Climate and Energy
Accelerating the Circular Economy in the Port of Rotterdam
At Finch & Beak, we are always curious about the sustainable developments taking place in the cities that we work in, and Rotterdam is one of them. In 2016, a shocking 20% of the national CO2 emissions of the Netherlands was accounted for by the port of Rotterdam. Time to take action: between the period 2016-2020, the port of Rotterdam managed to reduce its CO2 emissions by 27% to 22.4 million tons. A noteworthy reduction that can be explained by the switch to more renewable energy sources and the exploitation of waste-to-value opportunities. The port of Rotterdam is making an impact through discovering the benefits of the circular economy.
Countering the Clock: Climate Strategy Checklist
Our house is on fire: coming years are crucial for business and society to get on track to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees, and the clock is ticking. As companies work on reducing their carbon footprints and preparing for a changing climate, investors are eager to learn how effective those strategies are. This year, S&P Global has therefore updated the Climate Strategy criterion in its Corporate Sustainability Assessment (CSA), introducing more challenging questions, applicable to all industries. The criterion is now further aligned with the framework of the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD). In this article, five questions are suggested to challenge your company’s climate strategy.
The Sharing Economy's Circular Business Opportunities
The Dutch climate agreement and recent developments in the carsharing market present business opportunities to tap into the circular economy and bounce back better. Car sharing not only reduces the administrative and financial burden of company cars but also decreases emissions and congestion, which lead to better ESG performance. It also paves the road for a more circular automotive industry by incentivizing manufacturers to retain ownership of cars and maximizing their useful life.
Key Take-Aways from the DJSI Expert Training 2020
On the 5th of March 2020, Finch & Beak organized another successful edition of the DJSI Expert Training in collaboration with S&P Global. Global practitioners and experts on ESG benchmarking had the opportunity to meet and exchange knowledge with top-level DJSI peers in Amsterdam. In this article you will find a summary of the key insights from that day. Please note that SAM has extended the CSA deadline from 28 May to 30 July 2020.
EDP: Green Bonds Foster Sustainable Investing
Alternative forms of investments are becoming more predominant in corporate financial structures. Companies that leave a bigger fingerprint are encouraging internal collaboration by pairing unrelated divisions to one another. Energias de Portugal is living proof of this, blending its corporate vision with investors’ desire for portfolio diversification. Hedging both financial and environmental risk factors, green bonds enable alignment and play an active role in a strategic point of view.
Better Food for People and Planet
Notably, the food industry is among the first sectors affected by climate change and a wave of new reports and articles about food and sustainability have been published in 2019: What to make of the new evidence of today's food system challenges - from agri-food related climate change, to biodiversity loss, the ever significant food loss and waste and not to forget the increasing poor diets-related illness?
Powering Sustainability with Open Innovation
Changing market dynamics, rapid technological growth, and stakeholder pressure to find solutions to today’s toughest challenges requires companies to constantly evolve and develop new practices – if they want to stay competitive. There is no denying that every company can benefit from looking outside its own boundaries to come up with bold, new, and sustainable ideas. However, the search for open innovation and its integration into the company context needs to be done right to drive sustainable business transformation.
Bloomberg Sustainable Business Summit: London
This year's Sustainable Business Summit will take place in Bloomberg’s European headquarters in London for the third year. The summit welcomes corporate executives, investors and sustainability experts to learn and engage in conversation about sustainable business strategies in a post-Brexit world.
Corporate Climate Action: The Time to Act is Now
In a time where thousands of young (and slightly less young) people are following the lead of 17-year old Nobel nominee Greta Thunberg by marching the streets in cities all over the world, climate change might be higher on the societal agenda than ever before. Corporate climate action is definitely not a new thing – but today, even companies in traditionally less carbon-intensive sectors must also raise the bar committing to concrete targets to reduce their carbon footprint and contribute to the goals in the Paris Agreement. In this article, we propose a straight-forward 5-step approach to start building a pragmatic climate approach.
