Mike Hower
Managing Director, Sustainability & Social Impact
Deutsche Bank
Mike Hower is tagged in 1051 stories.
Page 20 of 53.
Waste Not /
A student in the United Kingdom has developed an innovative form of food packaging that incorporates the living roots of fruit and vegetables to allow them to continue ripening until they are ready to eat.Called Nurture, the packaging takes the form of a bowl made of organic material woven with the roots of plants bearing fruits such as tomatoes, cherries or figs. By keeping the bowl moist, the plants can continue to live even while being transported.
- 9 years ago
Chemistry, Materials & Packaging /
Chemists at the University of Birmingham have found a new way to make nanostructured carbon using the waste product sawdust, according to research published in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal Green Chemistry.By cooking sawdust with a thin coating of iron at 700 degrees centigrade, the researchers found they can create carbon with a structure made up of several tiny tubes. These tubes are one thousand times smaller than an average human hair.
- 9 years ago
Cleantech /
The Philip Morris cigarette plant in Concord, North Carolina is switching to produce batteries to store energy for wind and solar farms, Fortune reports.The plant used to manufacture a billion cigarettes annually, but a reduction in the number of Americans smoking took its toll and Philip Morris stopped producing cigarettes at the plant several years ago.
- 9 years ago
Chemistry, Materials & Packaging /
AkzoNobel has launched an additive for road salt to help protect against frost damage and improve driving safety.Inspired by the ability of certain animals to withstand cold and prevent ice forming in their bodies, Ecosel® AsphaltProtection is a fully biodegradable additive for de-icing brine. It works by preventing the water trapped inside the asphalt pores from turning into hard ice. It encourages the formation of slushy ice, which is mechanically weaker than the asphalt and substantially reduces the risk of damage. Slowing the freezing process results in soft, slushy ice, rather than hard, abrasive ice. After in-depth research and development, the product is available to customers in Italy and the Netherlands.
- 9 years ago
Leadership /
UCLA has announced the creation of a $15 million self-replenishing fund to support campus sustainability projects — the largest fund of its kind in the United States.The university says creating the UCLA Energy and Sustainability Revolving Fund is a way to acknowledge that sustainability is a way to help minimize climate change, as well as a good financial investment. The fund will be created through bond financing and will not use tuition or student fees, UCLA says. Supporters will also be able to donate to the fund to support sustainability at the university.
- 9 years ago
Marketing and Comms /
The North Face President Todd Spaletto and U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary Sally Jewell have announced a partnership to protect, preserve and celebrate public lands in support of the 21st Century Conservation Service Corps (21CSC).
- 9 years ago
Behavior Change /
Today, activists from SumOfUs.org, joined by concerned citizens in cities around the country are rallying outside Lowe’s Stores in an effort to build awareness of the company’s lack of action to eliminate bee-killing pesticides — known as neonics — from it stores and supply chains.Two protests in Brooklyn and Philadelphia will feature activists dressed as bees, distributing information on neonic pesticides and their impact on critical bee populations.
- 9 years ago
Cleantech /
Skyonic Corporation has opened the world’s first commercial-scale carbon capture and utilization facility in San Antonio, TX.Located at Capitol Aggregates, an existing cement plant, the $125 million Capitol SkyMine will have a total carbon impact of 300,000 tons annually, through the direct capture of 75,000 tons of carbon dioxide and transformation into solid, usable products such as baking soda (sodium bicarbonate), bleach and hydrochloric acid (HCl).Using Skyonic’s patented, groundbreaking SkyMine® technology, Capitol SkyMine is expected to generate approximately $48 million in revenue and $28 million in annual earnings — all from greenhouse gas emissions that previously would have been released into the atmosphere.
- 9 years ago
Collaboration /
Portland State University will sell Chevrolet carbon credits for two-and-a-half years' worth of energy-efficiency projects totaling 1,500 tons of avoided carbon emissions, as part of a move to raise funds for further campus sustainability projects.
- 9 years ago
Leadership /
Chief Sustainability Officers (CSOs) have expanded their responsibilities from internal program managers to strategic lynchpins who guide corporate strategy, identify product innovation opportunities, and orchestrate sustainability initiatives both inside and outside the company, according to a new report by The Weinreb Group.
- 9 years ago
Collaboration /
CVS Health and Direct Relief have partnered to provide $1 million in flu shot vouchers to community health clinic patients in underserved communities lacking health insurance.Nearly 100 participating clinics will identify uninsured individuals from their existing patient populations and provide them with a flu shot voucher redeemable at any CVS/pharmacy® or MinuteClinic® location.Direct Relief's network of more than 1,200 community health centers and clinics nationwide enables CVS Health's generous contribution to reach people in need.
- 9 years ago
Behavior Change /
The United States has the worst work-life balance of the 23 developed nations recently ranked by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) Better Life Index.The OECD judged work-life balance based on three variables:
- 9 years ago
Waste Not /
The Basel Action Network (BAN) has announced they are bringing to market an online trading platform that will allow businesses to easily recycle used electronics with some of the world's most responsible electronic waste recyclers — those certified to the e-Stewards® Standard.The e-Stewards® Marketplace, developed in cooperation with industry leaders and Seattle-based technology company Retrace, has been enthusiastically supported by e-Stewards recyclers and companies such as LG Electronics, as well as the data protection services firm Tabernus, which have expressed their intent to use the site for their electronic asset disposition or services.
- 9 years ago
Marketing and Comms /
Microsoft has met its carbon neutrality commitment through internal efficiency projects, the purchase of more than 3 billion kilowatt hours (kWh) of renewable energy and a carbon offset project portfolio representing more than 600,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, according to the software company’s 2014 Citizenship Report.The company also achieved its goal for all new data centers to have an average 1.125 Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE), one-third less than the industry average datacenter PUE of 1.7.
- 9 years ago
Supply Chain /
The North Face, H&M, Eddie Bauer and several other leading international fashion, bedding and outdoor brands have adopted a third-party certification standard that can be applied to any waterfowl-based supply chain to help ensure humane treatment of animals from gosling to end product.
- 9 years ago
Supply Chain /
Marks & Spencer (M&S) has scaled up its use of Labor Link mobile technology in the supply chain to poll 64,230 workers across 46 manufacturing locations in 5 countries (China, India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and the UK) — exceeding its target of 22,500 workers in 30 factories by more than double.
- 9 years ago
Collaboration /
Boeing and Kenya Airways have partnered with First Baptist Church in Baytown, Texas, to transport medical equipment to Kajiado, Kenya, on a newly delivered 787 Dreamliner from the company's North Charleston, S.C., facility.The supplies, including examination tables and other equipment, will benefit Kenyan children served by the Africa Inland Church Childcare Center in Kajiado. The center provides care and treatment for children with cerebral palsy and other disabilities.
- 9 years ago
Supply Chain /
Sub-Saharan Africa has the world’s largest gap in farm yields — 70 to 90 percent below their potential — according to a new research tool unveiled Monday.The outcome of a 6-year international collaborative research effort led by the Daugherty Water for Food Institute at the University of Nebraska and Wageningen University in the Netherlands, the Global Yield Gap and Water Productivity Atlas is the first transparent, interactive and map-based web platform to estimate exploitable gaps in yield and water productivity for major food crops worldwide.
- 9 years ago
Waste Not /
Italy will soon become the first country in Europe to legally require "advanced biofuels" in cars and trucks, the BBC reports. The new fuels are made from agricultural waste such as straw rather than crops, and reduce the amount of land taken out of food production.The first commercial scale plant making fuel from straw opened in Italy last year. Beginning in 2018, all fuel suppliers in the country will have to include 0.6 percent advanced biofuel in gasoline and diesel. This will rise to 1 percent by 2022.
- 9 years ago
Supply Chain /
H&M CEO Karl-Johan Persson recently called for the need for annual wage revisions in Bangladesh in line with local price inflation.The comments came during an October 14 meeting with the country's Minister of Commerce, Tofail Ahmed."We see that costs in society are negating many of the positive effects of increased wages. This is due to the absence of efficient systems of control leaving both workers and business owners in a difficult situation," Persson said.For several years, the retailer has worked towards establishing a fair living wage in Bangladesh — a key supplier country. H&M sources products from around 300 factories in the country, employing over 600,000 workers.
- 9 years ago