Sustainability presents auditors with a tricky task

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Leading auditors support the goal proclaimed by politicians to ensure a sustainable restructuring of the economy with rules and key figures. “This challenge must be accepted,” said Melanie Sack, deputy spokeswoman for the board of auditors IDW, at an information event on Tuesday. “From our point of view, this is an opportunity,” said Klaus-Peter Naumann, spokesman for the IDW.

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How can books become more sustainable?

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How can books become more sustainable?Paper causes the majority of the carbon footprint in the production of books, but printing and distribution also consume resources. Increasingly, publishers are focusing on sustainability. What does it take? And what role does the size of a publishing house play?

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CDU and CSU no longer want to rule out CO2 storage in Germany

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The Union calls on the government to use carbon dioxide industrially to become climate neutral. In addition, the parties want to use nuclear energy longer. The CDU is in favor of storing carbon dioxide underground and processing it in industry. The party wants to achieve the German climate targets by 2045. In industry, “residual emissions” would still occur after 2045, according to a motion by the Union faction in the Bundestag, which is available to the Handelsblatt. Germany wants to be largely climate-neutral by 2045.

Specifically, the Union faction calls for a “strategy process” that clarifies how and where CO2 could be separated, transported and stored in the future – abroad and “perspectively also in domestic storage facilities”. So far, the so-called “Carbon Capture and Storage” (CCS) has hardly been possible in Germany, because the countries can ban underground CO2 storage facilities on their territory.

 

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New solar-powered technology can transform plastic waste into sustainable fuels and cosmetics

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Researchers at the University of Cambridge have developed a system that can convert waste into chemical products using renewable energy.

The technology can transform two streams of waste – greenhouse gases and plastic – into two sustainable fuels – syngas and glycolic acid – at the same time. This is the first time the process has been achieved using a solar-powered reactor.

Approximately 300 million tonnes of plastic waste – an amount equivalent to the weight of the human population – are produced every year, according to the UN Environment Programme. However, only 9 per cent is recycled, leaving the rest to accumulate in landfills or pollute our oceans with microplastics. Chemical recycling, where plastic is converted into fuels, requires extremely high temperatures. The high cost and inefficiency of this process act as disincentives, but this new solar powered system could change that…

 

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Pune civic body constitutes Climate Action Cell to achieve carbon neutrality

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In its bid to reduce carbon emissions in the city, the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has constituted a Climate Action Cell, comprising experts in the field and representatives of concerned organisations, which met for the first time on Thursday to decide the city’s strategy to achieve carbon neutrality.

The civic body has formed an executive committee and working group under the dedicated cell. It expressed the need to prepare a Climate Action Plan for which a greenhouse gas emission inventory is needed and carbon emissions have to be measured…

 

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EU agrees on protective shield for climate-damaging imports

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The EU agrees on a defense system for climate-damaging goods from third countries. The decision is part of the “Fit for 55” package, which aims to reduce CO2 emissions. Additional costs are likely to be incurred for some products in the near future, including many essential ones.

 

Step towards climate protection: To ensure that the EU’s efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are not nullified by importing climate-damaging goods from third countries, negotiators in the European Parliament and the governments of the EU states have agreed on a so-called CO2 border adjustment system. This was recently announced by the current Czech Council Presidency…

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MANDARIN ORIENTAL’S SUSTAINABILITY CHIEF SHARES ECO PREDICTIONS

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Torsten van Dullemen is general manager of the Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park, the group’s area vice president of operations, and became group director of sustainability in April. He said Mandarin Oriental already seeks out suppliers who offer the most sustainable options, explaining: “Not only are we promoting and helping those who actually care as much as we do about sustainability, but we’re also pushing this responsibility further down the supply chain. We’re not going to accept everything being wrapped in single-use plastic, because we are part of this process and we have an opportunity to extend our influence.”

 

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78% Sustainability Managers Say Their Company’s Leadership Treating Sustainability Initiatives as a Priority

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Pure Storage® (NYSE: PSTG), the IT pioneer that delivers the world’s most advanced data storage technology and services, in partnership with Wakefield Research, has released a new report identifying the critical impact of IT on environmental sustainability and the challenges present in addressing the urgent and growing demands for IT to be accountable drivers of change.

The new report, “Drivers of Change: Pure Storage IT Sustainability Impact Survey 2022,” examines the opportunities for IT professionals to collaborate with enterprise sustainability directors to navigate reductions in the environmental footprint of their organizations.

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Chief Sustainability Officer and Co: Sustainability as a management job

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Something to do with the environment – ​​that is the answer given by quite a few young people when asked what they want to do later in life. And this topic can now also be put into practice at management level. A lot has happened since the first known appointment of Linda Fisher as Chief Sustainability Officer (CSO) at the chemical company Dupont in 2004. More than a third of German companies have introduced such a position at the upper management level.

These are the results of a study for which PwC Germany surveyed 1,640 companies in 62 countries at the beginning of the year. Around 30 percent of companies worldwide have filled the position of CSO. A further 49 percent have a “CSO light”, i.e. a position that is located below the two upper management levels or is only responsible for some of the topics, such as corporate social responsibility. Only one in five companies currently has no CSO function at all…

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Why a sustainability strategy is critical to sales in 2023

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In many parts of the world, we are hitting the holiday season and the demand for everything — from kettlebells to toasters — is going through the roof. While that may be the constant, change is also in the air. Consumers want more insight into the ethics behind the product and the carbon footprint of what they buy. At the same time global supply chains face disruption from all sides, including geo-political uncertainty, supply challenges, inflation, and disruptions from extreme weather. In addition, it remains hard to truly understand and predict consumption habits and buying behaviors.

 

To meet this change, innovative retailers and manufacturers are bringing fresh ideas, new technology, and data analytics and AI into their supply chains. The global pandemic accelerated the investment to modernize supply chains which are now digitized at an unprecedented rate…

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