Month: August 2023

KOHLER, Wis., August 17, 2023 /3BL/ – Kohler Co. returns as an exhibitor and session participant at World Water Week 2023, Aug. 20-24 in Stockholm, Sweden. This year’s conference is focused on innovation at a time of unprecedented challenges and the theme Seeds of Change: Innovative Solutions for a Water-Wise World invites attendees to rethink how they manage water.

At this year’s conference, Kohler will highlight innovative solutions that are making positive impacts on communities and lives around the world by focusing on increasing the access to safe water and sanitation. These solutions are generated from Kohler’s Innovation for Good business, an in-house incubator focused on creating new business opportunities with a social and environmental purpose:

KOHLER Cleanse – A wrist activated handwashing faucet attaches to a common bucket or hose and works without electricity or plumbing. Cleanse saves water with an auto open/close valve and enables hygiene with minimal water. Designed for indoor or outdoor uses and various uses cases ranging from healthcare spaces to commercial uses to schools.KOHLER Rinse – This pour-flush toilet solution affords individuals the comfort and dignity of a seated sanitation solution. The flush is activated simply by pouring water into the bowl, making it ideal for communities without a waste management infrastructure.KOHLER Unify – This power blending solution ensures off-grid water stations that are critical to health and disease prevention in poverty-stricken and refugee communities around the world are continuously powered. The system monitors solar power and automatically transfers to generator power only when needed.KOHLER Loope – A waterless sanitation solution that integrates with container-based sanitation waste collection models, designed to bring safe sanitation to dense urban environments where alternative options are often nonexistent.

Conference attendees can experience Kohler’s space in the Stockholm Waterfront Congress Centre. Kohler’s Director of Innovation for Good and Sustainability, Ratish Namboothiry, will also join two program panels on Monday, Aug. 21:

Markets and Life-Centered Design: How to Innovate for Good, a discussion on how we can shift from human-centered design to life-centered design: powering markets for profit, people, and the planet. 

How to operationalise the water energy-nexus which explores opportunities to promote and accelerate reductions in hot water consumption, and why this is key to achieve net zero targets.

Learn more about Kohler’s Social Impact and Sustainability initiatives through the company’s 2022 Believing in Better report, highlighting goals and progress across environmental sustainability, diversity, equity and inclusion and social impact. 
 

About Kohler Co. 
For 150 years, Kohler Co. has been a global leader in design and innovation, dedicated to providing gracious living through kitchen and bath products; luxury cabinetry, tile and lighting; distributed energy solutions – home energy, industrial power systems, and powertrain technologies – and luxury hospitality experiences and major championship golf. Kohler’s Whistling Straits golf course hosted the 43rd Ryder Cup in 2021. Privately held Kohler Co. was founded in 1873 and is headquartered in Kohler, Wisconsin. The company also develops solutions to address pressing issues, such as clean water and sanitation, for underserved communities around the world to enhance the quality of life for current and future generations. 

KOHLER Kitchen & Bath, Energy, Golf + Resort Destinations

Contact: 
Vicki Valdez Hafenstein 
Kohler Co. Public Relations 
victoria.valdezhafenstein@kohler.com

EMERYVILLE, Calif., August 17, 2023 /3BL/ – SCS Global Services (SCS), a global leader in third-party environmental and sustainability certification, auditing, and life cycle assessment, announced that two reports it completed on behalf of the Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action (FICCA) convened by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) are now publicly available. The first report, “Identifying Low Carbon Sources of Sheep Wool, Hair, Alpaca Fiber and Silk Fiber,” provides guidance to the textile and apparel industries for lowering the carbon footprint when sourcing animal-based fibers. The second report, “Identifying Low Carbon Sources of Man-Made Cellulosic Fibres (MMCF),” examined 14 separate LCA studies, and summarized the current best conclusions for low carbon sources of MMCF.

Both reports were undertaken by FICCA, with SCS acting as the neutral technical lead. FICCA is developing a roadmap for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from raw material extraction, production, and processing, which together can be the most carbon-intensive part of the fashion value chain. These reports add to earlier work to study cotton and polyester. The goal is to enable FICCA signatories to identify actions to reduce their GHG emissions in line with the 1.5-degree Celsius global target.

The report on animal fibers showed that, for virgin wool and hair, methane from enteric fermentation is the most significant contributor to climate impact. For silk production, the highest impact was the production of the leaves to feed the silkworms. For recycled wool, the results showed high variability in impact levels based on factors such as raw material sourcing, transportation requirements, and energy and material demand from shredding and fiber production.

The MMCF report concluded that the GHG profile of MMCF is heavily influenced by the type and location of the feedstock. The sources with the lowest greenhouse gas emissions were, in order: 1) Lyocell from low-carbon wood pulp or optimized recycled pulp; 2) Viscose from low-carbon wood pulp or optimized recycled pulp; and 3) Modal from low-carbon wood pulp or optimized recycled pulp.

Keith Killpack, Technical Director in SCS’s Environmental Claims division and project lead, said, “This important work being undertaken by FICCA and the Textile Exchange is bringing needed transparency and clarity to the goal of decarbonizing the fashion industry supply chain. The reports highlight key considerations for current fiber sourcing and recommendations for continuing textile LCAs, and helped illuminate data gaps to be addressed in continuing studies.”

“As the fashion, apparel, and textile industry seeks to improve its understanding of how to use impact data to make informed sourcing decisions toward achievement of decarbonization goals, these reports serve as a neutral, centralized reference point on the greenhouse gas (GHG) impact data that currently exists for these material categories, along with the data gaps and opportunities,” stated Beth Jensen, Climate+Impact Director for Textile Exchange. “We thank SCS for bringing their expertise to the development of these important industry resources, along with FICCA for its support of this work.”

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About SCS Global Services 

SCS Global Services is a global leader in third-party environmental and sustainability verification, certification, auditing, testing, and standards development. Its programs span a cross-section of industries, recognizing achievements in climate mitigation, green building, product manufacturing, food and agriculture, forestry, consumer products, and more. Headquartered in Emeryville, California, SCS has representatives and affiliate offices throughout the Americas, Asia/Pacific, Europe, and Africa. Its broad network of auditors are experts in their fields, and the company is a trusted partner to companies, agencies, and advocacy organizations due to its dedication to quality and professionalism. SCS is a chartered Benefit Corporation, reflecting its commitment to socially and environmentally responsible business practices. For more information, visit www.scsglobalservices.com.

About the Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action 

The Fashion Charter was set up with the support of UN Climate Change in 2018 to provide a pathway for the industry to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, in line with global efforts to limit warming to 1.5C. Other commitments in the Charter include sourcing 100% of electricity from renewable sources by 2030, sourcing of environmentally friendly raw materials, and phasing out coal from the supply chain by 2030.

Name: Aude Charbonneaux | Head of Climate & Environment

Company: Pernod Ricard

Connect with Aude on LinkedIn

Welcome to our series aimed at spotlighting the individual leaders within BIER member companies and stakeholder organizations. Learn how these practitioners and their companies are addressing pressing challenges around water, energy, agriculture, climate change, and what inspires each of them to advance environmental sustainability in the beverage sector and collectively, overall.

Briefly describe your role and responsibilities and how long you have worked with your company. 

I have started with Pernod Ricard for a little over one year. My role centers around climate and environment, and I am responsible for rolling out part of our 2030 Sustainability & Responsibility roadmap, ‘Good Times from a Good Place’ to make it operational and especially to track performance around the climate and environment. If you want to track performance, it means there has to be an agreement on targets and the methodology. How are you going to measure things? And which set of tools and systems will be allowed for monitoring performance? So, from the definition of the metrics to setting up the methodology, the tools, and tracking of the performance, that’s more or less what my role encompasses.

Also, each year, I am expected to challenge our strategy, year over year, to evaluate opportunities. Basically, to see whether we should reinforce some aspects.

Interestingly, my team is part of the Operations department, which allows us to be closer to all those operating in the supply chain, which includes working with our affiliates, buyers, etc. Also, we work closely with the Sustainability & Responsibility department (CSR department) around our ambitions and strategy, whether we need to review our targets, revise our policy, reassess some risks, and things like that.

Our Sustainability & Responsibility roadmap includes 4 pillars: Nurturing Terroir, Valuing People, Circular Making and Responsible Hosting. The pillars address all aspects of our business, from grain to glass. Each of our pillars sets out ambitious goals and targets which we measure and report against to drive change throughout the business, and support performance through innovation, brand differentiation and talent attraction. It is the second pillar, Circular Making, where we have our strategy around climate, water, circular packaging, and that is where my responsibility lies.

How has the company’s sustainability program evolved over the years, and what are your specific priorities for 2023?

Looking at one of our four pillars, Circular Making, we are committed to reducing our scope 1&2 absolute GHG emissions by 54%, our scope 3 GHG emissions intensity by 2030 (vs 2018 baseline) by 50%, and following a Net Zero by 2050 trajectory. To do this, we are reducing our carbon emissions in our own operations by turning to new technologies and alternative energy, by procuring renewable electricity for our sites and offices. We are also working with our supply chain to help reduce our overall carbon footprint linked to the procurement of packaging and agricultural materials, as well as logistics. The procurement team is working very closely with our suppliers to understand their emissions, to understand their roadmap, and the best ways to capture more granular and specific data to better manage the journey of decarbonization.

Building upon that, the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi) released new guidelines, and while they were fresh, we tried to use the guidance right at the beginning. So, we have analyzed our FLAG (forest, land, and agriculture-related) emissions and conducted a feasibility analysis to see how we can achieve this new ambition. In the process, we made progress in understanding how we may need to transform our Group in order to reach those new targets.

In parallel to this, we’ve also been working on reassessing our climate risks asking the question, “How would the Group be affected by future scenarios around climate in different rises of average temperature?

I’ve been involved with two studies this year that were very influential in terms of learning and awareness for the Group. They marked a clear new impulse for accelerating our transition to a lower carbon business model.

Overall, we are building momentum, and those are some of the key things we did this year that we can be proud of.

Learn more about Aude Charbonneaux in this BIER Member Spotlight.

Medtronic employees are dedicated to helping others through volunteering and community engagement beyond their daily jobs. As part of the annual Medtronic volunteering drive, employees in Minneapolis packed 98,700 meals in just two days this summer – contributing to over 3.3M meals packed by Medtronic employees in partnership with Meals From The Heart. The meals are distributed to local food shelves.

Learn more about how employees’ commitment to giving back makes an impact across communities.