In today’s edition:

📱Closed-loop mobile collections

🏠 3D printing your home

🌾 The first indoor-farmed wheat

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💼 Big Business (1-minute read)

U.S. aims to sanction Brazilian de-forestation — adding bite to climate fight

The problem: Deforestation in Brazil hit a 15-year high under outgoing President Bolsonaro - damaging one of the earth’s major buffers against climate change.

Cracking down: The US is looking to crack down on illegal deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon by using “Magnitsky sanctions” to tackle climate change more aggressively.

Magnitsky sanctions? Punish the accused by freezing US assets and bar all US companies from dealing with the sanctioned individuals or entities. The ultimate aim is to prevent the international financial system from being used for illegal activities with forest products.

Importance: The plan marks a major shift in US strategy to combat global warming by adding the bite of direct sanctions to an existing policy toolkit of incentives, diplomatic nudges and agreements.

Vodafone and WWF launch closed-loop programme for smartphone collection

Vodafone and WWF today announced a major global partnership to encourage, incentivise and educate customers to trade in old mobile devices to be repaired, refurbished or recycled. Every phone collected during the programme will see £1, or the local equivalent, donated by Vodafone to WWF conservation projects. A refurbished smartphone saves around 50kg of CO2e compared to a new one and removes the need to extract 76.9 kg of raw materials, making its contribution to climate change 87% lower.

What we love and a watch out: Partnership ecosystems with sustainability-focussed NGOs help inform impactful corporate action and reduce the risk of greenwashing. However, with cost of living crises across the globe, circular schemes like this will only take off if backed by appropriate financial reward (i.e people get more $ for cashing in their phones than they would elsewhere).

Nestle Waters plans the first hydrogen-powered freight train in Europe

The beverage company will use the train to transport Vittel mineral water products between the Nestle Water factory and distribution centres. The first commercial journey is planned for 2025, with Engie supplying green hydrogen to power the train, which will be a dual-mode vehicle capable of being powered by a hydrogen fuel cell or a line-electric connection. It’s estimated the project will reduce emissions by 10,000 tons of CO2 equivalent per year = equivalent to the annual emissions of over 30,000 round trips from Paris to Nice by car.

🤖 Future of Tech (1-minute read)

Wheat grown indoors = prospect of global food security

Vertical farm startup, Infarm, is the first company to grow a ‘stable’ crop indoors. They successfully grew wheat “vertically” without using soil or chemical pesticides and with far less water than conventional production. If delivered at scale, it could be a game changer, as wheat supplies are constantly challenged by climate change and logistical issues (the war in Ukraine has highlighted global reliance on a few “breadbasket nations”).

High yields, but challenges remain: The first trials show projected annual wheat yields of 117 tons a hectare from the indoor farm (vs 2022 yields of 5.6 tons a hectare in Europe & 3.1 tons in the US using conventional methods). However, achieving scale and low costs is crucial to compete in commodity markets, with big questions over the energy needs to power indoor farms.

Bio-printing buildings

Problem: Construction is a big emitter. Across the value chain it accounts for nearly 25% of global GHG emissions. Retrofitting old housing stock is a piece of the puzzle. However, in many geographies across the globe there is a need to continue to provide new affordable and sustainable housing.

Bio-Building: The University of Maine Advanced Structures and Composites Center (ASCC) unveiled the first 3D-printed house made entirely out of bio-based materials called BioHome3D, according to a press release by the institution. The new structure consists of walls as well as a roof made of wood fibres and bio-resins. The house is fully recyclable and highly insulated and its development produced a limited amount of waste due to the precision of the printing process. The modular installation also dramatically reduces installation costs supporting affordable price points.

💡 Deep Dive (1-minute read)

FIFA's climate own-goal

“It looks as though the Qatar 2022 World Cup is going to be the highest carbon event of any kind apart from a war that humans have ever staged” – Mike Berners-Lee

As the football World Cup kicked off last week in Qatar, great attention has been paid to the social issues in the nation, yet the tournament's green credentials (or lack thereof) have received less coverage. FIFA’s claims that the World Cup in Qatar is “a fully carbon-neutral event” (which means the net impact on the climate is zero/negligible) has raised environmentalists’ eyebrows — here are some reasons why:

1. Construction: A report claims emissions related to the construction of new infrastructure are underestimated by a factor of 8 and questions why the construction of 6 permanent stadiums and 1 temporary stadium has only been allocated 5.5% of the total emissions. In addition to stadiums, Qatar has been on a decade-long World Cup construction boom, building 30 practice facilities and expanding Doha International Airport.

2. Operations: Aside from GHG emissions from construction, stadiums are energy intensive, especially in a country such as Qatar, where 99% of electricity comes from fossil-fuel-powered infrastructure. Current operational emission estimates for stadiums exclude emissions from cooling the stadium = another intense source of energy. The tournament is also expected to generate 1,300 flights daily.

3. Offsets: World Cup organisers helped establish a carbon offset agency called the Global Carbon Council, which has authorised three projects: a hydroelectric plant, a wind farm in Turkey, and a wind farm in Serbia. These renewable energy projects are generally excluded from the carbon market system. Buying these credits has a less beneficial effect on the climate since they do not change the viability of the project that generates them.

TL;DR: FIFA predicts activities related to this year’s World Cup will amount to 3.6 million metric tons of carbon dioxide — the equivalent of nearly 460,000 homes’ energy use for a year — potentially a gross underestimate.

Our take: Sport offers one of the largest global platforms to educate and move the lever on sustainability. This World Cup could have served as a platform to encourage billions of viewers to think about the transition to sustainability, and the way to do that would have been to place a clear emphasis on staging a sustainable tournament. Look to Formula E for a sporting body pushing the boundaries on sustainable events.

💭 Little Bytes

Quote:  “Nature is our biggest ally in the fight against climate change and the source of our health, security and prosperity.” WWF-UK’s chief executive Tanya Steele

Stat: According to Green Alliance, 80% of items purchased on Black Friday end up as waste within a year.

Watch: Wasted: Fast fashion is fueling our ecological crisis

🗞 In other news…

• Greta Thunberg Sues Her Native Sweden for Failing on Climate

• New electrical device on a fishing line repels sharks and rays in an attempt to prevent some of the harm caused by commercial fishing to ecosystems

• Canada to double the amount of money available to support homes move from oil to heat-pumps for heating.

• Capturing carbon with giant algae blooms in the middle of the desert, and selling the service in carbon markets - a new initiative from Brilliant Planet

• Ex-Deliveroo exec launches rival sustainable quick commerce platform Bodo

Written by Colin and Ollie - Drop us a message!