Here is today’s sustainability, Net Zero and circular economy news, research and analysis. This daily update is designed for technology partners, management consultants, CIOs, chief sustainability officers (CSOs) and c-suite members.
Send Us Your News Tips: Got news or chatter to share? Please email me.
Our updates for Tuesday, March 28, 2023 include…
A. Sustainability and Net-Zero News and Research
1. Research and Development: Researchers have ‘hacked’ the earliest stages of photosynthesis, the natural machine that powers the vast majority of life on Earth, and discovered new ways to extract energy from the process, a finding that could lead to new ways of generating clean fuel and renewable energy, SciTechDaily reported.
2. Talent: CBRE has hired Laura Jones as a senior sustainability consultant in Scotland.
3. Student Competition: Schneider Electric has launched NextGen Go Green – a global student competition seeking disruptive ideas to make cities more sustainable and community-oriented, SME10X reported.
4. ESG Report: CleanSpark Inc., a Bitcoin Miner-focused company, released its inaugural ESG and Corporate Responsibility Report for the 2022 fiscal year, or the period from October 1, 2021, to September 30, 2022.
B. Sustainability and Net-Zero Government Policies
1. Canada: Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland on March 28 will present this year's budget, which will have a major focus on scaling up investment in clean technology and will include investments in healthcare and help for low-income households, Reuters reported.
C. Sustainability Funding, Financing, Mergers & Acquisitions
1. Funding - Green Buildings: BlocPower, a climate technology company focused on greening America’s buildings, has $150 million -- which spans over $24 million of Series B corporate equity led by VoLo Earth Ventures and $130 million of debt financing led by Goldman Sachs.
2. Funding - Sustainable Supply Chains: IntegrityNext, a startup on a mission to make supply chains more sustainable with better ESG compliance and oversight, has just secured a massive €100 million in new investment, EU-Startups reported.
3. Accelerator Fund: Cranfield University of Cranfield, England, has announced the first six members of its Green Future Investments Ltd (GFIL) Technology Accelerator Fund, a program designed to support technical and prototype developments of innovative technologies that address climate change challenges.
- Lambda Energy: looking to increase crop yields by leveraging greenhouses coated with sunlight changing films.
- SAGES London: exploring how natural, food-waste derived dyes can be refined to produce dyes that are more vibrant and have commercial uses in other industries.
- Bluemethane: a project focused on optimizing technology to capture methane from water and create a new source of bioenergy.
- ManholeMetrics: developing low-cost long-life sensors that can be mounted to the underside of manhole covers to give real-time flood warnings and enable flood prediction.
- TaiSan Motors Ltd: next generation battery pack for electric vehicles (EVs).
- Nium: using patent-pending nanotechnology to make green ammonia without direct CO2 emissions.
The funding is made possible as a result of a donation from Green Future Investments Ltd.
4. M&A - Energy Storage: Spearmint Energy, a renewable energy company focused on battery energy storage, has acquired a 900 MW portfolio of battery energy storage solutions (BESS) assets, collectively known as Nomadic. The deal largely involves the Texas area. Financial terms were not disclosed.
D. Sustainability Partnerships, Alliances and Associations
1. Digital Twins - Cloud Services: WSP and Amazon Web Services (AWS) are partnering assist governments and the private sector to develop digital twins for complex infrastructure such as transport assets, buildings, bridges, and ports.
E. Sustainability Conferences, Summits and Events Calendar
Here are five upcoming sustainability conferences and ESG events for business and technology partners:
F. Send Us Your News Tips
Got news tips, research or data to share? Please email me the details.
