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TriplePundit recently had an opportunity to speak to the director of sustainability and government affairs at Audi of America. What particularly piqued our interest in speaking with him is, not only is it atypical to combine sustainability and government affairs into one role at a car company, but in this case, the role is occupied by a person who is also a climate scientist.

We were interested to understand how placing a climate scientist in this role helps Audi navigate and perhaps drive an auto industry increasingly committed to electrification, and to learn what lies ahead for the company and for an industry in flux. 

Spencer Reeder, who started out as a chemical and materials scientist, is the person driving these efforts at Audi of America. Having previously worked for Boeing on environmental programs, and in particular, researching ways to reduce the toxicity of products used in the aerospace industry, Reeder later went back to graduate school to study earth sciences. This led him to focus on geophysics and climate science, and later to developing the environmental portfolio for Microsoft Co-founder Paul Allen’s philanthropic organization. 

Four years into his current role at Audi, we asked Reeder to talk a bit about Audi placing sustainability and government affairs in one role, and his approach to the job. 

“It’s only when you align government policy advocacy work with sustainability goals, that you truly mean what you say” he explains, adding that when he came on board he was “going to be a loud voice for this” both in terms of his engagement with the industry but importantly, internally within Audi.

By this he meant, he saw his role as one which needed to inspire the organization to see sustainability as something that would become part of its DNA. This was particularly important because around that time, Audi’s parent company, Volkswagen, was recently emerging from its “dieselgate” scandal.

Though Reeder recognizes he is just one voice in a large organization, aligning sustainability with government affairs manifests in things like opposing the previous administrations’ efforts to roll back national fuel economy standards. Audi, as part of VW, was one of only four car companies which joined with California to maintain more stringent mileage standards, for example.

Audi also aggressively prices carbon emissions within its own organization. Setting a price of $200 per ton — a level higher than industry standard, by an order of magnitude — Reeder says, rather than operating this as “shadow pricing,” the company actually makes a transfer of funds which is then used to undertake further CO2 mitigation activities internally. “The only way to effect long term change is through pricing carbon into your business systemically,” Reeder asserts.

Reeder was also a voice internally advocating for the company to lean-in to battery electric vehicle (BEV) technology for the future, even over competing technologies such as fuel cells. With that in mind, we asked him what he thinks the opportunities and impediments are for electric vehicles (EVs) in the short term.

First of all, he says customer demand is “very strong” though concedes it remains quite regionalized at the moment. Unlike California, many states have yet to make strong commitments to EVs, but Audi is not having any difficulty selling the ones it’s producing. 

Unfortunately, though, for the time being at least, costs are heading in an adverse direction. “Things are going to get more expensive before they get cheaper,” Reeder says. This is a result of higher commodity prices, and supply chain shortages in general — the latter, or course, impacting many industries in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Another important challenge Reeder identifies is the need for better charging infrastructure. Federal funding, he says, is “completely insufficient,” especially at this moment when he believes EVs have passed the point of the early adopter phase and are quickly moving into the initial stages of the mass market. He warns, “the mass market won’t tolerate inconvenience.”

As such, he says, broadly distributed fast charging infrastructure will be necessary to sustain the mass market, equipped with 150 kW fast chargers at a minimum. 

Given Reeder’s chemical and materials science background, we were keen to ask him about end-of-life battery considerations, since this is often cited by EV detractors as an environmental concern associated with the push towards electric vehicles. 

As well as identifying energy storage as an important second-life use for vehicle batteries, he is quite bullish on the opportunities for battery recycling, even to the point that recycling valuable battery components may even help wind down raw materials extraction at some point in the future. Indeed, Reeder says, most vehicle batteries probably won’t be repurposed for energy storage, so it is “critical for Audi to have a closed-loop life cycle for batteries.”

The automaker's goals are to have reduced its carbon footprint by 30 percent by 2025 compared with 2019 levels and for 30 percent of its vehicle portfolio to be fully BEV or plug-in hybrid by 2025.

Image credit: Audi media relations

Anyone who has stood downwind of a dairy farm knows the digestive processes of dairy cattle packs a noxious punch to the olfactory senses. Those same processes generate greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane. Estimates suggest livestock produce about 30 percent of the total methane emissions produced from human activities in the U.S., with beef and dairy cattle as the major contributors to climate change.

With dairy ingredients accounting for more than 50 percent of Ben & Jerry’s total greenhouse gas emissions, the ice cream maker has made a bold, but not atypical, commitment to bring greenhouse gas emissions on 15 dairy farms to half the industry average by the end of 2024. Once proven, pilot project initiatives will be expanded to farms across Ben & Jerry’s global dairy supply chain.  

The pilot program, Project Mootopia, will use regenerative agricultural practices and new technology to address methane-producing enteric emissions (cow burps), manure, and feed crops.

In a public statement, Jenna Evans, global sustainability manager for Ben & Jerry’s, said this new approach could be a “game changer” for dairy farming. 

“It has the potential to make a meaningful reduction in emissions on dairy farms and help fight the worst effects of climate change,” said Evans. “All of us, especially businesses, must take action before it’s too late and the climate crisis makes our world uninhabitable.” 

The company will take on enteric emissions by switching dairy cattle to a high-quality forage diet and innovative rumen modifiers that act as a digestive aid. Digestion can produce up to 50 quarts of gasses (mostly carbon dioxide and methane) an hour in the rumen, the largest component of a cow’s four-chambered stomach, and most of that gas is released by belching. Research has shown, for example, that adding small amounts of seaweed to cattle feed can reduce greenhouse emissions as much as 82 percent.

A single dairy cow produces about 80 pounds of manure a day. Project Mootopia will manage manure through methane reduction technology such as digesters and separators, which reduce the need for commercial fertilizer.

Ben & Jerry’s says the project will use regenerative practices to grow more grass and other feed crops to maintain healthy soils, increase carbon sequestration, improve grassland use, lower synthetic inputs, promote biodiversity and raise the percentage of homegrown feed.

The company says Project Mootopia is also promoting renewable energy on dairy farms and continues Ben & Jerry’s tradition of meeting high animal welfare standards. The 15 participating farms will be split between members of the Dairy Farmers of America (DFA) cooperative in the U.S. and CONO Kaasmakers in the Netherlands. 

“Too often, corporations buy up carbon offsets from somewhere else to claim they are ‘carbon neutral’,” said Taylor Ricketts of the Gund Institute for Environment at the University of Vermont. “Ben & Jerry’s is taking a more meaningful and direct approach: attacking the systemic causes of climate change in its own supply chain to achieve measurable, science-based targets.”

Intensive cooperation among researchers, advisors and farmers is key to developing tailored mitigation methods that are “feasible, affordable and safe,” said Theun Vellinga from Wageningen University and Research in the Netherlands in a public statement. 

“We have constructed the ‘Mitigation Engine’ as a tool to combine the science around [greenhouse gas] mitigation with the knowledge and experience of the farmer,” said Vellinga. “We cannot stick to one mitigation option only; there is no silver bullet. But a package of options will help us reach the target reduction.”

Ben & Jerry’s received $9.3 million to prove and scale regenerative practices on dairy farms from the billion-dollar Climate and Nature Fund of its parent corporation, Unilever, which has set several ambitious goals for reducing its carbon footprint. In addition to the Climate and Nature Fund, Unilever has committed to net zero emissions for all its products by 2039; a deforestation-free supply chain by 2023; empowering a new generation of farmers and smallholders to protect and regenerate their environment; a new Regenerative Agriculture Code for all suppliers; and water stewardship programs for 100 locations in water-stressed areas by 2030.

In addition to its environmental work, Ben & Jerry’s commitment to social activism is widely known, as evidenced by its efforts on behalf of criminal justice reform, worker’s rights, and the ice cream company’s public statements against racism and former President Donald Trump. On its website about turning waste into renewable resources, Ben & Jerry’s says they strive to be guided by their values in everything they do, that the climate crisis is the “single greatest challenge to life on this planet,” and that “everyone, especially businesses, must do their part to get greenhouse gas emissions under control before it’s too late.” 

Image credit: Annie Spratt via Unsplash
 

In Miami, home of the Miami Heat, buses soon will be plastered with images of sweating pregnant women imploring people to seek shade, drink water and rest. It’s part of a vanguard campaign by Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava and Chief Heat Officer Jane Gilbert and their Climate and Heat Health Task Force to save lives – lots of lives – as extreme heat impacts escalate due to climate change.

I’ve written before about extreme heat’s impact on health. And we know definitively now, based on COVID-19’s deadly toll, that real social determinants erupt from these impacts. Climate change shocks, like COVID-19 impacts, aren’t fair. Heat disproportionately impacts Black and Hispanic workers and could claim nearly 60,000 lives a year by 2050.

Which is why it’s particularly important that anyone with a stake in our cities uses that involvement to support extreme heat mitigation. As with many climate resilience interventions, local governments lead. And, fortunately, many of their tactics can be adopted easily by the corporate sector.  

Change outdoor work hours to allow for working when the sun isn’t blazing. A local Phoenix ordinance allows for construction to begin at 5a.m., and Home Depot obliges by opening then, too. Also in the West, the growing trend is to harvest crops at night to escape the worst of the agricultural sector’s heat.

Consider impacts for indoor workers in workplaces without air cooling options. Many job sites are blistering. Make frequent breaks compulsory. Require cooling centers. Ensure that a hierarchy doesn’t prohibit any of your employees from benefiting from such cooling actions. Also, reward foremen and teams that comply, change key performance indicators to include breaks per hour and discard performance measures that drive overwork in too-hot conditions. (And, while we’re at it, change cultural norms to waive dark suits for office workers in hot workplaces.)

Make drinking water accessible. At outdoor entertainment venues – including summer festivals where bottled water prices rival beer prices – make water free and easily available. Some municipalities are considering this requirement for events on public property.

Invest in cool community spaces that community residents actually will use. ClimateResolve, which in Los Angeles builds collaborations to champion equitable climate solutions, is working to create privately funded resilience-hubs – community-serving facilities that includes use as public cooling centers when it gets hot there. 

Install publicly accessible spray pools and water fountains; and in addition, build integrated shade and cool pavements, walls and roofs (think white reflectivity); install as much vegetated space outdoors as possible; and orient buildings to maximize shade.

Plant trees. Keep in mind that trees need water, so make it your business to care for trees in and near your property. It can take years for a tree to provide the shade and air cooling that the evapotranspiration we learned about in school confers. Check out the Tree Equity Score developed by American Forests to determine where your investment can pay significant dividends. Begin now with investments that confer multiple benefits to our communities for a generation.

While major coastal storms often catch the headlines, extreme heat is the leading weather-related killer. Increasingly, academics are pouring through death records of people who died during extreme heat times to identify heat-related deaths. Often, such deaths are a co-morbidity with heart attacks, asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Are these casualties in your community? What can you do to contribute to preventing future deaths – beyond the tips above?

Build partnerships with health care providers, emergency responders, faith communities, workers’ rights organizations, different units of government, corporations and small business to share the responsibility of caring for everyone when it’s scorching outside and to raise awareness about the danger of extreme heat and how to address it. 

And, of course, meet and exceed your ambitious net zero greenhouse gas emission targets. Because while heat will continue to rise due to the current greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere, the prospects for unlivable conditions (did you read about the astonishing heat in India and Pakistan?) are incredibly dire if all countries continue on today’s path of global emissions. 

At the recent Forum on Global Resilience convened by the Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center, Mayor Cava launched Miami-Dade County’s (and the nation’s ) first Heat Season. She and Kathy Baughman McLeod, director of the Center, are on a mission to name heat events like we identify hurricanes. 

In the face of rising city temperatures, more Americans are inspired to ensure that those most at risk in hot weather, the poor and minorities, survive and thrive. And many more must be so motivated. Simply consider this: Vivid Economics, a strategic economics consultancy, estimates that heat-related losses of labor productivity will cost the U.S. economy half a trillion dollars annually by 2050. 

Let’s agree: We are not playin’ with heat. All of us have a role – indeed, a stake – in creating ways to stay cool even as global temperatures rise. 

Image credit: Daniel Alvarado via Pexels

The political leanings of U.S. Supreme Court justices are not a matter of routine discussion in corporate DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) meetings. However, they should be, they must be, and they will be if business leaders really are serious about their responsibility to ensure diversity, equality and inclusion in the corporate family. Or was DEI always just a joke, all along?

How to sidestep the bystander effect

Activists seeking to ban abortion have held the rhetorical cards for far too long, thanks in part to business leaders who stood by while phrases like “right to life” and “pro-life” set the terms of debate.

Business leaders can begin to take action by defining abortion in the context of their DEI programs. Rather than getting distracted by arguments over the beginning of life or the legal status of a fetus, employers can —  and should —  insist that the anti-abortion movement is rooted in an extremist religious belief, not a civic one.

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As a matter of social morality, legal principle and medical ethics, it is generally agreed that society has interest in fetal life, limited to the advanced stages of pregnancy.

In contrast, the idea that society has an unlimited interest in preserving the existence of a zygote, embryo or fetus is of apiece with fundamentalist theory. It places men at the center of the decision-making universe and while treating everything else having to do with gender, sexuality and sexual identity as sins to be quashed. In short, it is the complete opposite of DEI.

In the context of DEI programs, the idea that non-believers should be held to an extremist position on pregnancy is as ridiculous as the notion that everyone in a company should be forced to adopt the behavior and clothing of a particular religion, whether or not they identify with that religion.

Calling out the anti-pregnancy movement

It is high time for employers to take control of the rhetoric and call the “pro-life” movement by its real name.

Unlimited social and legal control over an individual person’s pregnancy is not pro-life. It is anti-pregnancy. It stigmatizes all pregnancies, by identifying the womb as a human organ under community ownership, to be monitored and controlled by any passing stranger.

The anti-pregnancy movement reduces all pregnant people to a less than human status. Regardless of the risk to their health, life and safety, their right to self-determination is superseded by community control over their womb.

The resulting picture is about as ugly as it can get, for everyone. Every pregnant person is literally reduced to a community-owned vessel. Under this regimen, even those who plan their pregnancy and carry it to term are vulnerable to constant surveillance, harassment and stalking.  

The social bulldozers are coming for your DEI program

Against this backdrop, business leaders are deluded if they think they can wall off their DEI programs from the outside world.

That is made abundantly clear by the authenticated draft opinion of the Supreme Court attributed to Associate Justice Samuel Alito, which was leaked to the news organization Politico last week. In the draft, Alito outlined the fundamentalist case for overturning Roe V. Wade and other pregnancy rights precedents.

Court watchers quickly pointed out that the opinion does not stop at pregnancy rights. It upends decades of decisions affirming privacy rights of all kinds. As written, the draft opinion threatens the right to contraceptives along with marriage equality and LGBTQ+ protections, among other areas.

A nationwide ban on abortion could also be the ultimate outcome of the Alito opinion, forcing the anti-pregnancy movement onto states where privacy rights have long been respected.

Yes, let’s talk about ethics at the U.S. Supreme Court

The leaked draft has sparked a torrent of outrage, which Chief Justice John Roberts and his Republican allies in Congress have tried tamp down by expressing their outrage over the ethics of leaking an internal Court document to the public.

So, let’s have it. Let’s have that discussion about ethics at the Supreme Court. That discussion is long overdue, considering the conflict of interest issues swirling for years around Associate Justice Clarence Thomas.

The apparent power of a single executive at The Federalist Society to influence the confirmation process under multiple Republican presidents is another ethics issue that should be under discussion.

Also in need of a thorough airing is the successful effort by Republicans in the Senate to pack the court with justices vetted by The Federalist Society. In 2016, the Republican majority in the Senate blocked former form president Obama from exercising his authority to nominate Merrick Garland for a seat left vacant by the death of Associate Justice Antonin Scalia. That exercise in pure partisanship enabled former president Trump to replace Scalia with another Federalist Society conservative, Neil Gorsuch, after he took office in 2017.

In 2018 the rather abrupt and unexplained decision of Justice Anthony Kennedy to retire cleared the way for Trump to nominate Brett Kavanaugh as a younger, more reliably conservative replacement. Trump and Republicans in the Senate also rushed a third conservative nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, onto the court just days before the U.S. presidential election of 2020, after Ruth Bader Ginsberg died on September 18 of that year. The effort to install Barrett compressed a normally months-long process into weeks, but apparently that did not raise any ethical red flags in the Roberts court.

In addition, reporters have been scrolling back through confirmation hearings, during which several of the conservative nominees implied that overturning the right to privacy was not on their judicial radar, leading to accusations that some of them outright lied to members of the Senate. Apparently, that is not a breach of ethics, either.

What’s a corporate leader to do?

The leaked draft is actually a good thing. It has finally brought the true agenda of the anti-pregnancy movement into the sphere of public discussion. It has cleared the way for corporate leaders to mark their ground on diversity, equality and inclusion in no uncertain terms.

Either employers support DEI, or they don’t. Either they defend their employees against the anti-pregnancy movement, or they don’t.

A pro-pregnancy movement did begin to take shape among corporate leaders three years ago, when a group of companies took out a full-page ad in The New York Times to protest a growing torrent of state-based anti-pregnancy laws.

Clearly, that movement needs to step up to the next level. Offering to support and protect employees impacted by state based anti-pregnancy laws is a good start, but more is needed. Corporate leaders need to stop supporting candidates and legislators who seek to undermine the basic principles of a modern democratic society. 

The only answer now is money, and plenty of it, directed away from anti-pregnancy politicians, and towards allies in state legislatures and the U.S. Congress, who uphold the principle that control over one’s pregnancy is a basic human right.

Abortion is a necessary feature of individual self-determination and equality under the law, regardless of what religious extremists profess to believe.

Image credit: Ian Hutchinson via Unsplash

With May ushering in Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month, there has been no shortage of commemorations and reminders from companies that they “stand with” the AAPI community.

But based on data that has gauged how Asian Americans across the U.S. feel about their roles in the workplace, it has become clear that messages about standing with people with AAPI heritage aren’t necessarily resulting in organizations actually doing enough to stand up for these employees to ensure they feel welcomed and included.

Bottom line: The challenges many Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders feel about assimilation and acceptance across much of the country is magnified on the shop floor and in the office.

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Take a recent Bain & Co. report which, among other studies, confirms that a more inclusive environment can improve a company’s performance while lending a hand to other efforts such as recruitment and retention. But dig a little deeper into Bain’s research, and one will find that among various demographic groups, Asian men (16 percent) and Asian women (20 percent) overall feel less included in the workplace compared to the rest of the population.

To be clear, the AAPI community is hardly a monolith, as beyond many ethnicities, the wider community also experiences a wide range of differences in political leanings, socioeconomic statuses and how closely individuals actually identify with their culture. Nevertheless, it is clear that management needs to do more to order to make all employees feel as if they have a stake, and therefore a future, within any organization. “The facts on the ground, as opposed to widespread assumptions and stereotypes, demonstrate clearly that U.S. companies need to start paying attention to inclusion and belonging for Asian American employees,” wrote Karthik Venkataraman and Pam Yee, Bain partners who are based in the company’s Washington, D.C. office.

Another dataset to consider: While about 9 percent of the U.S. workforce identifies as part of the AAPI community (13 percent when evaluating white-collar jobs), less than 6 percent of senior executives at America’s largest companies are Asian American — suggesting that many AAPI employees frequently find themselves overlooked come promotion time.

A SHRM study from last summer found that many Asian Americans witness a lack of opportunity to advance within their organizations. Completed a few months after the March 2021 murders of six Asian women in Atlanta, SHRM’s survey found that about two-thirds of Asian Americans said that the business community had ignored racism against the APPI community; 58 percent of them said racism experienced on the job damaged any relationship they had with their employer; and 55 percent believed business at large had done very little to take any action against systemic racism.

Clearly, leadership is lacking across corporate America when it comes to supporting the AAPI community. And while we’re on the topic of leadership, conventional thinking about what makes a “good leader” ranks among the problems why companies often struggle to build a more accepting and inclusive work culture.

“Many companies are trying to expand the idea of what skills and characteristics make a good manager, though they are still fighting against a long-ingrained belief that traits such as aggression and competitiveness, adjectives typically associated with alpha males, are necessary for good leaders,” Theresa Agovino wrote last summer for SHRM. “All minority groups would benefit from broader definitions that would allow for more respect of cultural differences.”

Image credit: PxHere

Energy storage is the key to unlocking Earth’s vast wind and solar energy resources, but limitations associated with lithium-ion batteries, the technology of choice to date, are driving demand for alternatives. Li-ion technology is facing new challenges in its supply chain in addition to well-known operational constraints, safety risks and environmental impacts. While Li-ion batteries can be a good option for relatively short-duration storage applications, innovative new offerings, such as the utility-scale iron flow batteries produced by the energy storage firm ESS, provide more environmentally sustainable solutions that are able to store and deploy clean energy over longer durations built on a streamlined, plug-and-play platform.

Long-duration energy storage and the flow battery advantage

Li-ion batteries are long-lasting when used in small devices, but large-scale Li-ion installations, such as those capable of powering the grid or other large energy users, typically only provide power for a few hours. That is sufficient in some cases, but there are many more instances in which energy storage technologies capable of delivering power for 10 hours or more could provide utilities and large-scale energy users with needed flexibility and control over their power supply. In addition, these long-duration technologies can serve as emergency back-up over extended periods and accelerate the adoption of wind and solar resources, reducing or eliminating the need to construct new fossil power plants.

Flow batteries are a type of long-duration technology that has begun to challenge Li-ion in the energy storage space. As the name suggests, flow batteries leverage the ability of fluids (electrolytes) to store electricity when they flow through the system in one direction and release it again when they flow in the reverse direction.

One leading appeal of the technology is its simplicity. The bulk of a flow battery system consists of tanks which can be scaled up or down according to needed duration. In addition, the electrolytes used in typical flow batteries are non-flammable and non-toxic, making the battery systems safe and environmentally benign. Unlike Li-ion technology, flow batteries can also be taken out of service and started up again quickly, even after sitting dormant for long periods. That provides energy managers with a higher degree of flexibility and responsiveness to demand.

Flow batteries are not new, but early iterations of the technology were bulky and inefficient. Recent advances in materials science have provided innovators with new opportunities to improve efficiency and develop more effective, energy-dense systems.

A new twist on the old flow battery

Conventional flow batteries utilize two electrolyte solutions separated by a specialized membrane. A unique feature of the system developed by ESS is that the same base material (iron chloride) is used for both electrolytes. 

When the ESS battery charges, iron dissolved in the electrolyte is turned into metallic form and adheres to carbon plates, which act as electrodes. The amount of energy that can be stored is equivalent to the surface area of each plate times the thickness of the iron plating. To discharge the battery, the negative and positive terminals are simply reversed. That makes the iron dissolve back into the saltwater, as quickly as flipping on a light switch. The stored energy is available virtually in an instant.

ESS built its technology on previous research, with two key advances that provide for a closed-loop system that is easily recyclable and longer-lived. 

One new element is a precisely engineered management system for the iron-to-carbon plating process, which enables thousands of charging cycles without degradation. The other improvement is the electrolyte, which is designed to be restored to its original condition with each charging cycle so it can be reused thousands of times.

The sustainable supply chain of the future

The environmental and social justice impacts of the fossil fuel industry are well known. Environmentally intensive extraction and refining practices disproportionately harm low-income communities and communities of color while the particulate and greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel combustion place many populations at risk, particularly those in low-lying areas more vulnerable to flooding and sea-level rise. 

With a strong desire for more sustainable energy solutions, the impacts of the lithium supply chain are becoming increasingly apparent and include reliance upon critical minerals produced in politically unstable regions with poor environmental and human rights track records. When in use, Li-ion batteries pose fire risks, creating obstacles to safe siting and operation These challenges for the Li-ion battery field are surfacing as corporate sustainability planners increasingly seek cleaner, more ethical and lower-impact energy solutions.  

ESS stands out in that its battery does not employ rare earth minerals or materials sourced from conflict areas. The main components of the system are domestically produced in the U.S., including plastic and fiberglass tanks, casings and pipes, along with off-the-shelf pumps and other electrical equipment, according to the company. Likewise, the iron salts and carbon plates are sourced from a number of domestic vendors. 

The electrolyte solution is environmentally benign and nonflammable. When an ESS battery reaches the end of its life, the electrolyte can be easily recycled or dehydrated, and the salts can be transferred to public works agencies and other users.

A simple solution for utilities and energy managers

One ESS system, the Energy Warehouse, has been designed as a fully integrated, transportable, plug-and-play module enclosed in a 40-foot steel shipping container. This all-in-one approach relieves energy planners from having to develop complicated installation plans, and permits are relatively easy to acquire because the system is water-based and environmentally friendly.

Aside from ease of installation, ESS cites the operational simplicity of its iron flow battery, especially with regards to utility-scale operations.

“With Li-ion batteries for utilities, you get a big rule book of do's and don'ts to maximize life of battery without voiding the warranty or violating safety requirements,” said Hugh McDermott, senior vice president of business development and sales for ESS. “Lithium-ion systems have to be rested after charging, have to be discharged daily, there is a limit on the number of charges annually, and a limit on the rate of charge.”

In contrast, “there are no rules for the ESS system,” he explained. “It is more flexible as to charging and discharging. There are no rest periods, no cooling off, no worries about heat and safety, and no limit to yearly or lifetime cycling. With zero performance degradation, there is no need to replace modules in an eight- or 10-year time frame, no need to plan for battery pack replacement, and no need for a sensor system to track battery health.”

The bottom-line case for sustainable energy storage

The cost of the ESS system is similar to an equivalent Li-ion system while providing much longer duration and operating life. The ESS flow battery offers two to three times the usability of Li-ion systems, while lasting two to three times longer, McDermott said. 

In addition, the ESS system relies on established industries for end-of-life recycling, enabling energy planners to factor those costs into consideration. In contrast, end-of-life costs for Li-ion systems are unknown because the Li-ion battery recycling industry is still in its infancy.

“The market is evolving and will continue to evolve, and an iron flow battery system you invest in today can be upgraded by adding more electrolyte at a low cost,” McDermott explained. Corporate planners and utility managers who make smart decisions about energy storage technology today will help ensure a strong foothold in the sustainable – and profitable – energy landscape of the future.

This article series is sponsored by ESS, Inc. and produced by the TriplePundit editorial team. 

Images courtesy of ESS, Inc. 

As discussed in the first part of this series, it’s clear that many employees — particularly women of color — are hesitant to return to the office. Nevertheless, Tara Jaye Frank, equity strategist and author of The Waymakers, actually sees opportunities for business executives to address diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) within their organizations. A well-planned and smartly deployed strategy could result in a working environment in which everyone is encouraged to reach their full potential, which in turn can help companies retain talent and remain viable for the long term.

So, how does Frank help leadership stay on course with such goals? With six years of consulting under her belt, Frank has it down to a science. The first step is a work culture assessment. Leaders are instructed to take a good hard look at their reality and embrace it. That means analyzing payroll, promotions and retention data; paying attention to who is moving where within the organization and at what rates; and analyzing patterns across all data sets, including survey data from present employees and exit data from those who leave. Next, she helps company leadership define a vision — and they work together to determine what systems and processes need to be changed or implemented in order to achieve that vision. 

Frank is hopeful that her book will be used as a guide by more leaders to embrace their potential as “waymakers” in working to implement DEI in their organizations. Her goal for the future is one we should all commit to — a vision in which “every single person in the workplace, especially Black and Brown, can not only be themselves but also be able to achieve their highest aspiration.”

In the meantime, she does have some advice for Black women needing to safeguard their mental health upon returning to the office. She starts with a reminder to take care of themselves and take paid time off or a leave of absence, as they're able, if they need it.

When dealing with outright racism she also recommends that it is important to determine if it is an individual causing harm or part of the company culture. If there is no intervention made in response to inappropriate comments, or if high-level leaders are the ones making them, that is a sign that the problem is a company norm. So, while filing a complaint with human resources may fix the issue with an individual, it can really backfire if it is part of the company norm. Frank encourages women to connect with their external network for guidance and options and says that having such an external network is imperative for Black women in corporate America. With blatant racism, sometimes the best thing to do is find a new position. “That kind of harm gets on you and in you and it’s really difficult to unravel,” she explained.

As for leaders, Frank recommends they take their employees’ mental health seriously. “Whenever there is toxicity in any environment, it always harms the marginalized the most,” she said. As such, workers end up doubting their own abilities, and it becomes too painful for them to be so invested in their job. Instead of being able to fully contribute, they are forced to focus on self-preservation. 

It doesn’t stop with the individual either. Organizations suffer when they allow toxic and racist behavior to continue. An employee who is focused on self-preservation isn’t going to be able to be as creative in their contributions or as interested in collaboration. “Companies that don’t prioritize mental health will have a high turnover and low creativity," Frank explained. 

On the other hand, if a company wants workers to feel safe contributing and giving their all, then it is important to address racism immediately instead of trying to ignore it and pretend it won’t happen again. “Sometimes a company says they don’t want to give it attention, but that’s really saying it’s acceptable to them," Frank said. “The best response is swift, public and clear.”

Climbing the corporate ladder shouldn’t come with the expectation that Black women sacrifice their mental health or their personhood. As workers return to the office, corporate leaders have the opportunity and the responsibility to implement changes that eliminate microaggressions and encourage Black women to reach their full potential within any given organization. 

Image credit: Anna Shvets via Pixabay
 

The dream of a global hydrogen economy has tantalized policymakers ever since the 1970s when researchers began to discuss how the ubiquitous, clean-burning fuel could replace coal, oil and natural gas. Skeptics have had 50 years to scoff at the notion, but it looks like hydrogen fans are getting the last laugh — and that could open up new pathways for scaling up green hydrogen and, in the bigger picture, decarbonization across multiple commercial sectors.

The renewable energy difference

Hydrogen is the most common element in the universe, but it does not exist independently. It must be extracted from something. The primary source of hydrogen today is natural gas, along with coal to a lesser extent.

Hydrogen is also abundant in renewable resources, including water as well as biogas and biomass. The problem is how to extract hydrogen from renewable hosts without adding excessive costs and greenhouse gas emissions to the global economy.

Both of those problems appeared insurmountable until recent years, when the cost of wind and solar energy began dropping. That sea change in the global energy profile has provided low cost, zero emission electricity to power electrolyzer systems, which deploy an electrical current to push so-named green hydrogen gas out of water.

Though much of the media attention has focused on the use of hydrogen in fuel cell electric cars, recent developments indicate that green hydrogen is only beginning to flex its muscles on the global scene. 

Here are five key developments that have been sailing under the media radar.

Electrofuels

Fuel cell and battery-powered electric vehicles will eventually dominate the passenger car market, but that will take many years. In the meantime, biofuels can help neutralize greenhouse gas emissions to some extent.

However, the biofuel supply chain cannot scale up indefinitely. It is already running into food supply and and habitat conservation issues.  An alternative pathway is needed, and that’s where electrofuels come in.

During the Obama administration, researchers began to focus on electrofuels as drop-in replacements for both conventional biofuels and fossil fuels. The initial concept was to produce fuel from solar energy and bacteria in a process that mimics photosynthesis.

More recently, researchers have begun deploying low-cost renewable energy and green hydrogen to skip the bacteria and go straight to a synthetic process that deploys captured carbon dioxide, yielding a drop-in replacement for conventional fuel.

Porsche appears to be the first automaker to invest in the new electrofuels. The automaker has been investing in electric vehicles, but apparently the company also plans to lean on electrofuels to neutralize emissions from its profitable 911 line of sports cars.

Another leading firm to enter the field is Maersk. Last year Maersk invested in the Silicon Valley electrofuel startup Prometheus Fuels, which is developing a process that deploys direct-air carbon capture. BMW also has an interest in the project, along with American Airlines and other stakeholders.

Green steel

Heavy industry is one area that has resisted decarbonization, but that is beginning to change. In Europe, the steel industry is depending on the new HYBRIT project to demonstrate the use of green hydrogen to replace fossil energy in iron and steelmaking.

Closer to home, the global steel maker ArcelorMittal recently announced a successful test of green hydrogen in the direct reduced iron process at its steelmaking facility Canada. The process normally deploys natural gas to extract oxygen from iron oxide pellets, yielding metallic iron for steel production.

The somewhat modest test involved replacing only 6.8 percent of natural gas at the Canadian plant with green hydrogen, but apparently that was good enough to convince ArcelorMittal to continue pursuing that pathway.

“This test is an important milestone in the Company's journey to produce zero carbon emissions steel via the DRI-based steelmaking route using green hydrogen as an input,” ArcelorMittal stated.

The company is also working on a hydrogen demonstration project at its plant in Hamburg, Germany. The plans involve sourcing the hydrogen from waste gas at the facility at the beginning, then transitioning to green hydrogen as supplies become available.

Power generation and energy infrastructure

The design of systems that can transition from gas to green hydrogen is also taking hold in the power generation industry, where existing gas storage facilities, pipelines and other infrastructure can also be called into play.

The field has attracted the interest of leading global engineering firms, including Mitsubishi. The company is a stakeholder in the multi-level Advanced Clean Energy Storage project in Utah. The project includes converting an 840-megawatt coal power plant to a mix of green hydrogen and natural gas initially, with a goal of 100 percent green hydrogen in later years.

ACES is said to be the largest project of its kind, and it is not the only one. The idea of a “green hydrogen hub” that combines production, storage and deployment is already catching on among other U.S. states, including a newly announced, massive tri-state project that partners New York with neighboring Connecticut and New Jersey.

The green hydrogen-green ammonia connection

Aside from its use as a fuel, hydrogen is also entangled in other key global industries including agriculture and food processing as well as toiletries and medicines.

In particular, green hydrogen provides a pathway for decarbonizing the ammonia industry. As indicated by the chemical formula NH3, the industry currently relies heavily on fossil inputs to obtain hydrogen for ammonia production (the “N” is nitrogen, which can be drawn from the air).

Aside from its direct use in agriculture and other fields, ammonia can also serve as a low-cost, easily transportable carrier for hydrogen. Once the ammonia arrives at its destination, the hydrogen can be extracted for other uses.

The cost of extracting hydrogen from ammonia has been an obstacle, but the firm Hydrofuel Canada is among those working on solutions.

Last month, Hydrofuel licensed the patent-pending, low cost “MAPS” green ammonia system from Georgia Tech, which involves generating ammonia directly from electrolyzed water and airborne nitrogen. Hydrofuel plans to leverage the ammonia has a hydrogen carrier.

“Green Hydrogen can be separated out from this ammonia to sell at about $1.50 a kg, compared to traditional green H2 which sells for up to $15 a kg. Even at $.08/kWh the production of green Ammonia and releasing Hydrogen from it will be lower cost than any hydrocarbon fuel,” Hydrofuel claims.

New electrolyzer technology

Green hydrogen can be extracted from various forms of biomass, but so far most investor dollars have gone to water electrolysis. That puts the focus on lowering the cost of electrolysis systems, and activity in that area is beginning to pick up steam.

Last month, Bosch joined a growing roster of legacy firms that have committed to improving electrolyzer systems, lowering costs, and ramping up production. The company aims to market and produce “smart” electrolyzer systems in high volume.

Lowering the cost of the membranes and catalysts used in electrolyzer systems is a particular area of focus for startups and legacy firms alike. For example, the startup H2U Technologies is developing a new catalyst-coated membrane that eliminates the use of platinum and other expensive metals in electrolyzer systems. Honeywell is also working along the same lines. Earlier this year, the company announced that it is anticipating a 25 percent drop in the cost of an electrolyzer stack once it commercializes its new catalyst-coated membrane.

Another cost-cutting approach is illustrated by the U.S. firm Advanced Ionics, which is marketing a steam-driven, energy-efficient electrolyzer system for use at industrial sites.

This is just a small sample of the activity under way. Energy stakeholders are also beginning to explore green hydrogen production as a valuable add-on for offshore wind farms, and the field of concentrating solar power could also help increase the supply and lower the cost of green hydrogen.

The window of opportunity to scoff at the global hydrogen economy of the future is beginning to close. 

Image credit: Herbert Aust via Pixabay

Ireland is experiencing true green momentum. The Climate Action Plan 2021, Ireland’s all-of-government plan to tackle climate breakdown and achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, is just one example of an initiative that is helping Ireland achieve its sustainability and green economy goals. In fact, Ireland ranks number 12 in the MIT Technology Review 2022 Green Future Index, a ranking of 76 leading countries and territories on their progress and commitment toward building a low carbon future.

Here are three positive trends that are helping Ireland deliver on sustainability goals, all strategies that are worthwhile for American organizations to consider employing as well.

Make your business models circular

Achieving a circular economy requires many things that are new; new ways of designing products, new manufacturing methods, new materials and new business models. Every company produces waste – it’s unavoidable – but if you can repurpose it, you help the environment and often achieve significant cost savings. Given that the future depends on improving the planet’s climate, you also may find yourself ahead of the curve when you go circular.

For instance, the Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson, located in Cork, Ireland, this year gained recognition from the World Economic Forum (WEF) as one of only six sustainability lighthouses globally, a designation given to manufacturers considered to be factories of the future that have also achieved sustainability and productivity breakthroughs. For good reason: In recent years, the company has expanded the site’s footprint by 34 percent to meet growing business needs – but lowered carbon emission per kg of product by 56 percent. The site recently announced an additional $158 million investment to expand the facility.

There are ample examples of American companies creating a circular economy in Ireland, however. Rent the Runway, located in Galway, has been working to minimize the environmental impacts of fast fashion, by allowing consumers to rent high-fashion, trendy clothes instead of buying them, which helps minimize wasteful consumption practices. 

By making better use of the resources we already have, companies in Ireland can significantly reduce the cost of doing business. It is estimated that annual savings of $2.4 billion are achievable by boosting Ireland’s circularity. By embracing a circular approach to business, we can achieve growth without degrading the environment.

Deploy sustainability goals that align with your country

There is an urgent need for companies to invest in a more sustainable future. And advancing a country’s green economy starts with a plan. For example, in January 2021, Ireland announced the National Recovery and Resilience Plan as a result of COVID-19. Within this plan was the goal to cut greenhouse gases by 51 percent by the year 2030. Because wind energy is one of Ireland’s largest energy sources, the country deployed The National Energy & Climate Plan, which aims to develop 5 GW of additional offshore wind energy by 2030 and 30 GW of wind energy in the next 20 years. The Codling Wind Farm, which started in the early 2000s, and Moneypoint’s Offshore Wind Farms, which started in 2021, will help make this goal a reality, together they will bring nearly 3 GW of offshore wind capacity to Ireland. 

However, not every country will be able to deploy an offshore wind farm, which is why it’s important to create sustainability goals that align with your country’s ability and climate action plans, along with knowing what resources are available. In 2018, Ireland announced its Climate Action Fund (CAF), which was established to provide assistance and financial support to projects that will help Ireland achieve its climate and energy targets. Ireland’s Climate Action Fund offers about $530 million in Government funding. Depending on your location, you may not have as many resources to draw upon, but those opportunities to make money from improving the planet are out there. The U.S. Environment Protection Agency (EPA) has numerous partnership opportunities for corporations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and become more resilient to climate change.

Go big

Big problems need big solutions. The aforementioned ESB and the energy storage technology company Fluence, a Siemens and AES Company, headquartered in Washington, D.C., had announced two new battery projects in Dublin, one of which will be the European Union’s largest battery energy storage system project by energy capacity. Financial projections haven’t been released yet, but one of the battery projects, on an artificial peninsula called Poolbeg, will power about 321,000 homes and businesses in Ireland during peak demand.

One thing is certain. The demand for energy isn’t going to wane and the need for less energy utilized and to make better use of resources is going to become more important than ever. As supply chains get more complicated and geopolitics encourages the world to speed up its mission to rely less on oil, carbon-friendly initiatives will only become more important for all global firms.

Interested in having your voice heard on 3p? Contact us at editorial@3BLMedia.com and pitch your idea for a guest article to us.

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While the majority of American workers are meeting the call to return to the office with less than resounding enthusiasm, Black women are near-unanimous in their desire to remain remote or switch to a hybrid model. This reality is thanks in part to the reprieve they’ve experienced from microaggressions and harassment while working from home. Of course, returning to the office shouldn’t require Black women to sacrifice their mental health. Instead, Tara Jaye Frank, equity strategist and author of The Waymakers (May 2022), sees an opportunity for executives to address diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) in their organizations and create environments that encourage everyone to reach their full potential, thus retaining talent and boosting their companies’ success. 

Workers have any number of reasons for not wanting to return to the office: a better work-life balance, flexibility in their schedules, increased productivity from fewer distractions and a greater ability to focus, decreased anxiety, a stronger sense of safety, and so on. But for Black women specifically, working remotely can mean fewer opportunities for co-workers to display microaggressions or be blatantly racist. As Dr. Ella Washington of the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University explained to Bloomberg, office chit-chat also often leads to a sense of exclusion where Black women are not part of the conversation. Working remotely alleviates that discomfort. Remote work also helps with the crasser microaggressions: Dr. Courtney McCluney of Cornell University, for example, told the New York Times that working from home meant that for the first time in her career no one made insensitive remarks about her hair or tried to touch it. 

If that’s not bad enough, microaggressions often take a dig at ideas and accomplishments as well. Tara Jaye Frank explained to TriplePundit how ideas offered by Black women are more likely to be dismissed and their schooling and degrees are often challenged as less valuable. As a result, they are asked to prove themselves over and over by providing more evidence of their expertise. She explained that these types of microaggressions are the result of society’s perception of leadership as a white and male role, so those that don’t fit this mold are held to higher standards and denied the responsibilities they seek. 

After spending 21 years in corporate America — and achieving an executive position at the age of 29 — Frank is fully aware of the feelings of isolation that come with being a Black woman in business. She also described the burden of responsibility, as well as the sense of privilege, that comes with being expected to represent the Black community in the workplace. All of this pressure, along with the extra scrutiny in the form of microaggressions and harrassment, can make Black women feel like they have to be perfect. Frank explained how this has the unfortunate side effect of discouraging them from making risky moves or suggesting ideas outside of the norm, even though those ideas are exactly what makes DEI so valuable to business outcomes. 

The compound effect of all of this also drastically limits how many Black women are able to step into leadership roles. In fact, the number of women of color drops at each level of management in corporate America. That’s where Frank intends for her book to help. She described the title as a reference to her audience: “people who make a way for those that have been left behind.” Inspired by her work with high-level executives, she is confident that those in leadership positions want to do the right thing, and she is eager to show them how. “Leaders don’t show up looking to harm people,” she said. “This is about building the capacity to be more equitable.”

While the dismal level of diversity at the C-suite level suggests that corporate America has failed miserably when it comes to DEI, Frank maintains that change is possible with the right action plan. “It is one thing to claim a vision,” she said, adding that leaders have to be willing to make the decisions and implement the measures that will bring it into existence. They have to take accountability for defining goals and meeting them — and also determining whether their companies’ culture is getting in the way of deploying an effective DEI strategy in the first place. 

In the next article of this two-part series, Frank shares how companies can move forward on securing a culture that respects diversity and inclusion, including a commitment to taking employees’ mental health seriously.

Image credit: Brandy Kennedy via Unsplash