Search

By Shannon Houde

Talking numbers can be an awkward and nerve-wracking experience. But you need to roll those shoulders back and put on your brave face because — as you well know — once you are in an organization it is difficult to make a big jump in salary. That is why you need to negotiate your worth at the very start.

Knock-out your next stint in the hot seat with these 6 tips:

1.Don’t rush

Don’t talk numbers until after the hiring manager offers you a salary. Just hold-tight. It’s best to wait so that you don’t ask for less than what he or she was prepared to offer. Recruiters will often pressure you early on to reveal your current earnings.  You can give them a range and be a bit vague but prepared, just like they do to you. Something like…

“My current annual total comp ranges from $70-80K including benefits and bonus, however, I expect to be compensated at my market value which I have researched and know is more in line with $90-100K”

Keep calm by continuing to practice my top 6 Tips to loosen up and land the job.

2. Dream big

You do have some leverage: You're the top choice. So, if you’d like to make $85k then ask for $100k. And if you're feeling intimidated, consider that failing to negotiate effectively could cost you as much as $500,000 by the time you're 60. That gets the blood pumping, doesn't it?

3. Know your worth

Part of effective salary negotiation is knowing your worth. A few online tools can help you have a minimum salary in mind: Glassdoor.com, Salary.com, and PayScale.com are good places to start.

But salary benchmarking is only the starting point — or rather, the bottom point — of the negotiation. It's your minimum figure. Aim higher than the minimum to give yourself room to maneuver and prepare to sell your skills and track record. A good salesperson has conviction that what they are selling is worth it, so believe you're worth what you're asking for, and you'll find others will believe it too.

4. Don’t be a typical “girl”

We know the stereotypes: Women appreciate relationships over outcomes, they are more willing to compromise, they don't like confrontation, yada-yada.

Well, according to research cited in this article, there is a grain of truth in such stereotypes. Women are reluctant to negotiate in face-to-face meetings. They’d rather stick to money talk via email or over the phone. I say, best to prep yourself adequately and practice with someone before you have that live interaction.

5. Make it bigger than you

Imagine a family member or friend who would be proud or inspired to hear you stepped up. Consider how your negotiating can reinforce and revitalize the confidence of other women. If it helps, you can even take it a step further and pretend to negotiate on behalf someone else. This Harvard Kennedy School study showed that women who pretended to negotiate on a friend’s behalf asked for almost $7,000 more on average than if they negotiate for themselves:

 “One big hurdle for me was just realizing: I’m not greedy, I’m not super aggressive, I’m not ungrateful for this job,” says Kristin Wong, a freelance writer and journalist based in Los Angeles. “If I want to level the playing field, I have to do something about it.”

6. Remember, you don’t have to take the job

Be confident in your worth and path to success, because “Success, it turns out, correlates just as closely with confidence as it does with competence.”

If the shoe doesn’t fit, don’t wear it. You’ll be uncomfortable and itching for a new pair too soon! Get bespoke advice, unique tools, and more with my team.

Shannon Houde is an ICF certified executive and career coach who founded, Walk of Life Consulting, the first international professional development advisory business focused solely on the social impact, environmental and sustainable business fields.

Image credit: Vitaly via Unsplash

 

This article series is sponsored by Consumers Energy and went through our normal editorial review process. 

By Whitney Skeans

Each winter in Michigan, the question we all ask ourselves is: How cold will it get this year?

For most, the question is simple enough – check the Farmer’s Almanac, tune into the weather forecast, ask a few friends or co-workers what they’ve heard. And, if "colder" is the reply, we may decide to don that fluffy wool sweater, turn up the thermostat, make a pot of soup, or throw a log on the fireplace at home.

For some, colder weather means something far more urgent. Can I afford my energy bill? Will I be able to keep my heat?

Our state’s economy is as strong as it’s been in a while, but the struggles we hear from some of our customers don’t go away. Families are still stung financially by job losses or medical bills, or any number of challenges that may leave people choosing between their energy bill and other necessities each month. It’s a juggling act of responding to multiple, often competing needs -- which crisis to address first, which bill to pay, which need to forfeit.

That’s why it is critical for people in times of difficulty to understand that help is available. Consumers Energy is working to connect people facing hardship with nonprofit organizations in communities across Michigan. Recently, the state awarded nearly $90 million from the Michigan Energy Assistance Program (MEAP) to agencies to help with heating costs through this month and the rest of the winter.

Help is available today for anyone who has fallen behind and whose income qualifies. Many people who have difficulty with their energy bill may wait for a shut-off notice before reaching out for aid. With the health and safety of customers as its first priority, Consumers Energy wants to help prevent crisis. Customers do not have to wait for a shut-off notice to qualify for energy bill assistance. Getting help early is the best way to stay safe and in control.

Consumers Energy encourages anyone who is seeking help, wherever they live in Michigan, to start by dialing 2-1-1, a free service that can refer people to local assistance programs, or to visit www.ConsumersEnergy.com/assistance. Resource specialists at 2-1-1 are available 24-7 for free, confidential conversations to connect people with programs that can help with bills and support a path to self-sufficiency.

In addition to outside help, people might realize they can take steps on their own to lower their energy bill. These steps can be as simple as lowering the setting on their home thermostat, clearing vents of furniture and rugs, or being sure to fill cracks around doors and windows that let cold air inside on winter’s coldest days. Get this advice and more at www.ConsumersEnergy.com/coldweather.

Finally, this winter it’s essential that everyone consider safety first. We encourage people who use space heaters, generators or other means of heating their homes to be sure to read all directions and exercise caution. Avoid leaving heating units unattended, ensure they are adequately ventilated, and take all other appropriate safety measures.

This fall saw some unusually mild weather in Michigan, but there’s no doubt that winter has arrived! And, it’s probably here to stay for a while. Michigan residents need to know help is available right now. Consumers Energy and many friends among Michigan’s nonprofit agency networks are working to keep the lights and heat on for those who need it most.

Whitney Skeans is customer assistance manager for Consumers Energy.

Image credit: Flickr / Paul 

While many of us were preoccupied with the holidays and bringing in the new year, the Trump Administration has certainly been busy. Lost in the buzz over the tax cuts was a flurry of maneuvers by the federal government’s executive branch, which reversed several laws launched related to energy, mining and transportation.

The announcements – some of which were not even announced publicly but executed by other means, akin to the FedExed letters announcing the firings of all members of an HIV/AIDS advisory council – were clearly buried during the last two weeks of the year with the understanding that they will not be popular with the U.S. public.

The following under-the-radar law reversals are especially ironic, considering Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke’s public statement last week declaring that the Trump Administration’s environmental legacy is “second only to Teddy Roosevelt.”

Nixed regulations meant to prevent another Deepwater Horizon oil spill

In a late Friday announcement designed to escape press coverage, the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), which is charged with enforcing worker safety and environmental protection within the offshore oil and gas industry, announced it had revamped “production-safety-systems” rules. Those rules were designed to reduce various safety and environmental risks, including those attributed to the 2010 explosion, which killed 11 workers and led to the Deepwater Horizon Disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. The BSEE claims the relaxation of these rules will save the U.S. energy sector $228 million over 10 years.

To many environmentalists, the administration’s doublespeak is breathtaking. As BSEE’s director, Scott A. Angelle, said in a public statement:

“I am confident that this revision of the Production Safety Systems Rule moves us forward toward meeting the Administration’s goal of achieving energy dominance without sacrificing safety. By reducing the regulatory burden on industry, we are encouraging increased domestic oil and gas production while maintaining a high bar for safety and environmental sustainability.”

The reversal of anti-fracking rules

Also on Friday, the last business day before the long new year’s weekend, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) rescinded 2015 rules that enacted limitations on fracking across public lands. Ongoing litigation had prevented these regulations from ever going into effect, but the BLM finally decided to put the kibosh on the rules to “reduce the burden of federal regulations that hinder economic growth and energy development.” The BLM also announced that 1,700 fracking wells have been, or are slated for, drilling on both federal and Native American lands during this fiscal year.

Ending wildlife protection on lands used for energy and mineral extraction

The Friday before Christmas, the Department of Interior ended a policy designed to protect migratory birds. In a 41-page decision, one of the department’s attorneys described the rule as “the sort of recipe for arbitrary and discriminatory enforcement.”

Letting industry off the hook for bird deaths, including that of the nation’s symbol, the bald eagle, does not mean companies will start wantonly destroying natural habitats. What it does mean, however, is that many companies in sectors such as energy will no longer invest in technologies or develop precautionary steps that could prevent the death of these birds in the first place.

According to the Audubon Society, the rollback of these rules reverses 100 years of progress dating back to the passage of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) in 1918. “Gutting the MBTA runs counter to decades of legal precedent as well as basic conservative principles,” said Audubon’s David O’Neill in a December 22 press release. “For generations Republicans and Democrats have embraced both conservation and economic growth and now this Administration is pitting them against each other.”

A popular recreation area is now at risk of damage from mining operations

For over 90 years, the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in Northern Minnesota has offered 1,200 miles of canoe routes, 2,000 campsites and 12 hiking trails across 1 million acres nestled against the state’s border with Canada. As described in a profile written by the Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post, one of former President Obama’s final acts was to decline the renewal of copper and nickel leases on 234,000 acres of lands bordering the reserve.

The Department of the Interior did not even make the announcement public on its web site, choosing instead to inform a state political leader who is an ally of the Trump Administration. One reason could be that the optics are particularly bad, as the company lobbying for the rule reversal is a subsidiary owned by a Chilean mining company –  led by a family who rents their D.C. mansion to the president’s daughter, Ivanka Trump. The state’s governor, Mark Dayton, did not mince words:

“This shameful reversal by the Trump Administration shows that big corporate money and special interest influence now rule again in Republican-controlled Washington. We will have to uncover why the financial interests of a large Chilean corporation, with a terrible environmental record, has trumped the need to protect Minnesota's priceless Boundary Waters Canoe Area.”

Image credit: Greg Walters/Flickr

Facebook has come under heavy fire over the past year, from its role in disseminating “fake news” to how it has handled its users’ privacy.

And despite the social network’s pledge to do a better job eliminating hate speech from its platforms, the evidence suggests that the Silicon Valley giant still has plenty of work ahead.

ProPublica, a leading nonprofit investigative journalism portal, has made holding Facebook accountable one of its leading causes over the past several months. The news service’s reporters and readers have been aggressively flagging social media posts that they say violate the company’s terms and conditions – including community standards that ban any violent threats against people based on religious beliefs.

The problem, however, is that Facebook’s content reviewers enforce the company’s rules in a pattern that at best can be painted as wildly inconsistent.

For example, one reporter involved with ProPublica’s ongoing “algorithm injustice” investigation discussed a post, uploaded with a graphic image, describing “the only good Muslim is a (expletive deleted) dead one.” A reader had flagged the post as hate speech via Facebook’s reporting feature.

But according to ProPublica, Facebook’s automated response was “We looked over the photo, and though it doesn’t go against one of our specific Community Standards, we understand that it may still be offensive to you and others.”

Not exactly a step forward for artificial intelligence, is it? Nor does it speak well of Facebook’s quest to hire thousands of employees who are tasked with identifying and removing offensive and incendiary posts. Yet another post, which had no image and simply spelled out, “Death to the Muslims,” was removed relatively quickly.

ProPublica’s crowdsourced review of hate speech concluded last week that Facebook’s haphazard enforcement mechanism has become the norm. “Even when they do follow the rules, racist or sexist language may survive scrutiny because it is not sufficiently derogatory or violent to meet Facebook’s definition of hate speech,” wrote Julia Angwin, Ariana Tobin, and Madeleine Varner.

ProPublica contacted Facebook almost 50 times to explain the logic of letting some hate speech linger on the social network. In less than half the cases, Facebook admitted there was an error. But 19 times, the company defended the decision to let posts stand. In a few other cases, Facebook said content was flagged “incorrectly,” was deleted or there was not enough information to provide any response.

A more detailed listing of Facebook’s struggles containing hate speech shows that the company’s decision-making process is all over the map. One anti-Islam post, for example, was allowed to stand because “attacking the members of a religion is not acceptable, but attacking the religion itself is acceptable.”

Facebook also provided similar logic when defending decisions made to leave anti-Semitic posts on its platform.

Do not expect this problem to be solved anytime soon. After all, the sword cuts both ways: users who post controversial images on Facebook, in a push to fight back against sexism, racism or homophobia, have also seen their posts removed or have even been booted from the site. And Facebook’s byzantine reporting policies still accomplish little except generate confusion.

“For users who want to contest Facebook’s rulings, the company offers little recourse,” concluded ProPublica. “Users can provide feedback on decisions they don’t like, but there is no formal appeals process.”

Image credit: John S. Quarterman/Flickr

By Kasey Krifka

The Climate Trust, a mission-driven nonprofit that specializes in mobilizing finance for conservation projects, announced its fifth annual prediction list of carbon market trends.

The trends, which range from the maritime industry following aviation’s lead in carbon reduction commitments to increased dismantling of federal agencies addressing climate change, were identified by The Climate Trust based on interactions with their diverse group of working partners—government, investors, project developers, corporates, and the philanthropic community.

“In the face of federal inaction, the momentum around climate action in 2017 was extraordinary,” said Sean Penrith, Executive Director for The Climate Trust. “When our team gathered together to discuss our predictions for the New Year, it quickly became apparent that despite the big lift ahead of the U.S. (and the world) related to climate change, the room was filled with an overwhelming sense of positivity and anticipation to see what we could collectively accomplish in another year’s time. We hope that sentiment is reflected in our forecast.”

1. More links will be added to the cap and trade chain gang. North America has had two regional cap and trade markets operating the last several years, the Western Climate Initiative (WCI), involving California, Ontario and Quebec, and the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), involving nine northeastern states. Mexico has just crashed the party announcing in mid-December plans to launch a national mandatory market in August 2018. The list of jurisdictions linking up with cap and trade markets will only grow in 2018. New Jersey and Virginia are on a clear pathway to join RGGI, and several states that are already part of RGGI are considering expanding cap and trade to the transportation sector. Oregon is also poised to join WCI in 2018, as passing cap and trade legislation is one of the Governor’s top priorities. Ontario is facing political uncertainty around its future in WCI with the party leading the polls pledging to pull out of WCI and pass a revenue neutral carbon tax instead. Despite this pledge, the challenges of pulling out of the linked market and broad business support in Ontario belie that a change in government doesn’t necessarily mean the end of cap and trade in Ontario. A dark horse jurisdiction may also emerge in 2018. Expect 2018 to be the year of continued momentum towards expanding cap and trade markets, and the emergence of new states examining whether such an approach makes sense for them.


2. States, U.S. cities will quicken the pace in developing climate change adaptation plans. 2017 was a horrific year for natural disasters that wrought havoc throughout the United States. By October, natural disasters had already cost the United States over $25 billion according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and that was before wildfires broke out in southern California. PBS reports that 2017 is on track to break records for the number of major natural disasters in a year. With many of these events crippling major U.S. cities, officials and citizens will be thinking hard about how to prepare their cities for a future with more frequent and stronger disasters. Some cities have already taken the lead on developing and implementing climate adaptation strategies, such as Miami Beach’s efforts to elevate streets and install pumps. In 2018, we predict that a record number of cities will begin the process of developing climate change adaptation plans.


3. Institutional investors will increasingly count social and environmental impact as part of their fiduciary obligation. Foundations will follow McKnight's early lead by committing to invest endowment dollars (not just grant money) into climate mitigation and social improvement projects. Likewise, university endowments will adopt policies that address climate change in their investment portfolios as an integral part of their fiduciary commitment.


4. Shipping will follow aviation’s lead and agree to a carbon reduction commitment that will rely on offsets at the onset. A few years ago, the biggest future carbon market you’ve never heard of was created when the international aviation sector agreed to carbon reduction targets. Given the international nature of airline travel, aviation emissions have proven difficult to regulate. The establishment of a commitment, overseen by the United Nations International Civil Aviation Organization, and the creation of an offset market to allow the sector time to develop biofuels and fuel-efficient fleets, has provided a roadmap for other multi-national industries to follow. The clear candidate to follow this blueprint is the maritime industry. Although a growing number of shippers have called for some form of regulation, developing countries, which are dependent on ships to transport their manufactured goods to major markets in developed countries, have called for a go-slow approach. However, annual shipping emissions are already 30 percent greater than those from air travel and forecast to grow by another 17 percent if left unchecked. Meeting the Paris commitments will require progress on developing and agreeing to a framework for the shipping industry—just like in the aviation sector.


5. The first year of the Trump administration has seen deregulation and dismantling at agencies working to combat climate change. While President Trump has made broad and sweeping actions to reverse progress on addressing climate change, such as withdrawing the United States from the Paris Agreement, deliberate and quiet efforts are having a powerful effect at the agency level. Scott Pruitt, Director of the EPA, has taken a meticulous approach to deconstructing decades of regulation and basic environmental protections, including repeal of the Obama-era Clean Power Plan, which sought to curb greenhouse gas emissions. The Department of the Interior announced plans to hold the largest-ever auction of oil and gas leases in the Gulf of Mexico, and many scientific and administrative posts have been filled with people hostile to curbing greenhouse gas emissions. With at least three more years of the Trump presidency to go, we predict that the EPA and offices focused on climate change in other agencies will see further deconstruction in 2018.


6. The Trump administration’s intransigence on climate science will backfire in the 2018 midterms. Republicans remain the only major party in a global democracy to deny basic climate science. With intensifying weather, scientific consensus that anthropogenic greenhouse gases are to blame, and cheap renewables and electrified transportation demonstrating that mitigation can be affordable and improve our lives, the position of the Trump administration and many Republican party members simply cannot be sustained. In 2018, we expect Democrats to increasingly fight for the economic and environmental benefits of carbon pricing and look to chastise climate-denying legislators for their ignorance and intransigence. This strategy (which David Roberts calls “agnoism”) will pay dividends in the 2018-midterm elections, and Republicans will (slowly) reconsider the tenability of their outdated position on climate change.


7. U.S. companies will voluntarily, and increasingly, report on financial policies and performance related to the environment and social responsibility. The Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) recently published its Exposure Draft Standards for 79 industries, with the public comment period having closed on December 31, 2017. We predict there will be a continued increase in the number of U.S. companies that choose to include discussion of their policies and performance regarding the environment, social responsibility and similar matters in their required external reports or in what is often referred to as a sustainability report. Even though the standards are not legal requirements, we predict an upturn in voluntary acceptance that will inspire other companies to feel obligated to provide similar disclosure to their stakeholders. Due to the prominence and credibility of the SASB Board members, SASB has generated considerable momentum in a short period. The end result is a win-win for the companies and capital markets because the disclosures are not onerous and focus on financially material sustainability factors that result in providing extremely useful information for investors.


8. Public support of dairy digester development will shift to credit enhancements to mitigate risks for private investors. Explosive growth in the development of California digesters will continue in 2018. In 2017, California awarded grants to build 18 new digesters over the next two years (which will almost double the number of digesters in the state). With double the funding available in 2018, we expect more than 35 new projects to be supported. As projects become more cost-effective, their technology becomes increasingly understood and their impacts are proven, private capital can, and should, play a greater role in building new digesters to meet the state’s goals—significantly reducing methane emissions. To encourage this transition, expect climate-policy advocates, project developers, and the dairy industry to increasingly advocate for shifting public support from grant making to credit enhancements that mitigate risks for private investors in dairy digesters. In 2018 we expect to see a final design for California’s pilot financial mechanism to be proposed. We also expect a large number of advocates will line up to fund this mechanism, with at least $25 million to backstop price guarantees for the environmental markets that drive project economics but face real regulatory risk.


9. Climate smart agriculture and soil health will gain prominence in 2018. Collective activities in agriculture, forestry, and land use change are responsible for 21 percent of our global emissions, second only to the energy sector. The international 2017 climate talks in Bonn released the blockade restraining the agricultural sector from playing an active role in solutions for climate change. At the 23^rd Conference of Parties (COP), the Subsidiary Body for Implementation (SBI) and the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) took up the charge to “address issues related to agriculture.” The path set by the SBI and the SBSTA now engages agriculture as a strategic priority to develop on-the-ground practices that help curb greenhouse gas emissions. The Nature Conservancy found that natural climate solutions offers over one-third of the cost-effective climate mitigation we need by 2030 to achieve our Paris target of a less than 2 °C world. We will witness agriculture step up and adapt to climate friendly practices in the face of global population growth and the impacts of rising temperatures on smallholder farmers. The Sustainable Development Goal of achieving a hunger-free world by 2030 is being challenged by these mounting influences. The outcome of COP23 means that the theory, research, and discussions on agriculture will finally turn into tangible action on the ground.


10. Global health implications of climate change will sound an alarm for insurance markets. Climate change is on track to deliver “the biggest global health threat of the 21st century,” according to the British medical publication, The Lancet. Increasing global temperatures will aid the spread of vector-borne diseases like Malaria, Lyme disease, Zika virus, and water born illnesses such as Cholera and Toxoplasmosis. We have already begun experiencing the increased mortality risks from flooding, intense precipitation, and high summer temperatures and fires. Sadly, we will witness even more pronounced health impacts this year. While the property and casualty insurance market has become aware of the effects of a changing climate, the healthcare sector is just starting to understand the import that this will have on health care costs, services, and delivery. Ceres conducted research that ranked 148 of the largest insurance companies in the country. While Blue Cross Blue Shield of MA recognizes climate change as a significant threat to public health, a few companies surveyed by Ceres stated that they do not believe climate change is a material business risk. We will see an awakening in the health insurance sector in 2018 and an effort to follow European insurers who are active in combatting and adapting to climate change. The former CEO for AXA SA, Henri de Castries, said in his 2016 speech, “We have no choice, a 2°C world might be insurable, a 4°C world certainly would not be.” The alarm clock for the health insurance industry will sound off loud and clear in 2018.

“The Trust’s two decades of expertise in this space has laid the foundation for our team to make sound carbon market predictions year after year,” said Sheldon Zakreski, Director of Asset Management for The Climate Trust. “In fact, a record number of our 2017 predictions hit the mark, including environmental justice groups taking an active role in climate policy decisions, private industry picking up U.S. government slack, the California Air Resources Board prevailing in a high-profile lawsuit, China taking the lead in carbon markets, as well as an alarming number of U.S. citizens becoming climate refugees, with a related surge in momentum for global climate litigation.”

Director of Investments, Kristen Kleiman, added, “In particular, California’s move to recommit to their cap and trade system provided a valuable market signal to support linkages and increase jurisdictional participation in offset markets. Riding this wave of market interest, The Trust is now poised to fully commit our $5.5M pilot carbon investment fund, and launch our $100M 10-year private equity Fund II in 2018.”

Image credit: Flickr/Bureau of Land Management Oregon and Washington

Kasey Krifka is the Senior Marketing Communications Manager for The Climate Trust

This series is sponsored by Tetra Pak and produced by the TriplePundit editorial team. 

By Mario Abreu, Vice President Environment, Tetra Pak  

Sustainability has always been at the heart of Tetra Pak’s corporate strategy, in fact it’s embedded in our brand promise – ‘Protect What’s Good’. I think we’re very influenced by our Swedish heritage, where nature and its resources play a central role.

As a business our future depends on our ability to provide safe, secure and sustainable products to consumers. No business can succeed in the long run without a well thought-through sustainability strategy, particularly as it is businesses that are best attuned to ‘feel’ the impact of the global drivers that undermine business continuity, i.e. the risks and opportunities related to responsible business behavior.

As a company we recognize that we can have the greatest impact on those goals that are most closely aligned with our business model and strategic priorities. That’s why, last year we undertook a rigorous materiality assessment identifying and prioritizing those aspects of our business where we could have the greatest positive impact for our customers, our business and society. All 14 priority areas identified help us contribute to the achievement of the sustainable development goals (SDGs). In this way the SDGs and materiality assessment complement each other. It makes sense for companies to link the SDGs to the identified material topics and business strategy of the company. Based on this mapping exercise a company can act on the SDGs on which it has the most material aspect (both positive and negative).

Currently, we’re focusing on those goals that relate directly to our core business and our work to promote sustainability, and where we believe we can make a positive difference. We believe that this is how businesses can best adopt the SDGs as a framework for action. For example, by working with our customers, suppliers, non-government organizations and other stakeholders to make food safe and available everywhere through our innovative and market-leading food processing and packaging solutions, we are making a direct contribution to SDGs 2 (Zero Hunger),12 (Responsible Production & Consumption) and 13 (Climate Action).

This demonstrates how Sustainability is not an isolated function within Tetra Pak. Instead, it’s an integral part of the decisions we make and the actions we take, across our entire value chain. Society today rightly expects manufacturers to do more with less, which means developing technology and materials that drive efficiency, cut waste, and significantly lower our environmental footprint. We also believe our responsibilities extend beyond our own operations. For example, earlier this year we had our Science Based Targets approved. Under the SBT initiative Tetra Pak has committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions from its own operations by at least 40 percent by 2030 from a 2015 baseline, and 58 percent by 2040. Joining RE100, we are also committing to increase our use of renewable electricity from 20 percent today to 100 percent across all global operations by 2030. Climate action was identified as one of the priority areas during our GRI mapping. Through these climate initiatives, we are also making a direct contribution to SDG 13 – Climate Action. With this example you can see how we have come full circle, and the interrelationship between the materiality assessment and SDGs.

Those top material aspects identified will serve as areas of focus in the years ahead, and will be reported on, among other things such as promoting responsible forest management, in our annual online sustainability report which brings together all our reporting commitments in one place, helping us communicate our progress in a relevant way to our customers and key stakeholders. 

About Mario Abreu: Mario has been a member of Tetra Pak’s Environment management team since 2003. He leads functional teams which are currently responsible for Tetra Pak’s strategic priority to Drive Environment Excellence, one of the 4 Group Priorities approved by the Board for the period 2010-2020. Key activities include driving global recycling of post-consumer beverage cartons; reducing the environment footprint of the company’s product portfolio including value-chain climate emission reduction; and development and roll-out of innovative and sustainable products made with renewable and credibly sourced materials.

Image credit: Grahame Jenkins/Unsplash

At the close of 2017, AT&T joined with Wells Fargo, Fifth Third Bancorp, Boeing and Comcast to announce new pay and benefits increases for their workers. The announcements coincided with the passage of the new tax law championed by President Trump. Though the companies reportedly did not coordinate their moves, together they created the impression that the new tax law was already having a positive effect on U.S. wage earners  -- even before it took effect.

However, a followup look at AT&T sends a clear signal that the Trump brand is in serious trouble, new tax bill or not.

Did AT&T trade small bonuses for a big favor?

As widely reported on December 20, AT&T CEO Randall Stevenson promised $1,000 bonuses for 200,000 of the company's workers after the new tax bill was signed into law.

That sounds generous on its face, but the pledge has already backfired. Critics have pointed out the obvious: a one-time bonus that amounts to a few months worth of grocery money for many households is not worth much compared to a permanent hike in salary and benefits.

The $1,000 pledge also focused renewed attention on a November 8 announcement by AT&T, in which Stephenson effusively praised the new tax bill and pledged an additional $1 billion capital investment after Trump signed it into law. Multiple sources pointed out that AT&T is lobbying hard to secure approval from the Trump administration for approval of its multi-billion acquisition of Time Warner.

In that light, the $1,000 pledge seems like a simple attempt to curry a favorable outcome.

Bonuses for some, layoffs for (many) others

For the record, the other high profile companies announcing pay and benefit improvements at the close of 2017 also had little to offer in terms of a substantial boost for middle class wage earners. AT&T seems to be getting the most attention because its positive news was offset by layoff announcements totaling more than 1,000 workers.

That could just be the tip of the iceberg. Last year, the New York Times reported that AT&T was looking at the potential for slashing one-third of its workforce over time, as the company shifts operations into the digital age.

That report is consistent with the most recent rounds of layoffs at the company. Many of the job losses involved landline and other "legacy" services. Here's a snippet from an AT&T statement cited by The Chicago Tribune:

“Technology improvements are driving higher efficiencies and there are some areas where demand for our legacy services continues to decline, and we’re adjusting our workforce in some of those areas as we continue to align our workforce with the changing needs of the business,” the company said...

The statement also notes that "many" of the newly laid off workers will be offered other positions at the company. The statement did not indicate, though, whether or not the new positions would come with a similar salary and benefits package.

Damaging the Trump brand

That point about technology improvements is the critical issue. AT&T is far from the only major company shedding jobs in favor of digitization and/or automation.

That trend has already come back to haunt Trump in the manufacturing sector. After Election Day last year, Trump took credit for "saving" more than 1,000 jobs at a Carrier plant in Indiana. However, by the end of 2017 the company was anticipating a new round of 200 layoffs at the plant. That's in addition to an earlier round of 300 layoffs in 2017 and an undisclosed number of workers retiring or leaving for other reasons.

After Election Day last year Trump also indicated -- through Twitter -- that he could save jobs at nearby factory owned by the global auto parts firm Rexnord. However, his tweet appears to be the beginning and the end of his involvement. Three hundred workers were laid off last spring and the plant closed in June.

In fact, 2017 was peppered with job losses in wage-earning sectors that were among the most visible Trump supporters.

Boeing may have offered year-end perks to some employees, but it also announced hundreds of layoffs in 2017. That includes 200 layoffs at a South Carolina plant where Trump had earlier delivered one of his first public addresses as President.

Another example is the coal sector. As a candidate and as president, Trump repeatedly promised to bring coal jobs back. That's an unrealistic goal on its face. The industry consensus is that masses of coal mining jobs are never coming back. A slight uptick in production at coal mines in 2017 masked the effect of a generations-long mechanization trend that pushed coal mining employment down from 228,000 in 1980 to just 50,400 as of July 2017.

Coal mining employment aside, coal jobs have been lost by the hundreds at the user end.  The past few years have seen mass layoffs as aging coal power plants have been retired in favor of low cost natural gas and, more recently, renewable energy.

Layoffs in the steelmaking sector provide another example of danger signs ahead for the Trump brand. Uncertainty over the Administration's trade policy has left U.S. steelmakers in limbo, and layoffs are already looming:

...Scott Paul, the president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, a trade group that represents steelworkers, said he had “a profound sense of frustration that the president has been using steelworkers as political props.”

“The president’s own words and lack of action have actually put the industry in a worse position than if he had done nothing at all,” he said.

Trump is not generally at fault for the layoff trend -- after all, digitization, automation and clean power are global forces. The problem is that Trump branded himself as a successful, canny businessman who could leverage his experience for the benefit of wage earners.

The Trump brand is already in serious trouble with the general public, and with news of more layoffs in 2018, an increasing number of Trump supporters will have a compelling reason to abandon him.

Trump can call it "fake news," but the real damage done to real people is piling up.

Photo: Mike Mozart/flickr.

 

 

Numerous political observers have remarked upon President Trump's efforts to roll back policies and programs of the Obama administration, especially when it comes to energy. However, the transition to renewable energy is not stopping. A case in point is a data center in Nevada, which is now using power from two massive new solar farms thanks to an Obama-era program that set aside federal land for solar energy development.

Switch makes the switch to renewable energy

The two solar farms have a combined capacity of 179 megawatts, which is no small potatoes. Located in Clark County, they are named Switch Station 1 and Switch Station 2, in honor of the Switch data center that will receive renewable electricity from the two farms.

The Switch company briefly crossed the TriplePundit radar back in 2015, when we noted that it operated the single largest collection of data centers in the world, located in Las Vegas.

That puts Switch front and center in the issue of data center sustainability. Energy consumption by data centers has become a major point of concern, especially with the advent of cloud computing.

Leading companies like Amazon have been taking steps to reduce their data center energy use and use more renewable energy, and many of them are turning to Switch for help. Here's an explainer from Switch:

The Switch Sustainability Initiative has driven all Switch data centers in North America to be run by 100% renewable energy. Switch’s issued and pending patent innovations in design, power, cooling and density resulted in significant efficiencies and outstanding annual PUE ratings.

Solar power and jobs, jobs, jobs

Aside from their size, the two new solar farms are significant because they indicate how states like Nevada can grow jobs in the tech sector without new coal or nuclear power plants.

In a statement marking the official commissioning of the two solar farms, Clark County Chairman Steve Sisolak affirmed the role of renewables in economic growth:

The Switch Station solar projects are a great example of how our commitment to renewable energy has helped to stimulate economic growth in the County. The solar projects created hundreds of construction jobs and economic benefits, and the use of our abundant natural resources are fueling long-term, high-tech job creation centers such as Switch.

It's not just Clark County. Nevada's renewable energy industry was virtually nonexistent ten years ago, and now it is a solar power hotspot. The Solar Energy Industries Association ranks the state 4th out of 50 in installed solar capacity. The job count for the state's solar sector is currently topping 8,000, and SEIA projects continued growth over the next five years.

The availability of clean power in Nevada has attracted top shelf tech companies like Tesla and Google, which is anticipating building a new data center without delaying its renewable energy commitment. The Google property, located near Reno, is also being talked up as a location for testing the company's Waymo autnomous vehicle initiative.

Zombie clean power projects rise from the earth to haunt Trump

The Switch solar farms were developed by EDF, which notes that these are "first-ever utility-scale solar power plants to be built in one of the Bureau of Land Management’s Solar Energy Zones."

The Solar Energy Zones were launched under the Obama administration 2013, with the aim of streamlining leases for renewable energy development on federal lands.

Clean power or not, renewable energy development is not free of impacts, and the SEZ initiative was controversial. Nevertheless, the Bureau of Land Management designated a score of SEZ's on federal land. Five are located in Nevada and the others are distributed among Arizona, California, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah.

As of 2016, some of the lease auctions for the zones did not receive any interest. The Dry Lake Zone in Clark County was one that did, with the result that three projects were awarded leases for solar development in 2015.

No word on what happened to all of the projects, but the two Switch solar farms were approved for construction in 2016 under the developer First Solar, and acquired by EDF in the summer of 2017 while work was still under way.

The acquisition sparked this comment from EDF:

The acquisition of Switch Station 1 and Switch Station 2 marks EDF RE's entry into Nevada, a state with world-class solar resources where we plan to build additional projects in the coming years...

Last fall the Bureau of Land management signaled a policy change that could throw obstacles in the path of additional SEZ development. However, the SEZ's represent just one opportunity among many for renewable energy development, Trump or no Trump.

Trump's own Energy Secretary recently fast-tracked a major new hydropower transmission line for New England, which will help put a final nail in the coffin of coal power for that region.

In another striking example, states along the entire Atlantic coast are on the verge of exploiting their vast offshore wind energy potential.

As for EDF, the company's plans for Nevada are the tip of a renewable energy iceberg. EDF foresees $3 billion in new capital investments across the country within the next several years.

That investment outlook presents an interesting contrast with AT&T, which has faced blowback over linking its own $1 billion investment pledge to passage of the new tax bill championed by President Trump -- but that's a whole 'nother can of worms!

Image (screenshot): Data center via Switch.

Predicting the future is a risky undertaking, and of course, many forecasts are usually wrong, which is why there are few, if any, professional soothsayers. Let’s face it: hardly anyone could have predicted some of the biggest sustainable business stories of the past year. For example, in January, many companies do what they do every four years: they sent letters to the new presidential administration, urging the White House to be mindful of challenges including climate change.

Within days, many of those some companies found themselves publicly opposing the new president’s policies. More businesses, which in the past were always held back by legal and communications teams urging restraint, instead become relatively unleashed.

The following are five trends we expect to unfold during 2018. Yes, you could argue we’re playing it safe – like the typical horoscope or fortune teller, these predictions overall are fairly broad. Nevertheless, expect to see many headlines focused on these topics in the coming year, here on 3p and elsewhere.

More brands will keep on taking stands

One prediction will surely become true this year: the political climate in the U.S. will be just as toxic, if not even more so, especially with the mid-term elections coming in November. The shenanigans coming from the White House – and in fairness, the responses of those opposed to President Trump and his policies – will continue to rile up citizens on all sides. If past behavior is an indicator of future actions, expect number 45 to say and do things to endear him even more to his base while infuriating the rest of the country.

Companies and brands will continue to be stuck in the middle, and more will be forced to take a stand. We saw it last summer with the controversy over Charlottesville. Companies including Campbell’s Soup Company had to bite the bullet – while other brands, such as Ben and Jerry’s, have again reminded us that taking a stand on social issues can be a smart business strategy in the long term.

We don’t know what the hot-button issues will be for 2018. But the response of many companies to an array of issues in recent years, from public lands stewardship to immigration to supporting LGBT employees, indicates that more companies, and the executives leading them, will increasingly stand up for social causes. The alternative will be risking their brand reputation and upsetting their stakeholders – who now expect companies to not only do good financially, but socially as well.

More oil companies will invest in renewables

A new administration succeeded in upending environmental rules and dramatically shifted America’s energy priorities; nevertheless, market forces are at work and cannot be denied. And the business community continues to view renewables as more attractive for investment, as they can help companies better manage their energy costs. But it is not just multinational companies and financial institutions that are becoming major players in clean energy investment and deployment.

Watch for more conventional energy companies to take more interest in renewables; after all, there is money to be made. BP, for example, recently purchased a large stake in the solar company Brightsource for $200 million. Investments like that of BP’s make sense: even if the U.S. federal government is focused on fossil fuels, there are still state and local regulations that position renewables as a promising business – and with coal on the fast decline and oil and gas in a three-year price slump, oil and wind power will offer more opportunities for these companies to diversify their holdings.

Hydrogen technology keeps on advancing

Solar and wind power, along with the improved performance of electric vehicles, together dominate the ongoing discussion over how society will shift further away both from petroleum and the internal combustion engine. But as 3p’s Tina Casey has covered extensively, the hydrogen economy is on the rise again, a decade after efforts led by the likes of George W. Bush and Arnold Schwarzenegger were largely ridiculed.

Technical advances, more interest from the automakers and various startups are among the boosts hydrogen technology requires to keep pace with the advancement of electric cars. True, EVs offer the advantage that they can be recharged while their owners are at home or work, and they benefit from a more developed refueling infrastructure than hydrogen vehicles. Nevertheless, more fleet managers have noted that hydrogen cars can be refueled in a matter of minutes – and as the technology scales up and becomes more affordable, individual drivers will become more intrigued if the cost of hydrogen becomes more competitive.

As 3p’s Casey noted, transformative change is underway:

"Hydrogen fuel cell electric vehicles will challenge battery EVs, the fossil fuel whack-a-mole game will continue as natural gas moves out of power generation and into plastics and petrochemicals, algae biofuel will make important strides, and more people will accept the fact that our generation is going to Mars. Stock up on those potatoes now!"

The Circular Economy becomes more mainstream

Time is running out if society is going to come anywhere close to halting the deluge of plastics ending up in the world’s oceans. And we will see more companies moving away from “zero waste” to systems in which waste is not only recycled, but can be upcycled into a more robust revenue generator. Last month, Dell announced the launch of what it said is the world’s first ocean plastics supply chain: look for more companies to follow the tech giant’s lead. Brands cannot just say they are eliminating waste; more consumers will hold them accountable for preventing garbage from outnumbering fish in oceans.

Water scarcity solutions move to the forefront

California is the canary in the coal mine once again. After a very wet 2016-2017 winter marked by generous rainfall and a massive snowpack - to the point that some exasperated talking heads were aghast that much of it flowed to where water naturally ends up (the ocean) - so far it looks as if the Golden State will be in for long, bitter and dry winter. Of course, other regions of the world are also suffering from drought, which behooves companies to do even more across their global supply chains.

Many companies would argue they have become mindful of this most precious resource: “Water stewardship” has long been in the lexicon of many corporate social responsibility agendas. But expect more companies to embed “resilience” into their strategies, as it is not enough for businesses to become more water efficient. The stubborn truth is that companies are going to have to figure out how to become nimbler in the event of a long drought – or relaunch their operations after an extreme weather event such as a hurricane or wildfire, both examples of disruptions that can immediately cut critical water supplies to companies. More companies will be forced to explain their stakeholders not how can they reduce water consumption by 10 or 20 percent, but how they can become part of a more integrated plan to help communities, and even countries, secure safe and secure access to water.

Image credit: David Geitgey Sierralupe/Flickr

By Andy Wunder

Amid the big headlines about tax overhaul and wildfires in a season already full of holiday distractions, you would be forgiven for not noticing that California advanced an important climate initiative: the 2017 Climate Change Scoping Plan.

“Scoping Plan” you wonder? Few people have ever heard of the Scoping Plan, although this is California’s third. The state Air Resources Board (ARB) adopted the extensive 2017 version to outline California’s climate policy path to 2030 and detail how it will fulfill its landmark legislative mandate to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Developing a strong roadmap is important not only here but across the country and beyond because of California’s global leadership role as a climate policy incubator and best practice exporter.

For those reasons, adoption of a strong 2017 Scoping Plan was a priority for our Ceres BICEP Network (Business for Innovative Energy and Policy), and I joined colleagues from numerous environmental, public health, business, and environmental justice groups last Thursday to testify before ARB members as they prepared to vote on the Scoping Plan. And, over the past year, I participated in a thorough stakeholder engagement process about what the plan should contain.

So what is it and what does it contain? Put simply, this document “scopes” out California’s “plan” to meet our climate targets. As the state’s GHG reduction goals have become increasingly ambitious, the path forward to success more convoluted, and the role of California as a global climate change mitigation leader more significant, getting the Scoping Plan right is critical.

The 2017 Scoping Plan adopted by ARB intricately lays out a coherent policy path for state regulators to follow. And while not perfect, we believe the 2017 Scoping Plan cements a strong and achievable path to effectively reducing emissions. Its adoption is truly a landmark achievement. The document builds on existing policy, ties together a number of sector specific strategies, and solidifies targets with in sectors. It outlines a path towards a California with more electric vehicles, cleaner electricity to fuel those cars, denser more walkable communities with more efficient buildings, and less polluting agriculture. Of significant importance to BICEP, the Scoping Plan reinforced legislative direction by confirming the roll of the Cap-and-Trade program to cost effectively achieve over one-third of the state’s requisite reductions by 2030. Cementing the role of the Cap-and-Trade program will help keep compliance costs down and maintain important linkages; two Canadian provinces have joined California’s Cap-and-Trade market and Oregon is considering policy that may lead to a similar partnership.

On the other hand, we believe that the Scoping Plan missed an opportunity to make stronger transportation commitments. With close to 40 percent of California’s emissions coming from our cars and trucks, the Scoping Plan should have placed a stronger stake in the ground to ensure we adequately increase the number of electric vehicles on the road and decrease the amount of GHGs emitted by combustion engine cars and the fuels that power them. Many of stakeholders expressed similar sentiments – this is a solid framework but it could benefit from a little tightening here and there.

But overall, this Scoping Plan is a solid win for California and the world.

The history of the Scoping Plan

Since the 2006 passage of the California Global Warming Solutions Act (AB 32), the state has produced two previous Scoping Plans to guide its journey in tackling GHG emissions with an aggressiveness necessary to prevent catastrophic climate change. To undertake this monumental task, the state has developed and implemented a large suite of “complementary” policies that drive innovation and GHG reductions in specific sectors of California’s economy. Think of the state’s Renewables Portfolio Standard that mandates increasing percentages of our electricity be supplied by renewable energy. These complementary policies address GHG emissions in areas across our economy – transportation fuels, agriculture and land use, and our freight system to name a few – and are backstopped by California’s pioneering Cap-and-Trade program. Cap-and-Trade is a market based tool that caps the state’s emissions and ensures we cost effectively meet our reduction goals after our complimentary policies do their work.

Imagine California’s climate program as a skyscraper that needs to be built over the years to meet increasingly stringent goals. Cap-and-Trade works as the building’s structural steel frame critical to supporting the floors and meeting building goals as the building grows; the floors represent the state’s policy workhorses – the complimentary programs that tackle specific sectors. And of course, the Scoping Plan must be the blueprint. Get the blueprint wrong and you end up with a wobbly building, unable to maintain the long road to a sustainable economy. If California’s efforts wobble too much, it jeopardizes our success and global momentum when there is no time to spare. So far, our reduction targets have been modest and we’ve realized success by picking low hanging fruit. But the path to our 2030 reduction goals will be much more challenging. Overlay these stronger reduction goals with the depth and complexity of the world’s sixth largest economy and you begin to understand the importance of this framework.

Thankfully, California has proven it is up to the task. As ARB Chair Mary Nichol’s exclaimed after the vote, “Literally everyone around the world is looking at California.
Considering the gloomy news that we're getting on a daily basis now about how much faster the global warming worst-case scenario is proceeding than anyone had thought early on, I think it behooves us to take a minute and say this is something really important and it's good that we did it."

With President Trump rolling back federal efforts to reduce emissions, California’s role as America’s climate mitigation standard bearer was not lost on Chair Nichols.

Now that the 2017 blueprint is approved, the hard road of implementation lies ahead. And that includes making sure that California’s climate mitigation efforts don’t have unintended impacts on vulnerable communities: California’s leadership must lead for all.

But California is up to the task. Governor Brown - with support from Ceres, WWF International, BSR, and others - is convening the Global Climate Action Summit this September to drive private sector and subnational efforts to achieve reduction commitments abandoned by the Trump administration. And next month, the California state legislature will continue debate on a bill to codify one of the most ambitious renewable energy targets in the world. BICEP and many California business remain committed to ensuring California builds on its current success and continues to show the world that a vibrant economy goes hand in hand with healthy communities and aggressive climate action.

Andy Wunder is Manager, California Policy and Partnerships, Ceres

Image credit: Flickr/Rennett Stowe