PRODUCT, SERVICE & DESIGN INNOVATION -
A startup called Soundlazer claims to have developed the world’s thinnest speaker, made from a new class of plastic polymer. With the ability to reproduce a large range of audio frequencies, the company says it can be used to deliver audio in tight or unique spaces.
COLLABORATION -
This is the fifth of six questions from a roundtable discussion with the directors of sustainability research centers at six top business schools.So there are a couple different ways that we support the research process as an Initiative.One is that we bring in funding and then disperse it to faculty for research on sustainability. We’ve done that with some corporate funding, as well as philanthropic individual donors or foundations. We put out those calls for proposals, and it helps us to identify who among the faculty is doing research and sustainability.
CLEANTECH -
General Motors for the first time is procuring wind to power its manufacturing operations, enabling one of its Mexico facilities’ electricity needs to be run mostly on renewable energy. This addition of 34 megawatts of wind power allows GM to achieve its corporate goal of renewable energy use four years early.GM says construction of the wind farm will begin in the second quarter of this year. When complete, more than 12 percent of the company’s North American energy consumption will come from renewable energy sources, up from 9 percent. GM’s current renewable energy use — comprised of solar, landfill gas and waste to energy — totals 104 megawatts against a goal of 125 megawatts by 2020.
PRODUCT, SERVICE & DESIGN INNOVATION -
Interest is growing in new synthetic fabrics and textiles made from waste materials that have the potential to be used again and again. Designed from the outset to work within closed-loop supply cycles, Returnity and Econyl are perhaps the two best-known examples of branded products in this field.
The level of innovation that is built into these regenerative fabrics is impressive – they outline a wealth of environmental benefits and savings. In the case of Econyl, there is a clear social value driver in terms of delivering a more community-minded, inclusive business model.
PRODUCT, SERVICE & DESIGN INNOVATION -
Silicon Valley startup OpenLabel has just launched a free iPhone app and website that lets consumers and non-profit partners attach information and product ratings directly onto any barcoded product.After closing half a million dollar seed investment from investors at Google, Amazon, and MicroVentures, OpenLabel released its free mobile app and web platform that helps smart shoppers make healthier, more responsible, and more informed decisions.
MARKETING AND COMMS -
GE Water & Process Technologies recently launched UsedtoUseful, a new platform that explores the impact of water reuse on industrial and municipal sectors. The site shares industry insight and discusses interesting concepts surrounding the impact of water reuse on industrial and municipal sectors.UsedtoUseful focuses on water reuse, tough-to-treat water, energy efficiency, and monitoring through interesting articles, original content, and water stories from around the globe in a non-commercial way.
WASTE NOT -
The most effective technologies for addressing growing global water and energy interdependence — known as the water-energy nexus — are based on reduce, recycle, and recovery and zero-water/zero-energy, according to new research from analyst firm Frost & Sullivan.The report, Technology Convergence Resolving Water-Energy Challenges, identifies six types of technology that contribute to solving the water-energy challenge: renewables-based desalination, wastewater treatment and recovery, hydraulic fracturing, thermal power, water efficiency and energy efficiency.
CLEANTECH -
Carbon-capture technology holds much promise for helping the world to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere and mitigate the effects of global warming. It works by trapping the carbon dioxide at its emission source, transporting it to a storage location — often deep underground — and isolating it. However, most carbon-capture techniques developed to date are uneconomic because they consume too much energy to sequester the carbon.
CLEANTECH -
AT&T and GE have announced a collaboration to create the next generation of smart energy solutions for the industrial Internet of Things (IoT), helping to improve the way the energy industry works.The companies say they are jointly working on proof of concepts at the AT&T IoT Foundry in Plano, Texas.
COLLABORATION -
Howard Connell, managing director of Georgia Tech’s new Ray C. Anderson Center for Sustainable Business, points to the panel of presenters at the Center’s inaugural event as an example of how it plans to address the systemic complexities of sustainability.
STAKEHOLDER TRENDS AND INSIGHTS -
For third-sector organisations, the fundraising environment has rarely seemed so tough. One aspect of this is the prevalent belief that digital media and technology is creating a culture of 'slackivism’ — people replacing direct involvement and engagement with causes and campaigns, with clicks and Facebook likes.
THE NEXT ECONOMY -
The Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute and Autodesk, a world leader in 3D design software, have teamed up to offer product designers a chance to win up to US$4,000 through the inaugural Cradle to Cradle Product Design Challenge. Participants are eligible to submit their design after completing the free 1-hour, online course, Designing Cradle to Cradle Certified™ Products for the Circular Economy. Submissions are due March 15, 2015 and winners will be announced in April.
WASTE NOT -
Sprint today launched its Smartphone Encore Challenge — an attempt to inspire students to generate new ideas about how to revive old smartphones and their components. The competition — launched in partnership with Brightstar Corporations and HOBI International — calls upon students to come up with innovative ways to retrofit their old devices that could be scaled into a commercial business model. The Encore Challenge will be supported by Net Impact, the leading nonprofit that motivates younger generations to find sustainable ways to work within and beyond business.
PRODUCT, SERVICE & DESIGN INNOVATION -
Daniel Yu, founder of Reliefwatch — which makes software to help medical clinics in the developing world to digitize and manage inventory records for better patient outcomes — has won the Prince of Wales Young Sustainability Entrepreneurs Prize.As part of the prize, Yu has been awarded €50,000 ($56,500) and will be supported with a tailored mentoring program delivered by the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership and Unilever experts over the course of 2015. The six runners up each will receive a cash prize of €10,000 ($11,300) in addition to mentoring and support.
PRODUCT, SERVICE & DESIGN INNOVATION -
In this new age of mobile phones, many of us suffer from “Shiny Object” syndrome — where we always want the latest and greatest toy Apple, Samsung or one of the other multitude of manufacturers can think up. Most of the more than 1.8 billion mobile phones sold worldwide in 2013 replaced devices that were less than two years old. Nearly a billion of these devices were smartphones.
MARKETING AND COMMS -
When Sandy flooded New York and New Jersey, it destroyed key infrastructure for two lifeline sectors: fuel and transportation. What happened next reveals just how essential it is to share supply chain information in times of crisis.
CLEANTECH -
Recovery specialist Axion Consulting, Johnson Matthey Fuel Cells Limited and Technical Fibre Products (TFP) have developed a new recycling process to recover high-value materials from waste fuel cells.Funded by Innovate UK, the UK government's innovation agency, the Recover project aims to establish the technical and economic feasibility of recovery and reuse of high value materials from fuel cell membrane electrode assemblies and ultimately to establish the potential for a new UK-based global recycling business.
CLEANTECH -
Chemical giant BASF is on a mission to connect people and ideas in six locations worldwide with the Creator Space™ tour, a yearlong event series aiming to address challenges in the areas of energy, food and water, and urban living. The first stop, in Mumbai, India, will take place from January 16-23 at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (formerly the Prince of Wales Museum), with a focus on water sustainability.
COLLABORATION -
Royal HaskoningDHV has partnered with Dutch water supply company Vitens to help other drinking water companies around the world recover humic acid, an organic fertilizer.Humic acid is often discharged as a waste product during the drinking water blanching process. However, it can now be reclaimed sustainably in its pure form, providing an organic soil improver.
CLEANTECH -
Many companies already use manual systems to collect data on and manage their sustainability programs, but a growing number are using software tools that were professionally-developed for this purpose, according to a new white paper by CSRHub and French software company Tennaxia.