Month: March 2024

ATLANTA, March 19, 2024 /3BL/ — Wesco International, a provider of business-to-business distribution, logistics services and supply chain solutions, announced that it is expanding its partnership with Habitat for Humanity International.

This year, Wesco will contribute $300,000 to support worldwide projects including Habitat’s Home Equals five-year global advocacy campaign, as well as fund the construction of a home in Monte de Sion, Chiapas, Mexico. The home will be built with recycled materials and include energy efficient features including a biodigester, solar heating, bathrooms with a rainwater collector and a wood-saving stove. Additionally, Wesco will contribute $200,000 towards team builds in the United States and Canada and sponsorship of the 2024 Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Work Project.

“We are proud to expand our partnership with Habitat for Humanity,” said John Engel, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Wesco. “Wesco’s mission is to build, connect, power and protect our world and contributing to Habitat’s worldwide projects is part of our ongoing commitment to supporting the communities where we live and work.”

Wesco and Habitat began their partnership in 2022 when the company donated $500,000 to the global housing nonprofit. Over the course of the partnership, the company’s work alongside Habitat has included a community renovations project in São Paulo, Brazil, a roof wind mitigation project in Orlando, Florida, and supporting projects in England, Mexico, and New Zealand. The company was also a sponsor of the 2023 Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Work Project in Charlotte, North Carolina. Last year, Wesco completed 100 home build projects in local communities in honor of its 100th anniversary.

“We are thrilled to have the continued support of Wesco and we are excited to see our partnership grow this year,” said Tolli Love, chief development officer, Habitat for Humanity International. “Currently, more than 1 billion people live in informal settlements and lack basic services, land tenure security and climate resilience. With Wesco’s support of Habitat’s Home Equals campaign, we will be able to further our efforts to create lasting change and ensure families have equitable access to adequate housing.”

About Habitat for Humanity 

Driven by the vision that everyone needs a decent place to live, Habitat for Humanity found its earliest inspirations as a grassroots movement on an interracial community farm in south Georgia. Since its founding in 1976, the Christian housing organization has since grown to become a leading global nonprofit working in local communities across all 50 states in the U.S., Puerto Rico, and more than 70 countries. Families and individuals in need of a hand up partner with Habitat for Humanity to build or improve a place they can call home. Habitat homeowners help build their own homes alongside volunteers and pay an affordable mortgage. Through financial support, volunteering or adding a voice to support affordable housing, everyone can help families achieve the strength, stability and self-reliance they need to build better lives for themselves. Through shelter, we empower. To learn more, visit habitat.org.

About Wesco

Wesco International (NYSE: WCC) builds, connects, powers and protects the world. Headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Wesco is a FORTUNE 500® company with more than $22 billion in annual sales and a leading provider of business-to-business distribution, logistics services and supply chain solutions. Wesco offers a best-in-class product and services portfolio of Electrical and Electronic Solutions, Communications and Security Solutions, and Utility and Broadband Solutions. The Company employs approximately 20,000 people, partners with the industry’s premier suppliers, and serves thousands of customers around the world. With millions of products, end-to-end supply chain services, and leading digital capabilities, Wesco provides innovative solutions to meet customer needs across commercial and industrial businesses, contractors, government agencies, educational institutions, telecommunications providers, and utilities. Wesco operates nearly 800 branches, warehouses and sales offices in more than 50 countries, providing a local presence for customers and a global network to serve multi-location businesses and global corporations. For more information visit Wesco.com.

Schneider Electric

The Semiconductor industry is a key enabler for nearly every device we use to travel, work, and entertain ourselves. It’s needed for every sustainability effort – smart grids, the transition to renewables, low carbon footprint logistics, and supply chains. Even scientific discoveries and energy efficiency measures in factories rely on it. These chips are everywhere, and our net zero success hinges on the chips that silently power our efforts. 

Yet the semiconductor industry also needs to recalibrate its environmental impact. In 2021, it used enough energy to power a city of 25 million for an entire year.

Consequently, in 2022, COP27 saw the creation of a Semiconductor Climate Consortium with 60 founding members pledging to reduce emissions to 0% by 2050. 
The initiative underscores the semiconductor industry’s vital role in meeting the planet’s sustainability targets. It’s a lofty but achievable goal.

By weaving sustainability into semiconductor-fabricated electrical network designs from the outset, and with the right strategic planning and early-stage implementation, the industry can significantly reduce the carbon footprint of its chip manufacturing processes.

Complex production, resource-intensive supply chains

Semicon fabs are colossal consumers of water and energy. The giga-sized factories need increasingly massive energy supplies and significant water usage for cooling. In 2022, TSMC, the world’s largest chip manufacturer, consumed 97 million metric tons of water and 22 thousand gigawatt-hours – a significant portion of Taiwan’s total energy output. 

In addition, suppliers who provide the necessary materials for production also generate emissions (known as a company’s Scope 3 emissions). This adds considerably to the industry’s carbon footprint. All in all, producing today’s advanced 3nm chips is expected to consume nearly 8 billion kilowatt-hours annually. 

Given these high levels of consumption and the associated Scope 3 emissions, there is a pressing need for a strategic pivot that focuses on optimizing energy use and enhancing energy efficiency in Semicon electrical networks.

Embracing strategies that work

There are 4 key strategies that I believe can optimize electrical networks in Semicon factories: 

Distribution Lineup Optimization: This initial strategy lays the groundwork for a robust electrical network layout and improves operational efficiency. Begin by determining the appropriate starting point for energy inputs and optimizing transformer placements. These are based on load demands, cooling efficiency, and integration with smart grid technology. Then, ensure efficient voltage and current distribution. 

Your optimization strategy must remain agile to adapt to changing regulatory demands. These regulations often require new technology integration, design modifications, additional reporting, and advanced monitoring and control systems to support smart grid technologies. New safety or efficiency standards may even require different distribution lineup configurations. An agile optimization strategy ensures ongoing compliance and prepares the infrastructure for future smart grid developments. 
 Standardization: In substation designs, consistency and replicability of components simplify construction, reducing the risk of miswiring and streamlining maintenance. For example, a large Semicon fab has 300 MV substations, and we can standardize the designs of 250 of those. That’s a significant optimization of lead time, manufacturing efficiency, and energy usage. And it makes it more responsive to customers’ evolving needs and lowers total ownership costs. Replacement parts from suppliers are also more readily available or have much shorter lead times. 

Standardization also helps semiconductor manufacturers more easily comply with international or regional regulations. It helps simplify certification processes and regulations that may require evidence of reliable manufacturing practices and product stability. 
 Distributed Energy Resources (DERs): Integrating DERs – like microgrids consisting of solar panels, fuel cells, and battery storage – provides a clean and reliable energy source compared to traditional methods. Implementing microgrids significantly reduces carbon emissions and energy costs. This showcases the potential for broader adoption across the industry to improve resilience, optimize energy loads, and support sustainable operations. 

DERs can also be a robust response to regulatory changes that incentivize or mandate renewable energy and decrease carbon footprints. In fact, a significant advantage of distributed energy is that it can meet diverse regulatory environments. 
 Collaboration with Suppliers and Partners: Semiconductor facilities have complex electrical ecosystems. Optimizing the electrical network requires collaboration and engagement with expert partners – particularly those specializing in advanced energy management and automation solutions. 

These partnerships are essential to transforming production facilities into models of energy efficiency and sustainability by utilizing advanced IoT-enabled systems and cutting-edge technologies. Services provided by these partners, such as energy audits and the implementation of digital modeling architectures, play a crucial role. They drive down operational costs and carbon footprints, ensuring network reliability and efficiency. 

Beyond achieving sustainability goals, collaborations also pave the way for strategic ventures. These efforts can take the form of joint investments in research and development or focused lobbying to secure incentives under the CHIPS Act and influence future policy. 

The CHIPS Act is a pivotal legislative mandate in the United States that the semiconductor industry must navigate. With an ambitious goal to reduce energy consumption of microelectronics by 1000 times in the next two decades as a catalyzes innovation. Imagine reducing energy consumption by that much!

Charting the course for sustainable Semicon fabs from day one

Each of these strategies is more than just a standalone solution. They’re interconnected pieces that create optimized, resilient, and adaptable networks. Designing electrical networks strategically and making early engineering choices sets the stage for more resilient, efficient operations and responsible resource use. 

Because of the complexity of these projects, having an expert partner like Schneider Electric can be critical to embodying these strategies. Expert partners can use their deep industry knowledge to guide your decision-making with these strategies. They can also ensure continuous improvement and long-term support well beyond the initial construction of your facilities.

To deepen your understanding and take practical steps towards a more sustainable practice, download our Semiconductors Reference Guide for insights on ten critical business challenges impacting this industry and the offers and solutions needed to overcome them.

In the summer of 2019, Bora was celebrating his mother’s birthday at a seaside restaurant in Istanbul when he suddenly became very ill and couldn’t finish his meal.

“I woke up the next day with a high fever and terrible pain and was unable to move or eat for 10 days,” recalls Bora.

It was at this point that a friend took him to an anonymous HIV testing clinic. After losing a close friend to an HIV-related condition years earlier, Bora understood the importance of taking precautions and periodically got tested.

“I was stunned to get a positive test result, but after the initial shock I knew that with the therapies available today I would be able to manage it,” Bora says.

He immediately went on antiretroviral treatment and soon thereafter, the virus was no longer detected in his system.

An actor and singer by profession, Bora has since also become a peer counselor with Pozitif-iz Association – a nonprofit HIV advocacy group in Istanbul. “I want people to know the importance of testing and how early detection is key to recovery and moving forward to living a healthier life,” he says.

Last fall, Bora decided to share his story more broadly with the media as Türkiye joined European HIV Testing Week for the first time since the biannual testing campaign began a decade earlier throughout the continent. During that time, Türkiye experienced a fourfold increase in HIV diagnoses over an 11-year period.

Gilead subsequently worked closely with Pozitif-iz Association and various other partners and healthcare organizations to help launch the inaugural testing week campaign in Türkiye. As the largest private funder of nonprofit HIV programs in the U.S. and the world, Gilead strives to address unmet needs and help ensure people receive the HIV care and services they need.

“More than 27,000 free, anonymous tests have been provided to healthcare organizations by Gilead,” says Çiğdem Şimsek, founder of Pozitif-iz Association. Those diagnosed with HIV were referred for antiretroviral treatment, which is reimbursed under the national health care system.

According to the government’s figures, more than 40,000 people are now living with HIV in Türkiye, a figure Çiğdem attributes to a climate of stigma, fear, misinformation and lack of awareness and education. Young people, she says, don’t have sufficient access to sex and reproductive health education in the schools so they don’t know how to protect themselves against sexually transmitted diseases like HIV.

A recent modeling study by Assistant Professor Emine Yaylali of Istanbul Technical University projects that the numbers of people living with HIV could swell to 2.4 million people by 2040 if the trend continues.

“These are dramatic numbers, especially if you consider we’re a nation of some 80 million people,” says Çiğdem. “There’s an urgent need to increase testing centers and build awareness in key groups.” Due to this urgency, Türkiye plans to participate in the HIV testing weeks held twice a year, with the next one taking place in May.

Bora does his part to respond to the need by answering calls that come in through the peer counseling hotline. Many of the more than 5,000 calls fielded by Pozitif-iz Association last year were from people who are afraid that they will be spurned by a spouse, family member or a friend if they are diagnosed.

“They shouldn’t despair and live in fear,” he says. “I’m in a good position to tell them HIV is no longer a death sentence. Instead, it can be very manageable if detected and treated early.”

Originally published by Gilead Sciences

CHARLOTTE, N.C., March 19, 2024 /3BL/ – Power plant employees at Marshall Station, Mayo Station, Roxboro Station, Allen Station, Belews Creek Station and Cliffside Station awarded nearly $60,000 in Duke Energy Foundation grants and matching donations to nearly a dozen charitable organizations in the communities where they live and work.

“Giving back to our communities is a part of everything we do,” said Paul Fisk, vice president of Carolinas Generation. “I’m proud of the way our plant employees demonstrate genuine care and compassion for their neighbors, and we’re pleased they’ve chosen to support causes that are making a difference in the lives of those we serve.”

Employees were given the opportunity this year to nominate charities of their choice to support. Those nominations were then brought to plant management who ultimately selected the organizations that would receive the funds.

One of the nonprofits that received the grant was FeedNC, a North Carolina-based nonprofit that focuses on food insecurity. Each year, FeedNC serves 6,000 neighbors in need through dignified, creative and innovative programs.

“Families in our community turn to FeedNC when life’s circumstances become overwhelming, and they need help,” said Bonnie Battalia, chief development officer for FeedNC. “The generosity of Duke Energy through financial support for our programs and volunteering, allows FeedNC to make an immediate impact for a neighbor in need. We are grateful for Duke Energy’s partnership and friendship. Thank you for being a part of the solution.”

Marshall Station employees awarded grants to the following organizations:

FeedNC – $10,000 ($5,000 Foundation grant matched with $5,000 from the Marshall Community Service Team) 
 The Corner Table – $10,000 ($5,000 Foundation grant matched with $5,000 from the Marshall Community Service Team)

Allen Station employees awarded grants to the following organization:

Belmont Optimist Club Scholarship Foundation – $5,000

Mayo Station and Roxboro Station employees awarded grants to the following organizations:

Halifax County Veterans Affairs Cancer Association – $5,000 
 Person County Veterans Council – $5,000 
 Safe Haven of Person County – $5,000 
 Roxboro/Person County Rescue Squad – $5,000

Cliffside Station employees awarded grants to the following organizations:

Cliffside Fire and Rescue – $5,000 
 Boiling Springs Fire and Rescue – $5,000

Belews Creek Station employees awarded a grant to the following organization:

South Stokes Youth Soccer Association – $10,000

“A lot of our employees give their time and talents outside of work to various causes in the community,” said Jason Talbott, the general manager of Carolinas Dispatchable Generation North at Duke Energy. “These grants are an opportunity for our teammates to drive meaningful change that will have lasting benefits for our plant neighbors.”

Duke Energy Foundation 
The Duke Energy Foundation provides more than $30 million annually in philanthropic support to meet the needs of communities where Duke Energy customers live and work. The foundation is funded by Duke Energy shareholders.

Duke Energy Carolinas/Duke Energy Progress 
Duke Energy serves nearly 3.7 million households and businesses in North Carolina through two utilities, Duke Energy Carolinas (central and western North Carolina, including Charlotte, Durham and the Triad) and Duke Energy Progress (central and eastern North Carolina plus the Asheville region).

Duke Energy Carolinas owns 19,500 megawatts of energy capacity, supplying electricity to 2.8 million residential, commercial and industrial customers across a 24,000-square-mile service area in North Carolina and South Carolina. Duke Energy Progress owns 12,500 megawatts of energy capacity, supplying electricity to 1.7 million residential, commercial and industrial customers across a 29,000-square-mile service area in North Carolina and South Carolina.

Contact: Ben Williamson 
24-Hour: 800.559.3853

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