leaders of professional sports leagues, he says.

“They understand that water freezes at 32 degrees…. In congress, things are negotiable, but when you’re operating an arena, you have to be precise,” he says.

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The province is creating what is essentially a buying consortium coordinated by Shared Services BC. It has pre-qualified LED street lighting suppliers and struck a volume supply deal with them, giving municipalities and other eligible public-sector organizations the ability to get dependable technology at a cost that is much lower compared to what organizations would pay if they made the purchase alone.

The multiyear procurement program will be able to support the deployment of 330,000 LED-based streetlights across the province, and offers a model for other provinces to follow.

LightSavers Canada, an LED program that’s part of the Canadian Urban Institute, will be providing B.C. municipalities access to case studies, workshops and training materials to support their transition.

Phil Jessup, director of LightSavers Canada, said his next mission is to get the Ontario government interested in backing its own province-wide LED street light program.

There’s little doubt that converting to LED street lights makes sense for municipalities. As Corporate Knights publisher Toby Heaps wrote in May, the lights are much more efficient than sodium lamps used today and last several times longer, reducing both energy bills and maintenance costs.

The biggest barrier to adoption, however, has been figuring out how to finance projects – that is, fund the upfront costs. Energy services companies have been emerging to reduce that barrier, making it possible for municipalities to pay off the investment through monthly operational and energy bill savings.

The B.C. program is expected to help reduce costs more through coordinated procurement.

LightSavers Canada’s goal is to see one million or 37 per cent of all street lights in Canada switched over to LED by 2016. Canada currently lags at just 5 per cent penetration, well below the nearly 15 per cent figure for the United States.

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The field of heritage preservation is shifting its attention from protecting old buildings to preserving the vibrancy of communities and responding to contemporary challenges, such as climate change.

And this is attracting a younger crowd of professionals and activists to the field who are interested in sustainability and culture, says Shannon Clayton, a junior architect at ERA Architects Inc. and co-founder of the Architecture Conservancy of Ontario (ACO) Next-Gen program.

“The greenest brick is the one that is already in the wall” has become a slogan for those who know how much energy and labor has already gone into existing buildings, says Clayton.

Heritage buildings were built during a time when energy was not as abundant and designers had to think about conserving heat in the winter and keeping buildings cool in the summer, all without using the mechanical systems that we rely on today, she says.

But the benefits of older buildings go beyond the natural light and floor-to-ceiling windows that many people desire in their homes and office buildings. Heritage communities also tend to be walkable and human-scale because they were built during a time when people were not dependent on cars and buildings were a lot smaller, says Clayton.

This, she says, is also good for small businesses that rely on foot traffic.

Until recently, heritage preservation has been focused on the practice of protecting and restoring buildings. It required years of technical experience, for example, to know what kind of mortar mixture would work well with different materials, says Sharon Hong, a heritage planner at ERA Architects.

But in the last few years, there has been a shift away from thinking about heritage as physical artifacts to a living and evolving thing, says Hong.

Heritage preservation is now about protecting communities that have had many years to mature and accumulate meaning—places where people can say, “culture happened here,” says Hong.

By expanding their definition of heritage preservation, Toronto Heritage has been able to draw in younger people with broader interests, says Karen Carter, Executive Director of Toronto Heritage, a charitable agency of the City of Toronto.

The ACO has also decided to do something about its aging demographic by launching a program called ACO NextGen, which helps young people connect with experienced professionals and hosts design charettes for students and young professionals.

Having young people participate in heritage preservation is refreshing, says Clayton. “The ACO is starting to value our little group…. They want to have younger members and fresh ideas. They want the organization to last.”

Most importantly, says Carter, it is important for young people to understand the history of their communities so that they can make informed decisions about the future.

“If you don’t take care of the identity of your city, it gets lost. And if young people don’t participate in creating that identity, they can’t own it,” says Clayton.

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Yet there are so many barriers that prevent new, potentially world-changing innovations from becoming successful commercial products. As Rick Whittaker, vice-president of investments at Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC), a federal agency that funds new cleantech innovations, once told me, “It’s a surprise some people ever start.”

So when I sat down last September with Jeff Golfman, president of Winnipeg-based Prairie Paper Ventures, I was predisposed to helping. Golfman has spent the past 15 years developing quality paper made from wheat straw (see page 55). His goal is to create an affordable product with very low environmental impact that is 100 per cent tree-free. It would complement existing recycled paper products on the market and help take pressure off the world’s old-growth forests.

So far, Prairie Paper has reached 80 per cent straw content in copy paper that began selling last year at Staples Canada and later through Staples USA. Now, the company wants to come to market with large-format paper that can be used for publishing books, reports and – that’s right – magazines.

If Golfman (whose business partner is actor Woody Harrelson) can build enough demand in North America, he can justify moving ahead with the straw pulp and paper mill he wants to build in Manitoba.

A big hurdle entrepreneurs face has to do with the unwillingness of prospective buyers to take a chance on a new technology or product that lacks a track record, no matter how impressive that product appears. The reason is understandable, as it’s difficult to say for sure if its use will void warranties, put existing equipment at risk, raise a red flag with insurers, or flop with customers. Sometimes, embracing something new requires a retooling of manufacturing systems or reworking of business processes.

That can be costly and risky, so for many the question asked is: If I don’t really have to do it, then why bother? Lacking customers willing to take even modest risks, a company has a difficult time establishing a track record. Without a track record, the risk is perceived to be greater. It’s a classic catch-22.

When Corporate Knights decided to partner up with Prairie Paper to produce this special edition, it was our intent to help build a track record for its large-format product, called Step Forward Professional Grade. We wanted to show others that there is no real risk to using this paper on conventional web roll or sheet-fed presses and other high-speed, mechanical equipment used in the commercial printing industry.

One worry about using straw as an ingredient in paper production is that it has shorter fibres compared to wood fibre. Generally speaking, the longer the fibres the greater the tensile strength of the paper. While not as much a concern for copy paper, it becomes a more important consideration when large rolls are run through high-speed presses. This puts a lot of stress on the paper, and if a roll tears midway during the printing process it can cause damage to expensive pieces of equipment.

It’s why commercial printers are cautious when it comes to using paper made from non-wood fibres. Indeed, Corporate Knights spent considerable time trying to find a printer that was comfortable enough with this project, and it wasn’t until we were introduced to David Podmayersky, sustainability director at New Jersey-based EarthColor, that we knew we’d found the right printing partner.

“I know we can make it happen,” was the comforting comment I frequently heard during my discussions with Podmayersky.

Other partners joined the effort. SDTC, an early funder of Prairie Paper, saw the value of this project immediately and was first to lend its support. So, too, did Staples Canada, which considered this a natural extension of its current sustainability initiatives.

The Globe and Mail, which has distributed Corporate Knights as an insert for more than a decade, was also keen to learn about this new folio. As Canada’s national newspaper, it is committed to making sustainable paper choices and as a partner it is helping to spread the word.

And providing us valuable guidance from the start has been Canopy, an environmental not-for-profit that has spent nearly a decade pushing corporations to adopt sustainable paper purchasing practices.

The result of our yearlong project is what most of you are holding in your hand. I say “most” because a good number will be reading the online or digital mobile version of this issue. You can’t get any greener than that. Still, paper use continues to grow worldwide so solutions are needed to address the problem of deforestation.

This special edition was printed on paper made from 60 per cent wheat straw waste. Thanks to EarthColor, the energy that went into printing this issue is carbon neutral and there are low or no volatile organic compounds in the inks we used.

It’s an experiment that needed to be done, and we believe this issue is a North American first of many more to come. We’re proud here at Corporate Knights to have played our part in making it happen

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