Here is today’s sustainable IT services news, research and analysis -- written for technology partners, green IT service providers, CIOs, chief sustainability officers (CSOs) and climate accounting professionals.
A. Sustainable Technology, Talent, Partnerships and Green IT Alliances
1. Talent - IT Asset Disposition (ITAD): Circular Integrity has hired Blancco veteran Karen Fedder as VP of ITAD partnerships.
2. Google and Amazon Climate Claims: MIT takes a closer look here.
3. Is ESG Software Worth the Money?: Should businesses leverage ESG software to report, pursue and track various sustainability goals? A Nasdaq executive report examines the ROI of ESG and sustainability software.
4. ESG Software - Real Estate: Measurabl has launched a new ESG software suite for real estate owners, operators, and investors.
5. Partnership - IT Solutions: Bristol Myers Squibb and Lenovo in 2023 conducted sustainability workshops to "find tangible opportunities to help decarbonize the supply chain" of hardware devices. The results are outlined here.
6. EV Charging Network - Mercedes-Benz and Starbucks: Mercedes-Benz High-Power Charging is working to install EV chargers in 100 Starbucks stores across the United States.
7. Partnership - Carbon Accounting and Hospitality Software: Net Zero Now and Zonal have partnered to help restaurants, pubs and bars with their carbon accounting, inventory tracking, procurement automation, and financial reporting. More than 3,000 sites leverage Net Zero Now's software. And more than 17,000 hospitality businesses leverage Zonal.
8. Supply Chains - Scope 3 Carbon Emissions: Supplyframe has announced Electronics Product Carbon Footprint (PCF), a platform that provides manufacturers with access to product carbon footprint for more than 300 million electronic parts. The system will allow users to more easily measure and report the sustainability of their new product design and sourcing decisions, Supplyframe asserted.
9. Distribution: Arrow Electronics in Colorado has joined the Businesses for Environmental Excellence (BEE) Sustainable Partners Program -- which seeks to "protect butterflies, bees, beetles and other insects that play a crucial role in the ecosystem," the distributor said.
B. Sustainability M&A, Investments, Funding and Green IT Business Launches
1. Funding - Carbon Projects: Earthshot Labs has raised $5.5 million in Series A funding to expand a platform for developing and financing nature-based carbon projects. Acorn Pacific Ventures led the round. Earth Foundry, Future Ventures, Resilient Earth Capital, One Small Planet, Parameter Ventures, Sand Hill Angels, and Orca Capital participated in the round.
2. Funding - Battery Startup: Peak Energy, an energy-storage startup, received $55 million in Series A funding to scale up production of sodium-ion batteries that the company is positioning as an alternative to the widely used lithium-ion technology, Bloomberg reported. Xero Innovation led the round. Eclipse Ventures and TDK Ventures participated in the round.
3. Funding AI Startups: Anthropic, an OpenAI rival, has created a $100 million initiative with Menlo Ventures to invest in startup AI companies, SeekingAlpha reported.
4. Funding - Venture Capital: EIT InnoEnergy, a venture capital firm, has received new funding from OMV, OMV Petrom and ACB.
5. Funding - Solar Energy: Naked Energy has raised secured £17 million of new equity as part of a Series B funding round. Naked Energy's business goal is to decarbonize heat. E.ON Energy Infrastructure Solutions led the round.
6. M&A - Electric Services: Quanta Services has acquired electrical engineering and construction company Cupertino Electric Inc. (CEI) for $1.54 billion up-front. Quanta will pay an additional $200 million if CEI achieves certain post-deal earn-out targets. CEI expects to generate roughly $155 million to $175 million in adjusted EBITDA for 2024. Based on the purchase price range ($1.54 billion to $1.74 billion) and the adjusted EBITDA forecast range ($155 million to $175 million), the deal valuation range is 8.8X to 11.2X annual adjusted EBITDA. CEI, backed by 4,300 employees, is an electrical infrastructure solutions provider to the technology, renewable energy and infrastructure and commercial industries.
7. M&A - Sustainable Buildings: Sweco has acquired Valstar Simonis BV, an engineering and consultancy company in the Netherlands. Valstar Simonis, backed by roughly 60 employees, specializes in circularity and technical installations for sustainability, comfort and safety in buildings. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
8. M&A - Private Equity and Backup Power: Blackstone has acquired Trystar, a provider of electrical equipment used for backup power solutions. Trystar, founded in 1992, is based in Faribault, Minnesota. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
C. Regional and Global Sustainability Policies and News
1. COP29 - United Nations Climate Conference: The hosts of this year's UN climate summit urged governments to start compromising to break a deadlock over how to help poorer countries tackle global warming, Barron's reported.
2. United States - EV Charging Station Deployments: At the current pace, public fast-charging sites will outnumber gas stations in the US in about eight years — but charger momentum is only expected to accelerate, Bloomberg reported. North American operators will spend a combined $6.1 billion on charging infrastructure in 2024, nearly double their 2023 investment, BloombergNEF estimates. That annual spend is expected to double again by 2030, the report added.
3. United States Legislation - Forever Chemicals: New forever chemical rules are set to hit renewable energy companies, Bloomberg Law reports.
4. United States - Car Emissions: Several of the world’s largest carmakers, including Toyota and General Motors (GM), are unlikely to meet new U.S. greenhouse gas emission targets by 2032, according to analysis by Greenpeace, Bloomberg reported.
5. Canada - Green Buildings: The Canada Green Buildings Strategy (CGBS) introduced the $800 million Canada Greener Homes Affordability Program (CGHAP). The program seeks to "help low-to-median-income Canadians, including tenants, upgrade their homes to save money on their energy bills and cut pollution."
6. United Kingdom - Green Policies: The new Labour government must “urgently” reverse rollbacks of green energy initiatives by its Conservative predecessor, Bloomberg reported, in order to meet the UK’s net-zero targets, the independent Climate Change Committee said in an annual progress report.
7. Germany - Green Wind Power: Germany unplugged more onshore wind farms than it added for the first time ever after subsidy programs ended, Bloomberg reported, yet the nation still expanded capacity of its most important energy source in the race to meet ambitious climate targets.
8. Australia - Renewables Strategy: Mining lobbyists and environmentalists support the Australia government’s renewable energy transition plan, Bloomberg reported, after opposition lawmakers called for it to be abandoned. Key proponents include the Australian Industry Group, the Clean Energy Council, the National Farmers’ Federation and the World Wildlife Fund, the report said.
D. Sustainability and Green Technology Conference Calendar
- ITAD 2024 (July 23-24, Miami Beach, Florida)
- XeroCon Nashville 2024 (August 14-15, Nashville, Tennessee)
- World ESG Summit Dubai (August 20-21, Dubai, UAE)
- Tennessee Sustainability Conference 2024 (Gatlinburg, Tennessee, August 20-23)
- VMware Explore 2024 (August 26-29, Las Vegas, Nevada)
- Complete Calendar of Sustainability Conferences
E. Previous Updates & Future News
- Did You Miss Yesterday's Daily Update?: Here is our previous sustainability, green IT and renewable energy news for technology partners.
- Future Updates: If you have news to share then please email me the details.
