Sustainability In Your Ear

The founders of Cambium Carbon, CEO Ben Christensen and CFO Marisa Repka, explain how they salvage wood from the 36 million trees that fall each year in American cities to create a hyper-local lumber supply chain. Currently, most of those fallen trees are mulched, burned or landfilled, all of which contributes to global warming.  The company's Carbon Smart Wood is sourced from downed trees — also referred to as “urban wood” — and it can be used in furniture and buildings in place of trees from clear-cutting operations. They also dedicate 15% of their revenue to replant new trees, which provides urban green cover. Cambium Carbon is a social enterprise that has organised an alternative, thoroughly tracked wood supply chain for designers, architects and builders while helping to preserve local sawmills and the jobs they provide. Their Traece wood tracking system, which allows customers to learn where the wood in their home or office came from, enables a new level of accountability and storytelling in wood products. We also discuss the potential to apply their strategies to other commodities. Find out more about Cambium Carbon at https://cambiumcarbon.com/.

Sam Teicher, co-founder and Chief Reef Officer at Coral Vita, a social enterprise that grows resilient corals on land and transfers them to the sea to restore dying reefs, joins Mitch Ratcliffe to discuss ocean restoration. Check out his recent article, Coral Vita and the Vital Importance of Restoring Coral Reefs, on Earth911. More than half of the world’s coral has died since 1970 — if that doesn’t set alarm bells ringing, consider that a University of California Santa Barbara study published in Nature in August 2020 found that sea-sourced meat is essential to feeding humans in 2050. We must increase sea yields by up to 74% to keep up with demand, but coral reefs are a critical feature of the food chain in the oceans — if they disappear, we cannot meet the dietary needs of humans — the entire ocean ecosystem could collapse. But there are also glimmers of hope, such as a large, healthy reef recently discovered near Tahiti that has not suffered bleaching. And as Sam explains, resort and seafood companies are beginning to recognize the importance of protecting and restoring reefs that are the foundation of their businesses.Coral Vita's Grand Bahamas facility is the first to take a social enterprise approach to restoring coral. Sam is building the foundation for an industry that has the potential to bring coral back around the planet while creating good paying jobs that are good for the environment. He previously worked on climate resiliency initiatives for the Obama White House and Global Island Partnership. Sam is also an inaugural Earthshot Prize Winner and a Forbes 30 Under 30 Social Entrepreneur. He also co-authored the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal #14: Life Below Water. You can learn more about Coral Vita and adopt a coral at https://coralvita.co/.

Newday Impact Investing CEO Doug Heske returns to talk about how to design an investment portfolio to achieve environmental improvements in our world. Just as buying sustainable products can help reduce your environmental impact, your investing can change the direction of the economy. And 2021 was the biggest year in the history of environmental, social and governance (ESG) investing by more than twice the previous record, with $120 billion flowing into the green economy, according to Bloomberg. Green economy momentum is building but investors are concerned about greenwashing and are not confident they can choose companies that are making real environmental progress. Doug explains how Newday Impact portfolio managers make decisions based on the environmental impact of companies, ETFs and bonds to produce ESG results. Visit visit Newday’s Sustainable Development Equity page to follow along with the conversation.If you've heard our previous conversations with Doug Heske, which covered investing to improve animal welfare, make clean water available for all, lower greenhouse gas emissions, and create a responsible energy grid, this episode brings all the threads together. He explains how to set your priorities and choose a diversified portfolio while keeping the planet's health squarely in mind. Doug also discusses the importance of overseas investing, particularly in Europe; he urges caution when considering the stock of companies in other regions where transparency is not practiced. You can learn more about Newday Impact Investing, a financial services company that manages a wide range of socially and environmentally responsible portfolios, visit https://newdayimpact.com/.

Mike Marsch, the head of solar development at BlueWave, explains how floating solar panels can plan a key role in deliver widely available community and privately owned renewable energy generation capacity. The Boston-based certified B Corp's mission is to “revolutionize energy with simple, powerful solutions.” But solar faces challenges from communities that are concerned about local views, and floating solar has been opposed by vacation destinations along coasts. We must overcome some of those objections to find a way to talk frankly about the benefits and urgency that make floating solar an important feature of our energy landscape. We explore where and how floatovoltaics can be deployed, and the environmental benefits of using human-made reservoirs to catch more of the sun's energy.Solar power is a keystone of the post-carbon economy, the goal we need to achieve as soon as possible to halt CO2 emissions that are raising the planet’s temperature. Fossil fuel-generated electricity is responsible for much of the increased occurrence of drought and extreme weather, it is also leads to rising sea levels. But the tide could turn. The International Energy Agency reported that as of 2020 solar the cheapest source of electricity. Floating solar panels enjoy advantages over land-based solar farms because the water cools the system, which makes it more efficient. You can learn more about BlueWave at https://bluewave.energy/.

Our guests, Shannon Bouton, CEO of Delterra, and Ella Flaye, the organization's regional director for Asia, lead the environmental non-profit's “rethinking recycling” initiative in emerging economies. Around the world, more than 2 billion people live without waste removal and recycling services. Despite the challenges of the pandemic, Delterra’s recycling and waste management services have scaled over these last few years and currently serve nearly 50,000 people, with plans underway to reach a quarter of a million people by the end of 2022. The non-profit was incubated for three years and funded by the business consulting giant, McKinsey & Co. The non-profit has already diverted more than 1,000 tons of waste from landfills and the oceans while achieving up to 60% recycling participation rates in several Indonesian and Argentine slums, well above the U.S. recycling engagement levels.Delterra's first programs have also created lives livelihoods for more than 450 affiliated waste workers -- a marginalized and often overlooked faction of essential workers -- by providing them safe, fair and dignified working conditions. We explore what they've learned during the organizations early projects in Buenos Aires’ vast Barrio Mugica and in Indonesian communities, where low-income people, especially women are working to organize recycling programs. You can learn more about the program at https://delterra.org/.

Jason Gates, CEO of Compology, is taking the recycling battle to the dumpster. Compology makes AI-powered smart cameras that monitor how full dumpsters are and help understand and manage what they contain — the process reduces unnecessary pickups, which lowers fuel waste, and improves the processing of the contents of each bin. There’s no question the current economy is wasteful, but the challenge remains to figure out where that waste is located and how to reduce it, recycle it and return it to use without cutting down more trees, mining more raw ore or other extractive activities. Compology tracks the bin over time to provide the first end-to-end waste monitoring for business, including advice delivered through its app. These tools let companies and government organizations plan their production, manage waste to reduce contamination and help them meet their sustainability goals. Compology may also have the solution for large landlords who want to implement recycling systems for apartment complexes and other facilities that rely on private haulers to remove and recycle waste.Jason explains how Compology cameras work, the six types of contamination they can spot and how the bin user gets alerts. For example, uncompacted cardboard boxes take up space, leading to more pickups than necessary. In the future, the system could also track food waste and help divert it to composting programs. We also discuss the security and privacy benefits of monitoring waste to prevent confidential data from being exposed. When tracked in detail, the economy can be optimized and we would not simply reduce waste, but route it back for recycling or reuse. Learn more about Compology at https://compology.com/.

The availability of safe, fresh drinking water will become a more pressing issue as the climate crisis progresses. Our guest today, Rich Razgaitis, started FloWater, a maker of water refill stations that can purify local water, allowing people to refill bottles safely and quickly. The company also sells reverse-osmosis purified water in recyclable, reusable aluminum bottles and a faucet filter attachment the remove many of the impurities that can still be found in U.S. drinking water. We discuss the role of publicly accessible water refill stations in providing access to water, and the reduction of soda and other canned and bottled beverages and water when water is easily available in offices and schools. We also look forward to consider how efficient, hyper-local water filtration services can potentially allow reuse of greywater -- post-use water generated by an office building or university -- to reuse water on-site. Los Angeles is currently providing some water that has been processed from local sewage -- these technologies can be miniaturized and distributed to help water impoverished communities build a sustainable local water supply.Drought will reduce supplies and extreme heat will increase demand for water. Across the planet today, 785 million people do not have reliable access to drinking water and as many as 884 million are without safe drinking water, according to the World Health Organization and UNICEF. We’ve made progress, bringing water and sanitation services to an additional 1.4 billion people since the turn of the century. But there is a long, long way to go to providing safe drinking water for all of the people on planet while leaving enough freshwater for the rest of nature.Learn more about FloWater at https://www.drinkflowater.com/.

Our guest is Alexander Olesen, CEO and founder of Babylon Micro-Farms. The Richmond, Va-based company has developed a hydroponics-based approach to growing produce in enclosed compact systems that are about the size of a large vending machine that can be managed remotely.  It produces as much produce in 15 square feet of space as 2,000 square feet of traditional farmland. The company describes its product as a “cloud-based vertical farm” that provides expert cultivation advice and cues about when to harvest. The Babylon Micro-Farms system can help grocers, restaurants, and communities to plant, grow and harvest produce within yards of where it will be purchased or consumed.Growing and shipping food is the basis of human life in our era, in any era — but today moving produce from field to table is a carbon-intensive process that also results in extensive food waste, as much as 40% of the original harvest spoils in transit or on store shelves. What if we could grow food near the the people who need it, particularly in cities? You can learn more about Babylon Micro-Farms at https://babylonmicrofarms.com/.

Discussions about the plight of the homeless usually ignore the issue of sustainability, and there are certainly more pressing concerns to be addressed when someone is in crisis. Our guest, Zac Clark of the HomeMore Project, has developed a comprehensive approach to helping the more than 10,000 homeless people in San Francisco escape from living on the street. The project includes a novel, solar-powered backpack made of recycled plastic, the Makeshift Traveler, which he describes as a “temporary form of aid” that can help keep the individual connected to society, family and services. The Makeshift Traveler provides solar power, a battery and charging ports for devices that can potentially connect them to job opportunities. Using recycled materials make this interesting, but as we’ve talked about on the show many times, there are millions of dollars worth of recyclables scattered across many cities and the digital features of the Makeshift Traveler could connect homeless people looking for a living to assist the in making their first steps to organizing an income.We’ve talked on our podcast about the role of “trash picking” in countries with high recycling recovery rates. Zac addresses whether there are ethical ways opportunities in San Francisco, which has one of the most advanced recycling systems in the U.S., to enable the homeless to begin to earn a living and contribute to reducing waste headed for landfills. You can learn more about the HomeMore Project at https://thehomemoreproject.org/

Newday Impact Investing CEO Doug Heske is back for another in our regular series of conversations about Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) investing. We discuss companies that are working to improve animal welfare, both on the farm and for pets in our homes. The first question today relates to the European Union's recent proposed rule to reclassify natural gas and nuclear power as "sustainable" bridge technologies to the post-carbon economy and how that might impact ESG investor's decisions.We take a deep look at the stocks of British retailer Sainsbury's (OTC: JSAIY), which has established comprehensive rules for the treatment of animals in its supply chain, pet care and large animal  and pharmaceutical maker Zoetis (NYSE: ZTS), Tractor Supply Company (Nasdaq: TSCO), which operates farm supply stores and Petsense, and, finally, pet product and insecticide manufacturer Central Garden & Pet Company (Nasdaq: CENTA).