Month: July 2024

Sappi, a leading global provider of everyday materials made from woodfibre-based renewable resources, has again achieved Platinum, the highest rating in EcoVadis’ sustainability assessment across all three of its manufacturing regions – Europe, North America, and South Africa. Sappi continues to be among the top 1% of the companies worldwide rated by EcoVadis in the manufacture of pulp, paper and paperboard category. In 2018-2019, Sappi received EcoVadis gold medal, which was the highest level until the Platinum category was introduced in 2020.

Sappi’s global business strategy focuses on growing its business, enhancing trust, and driving collaboration and innovation as a sustainable, diversified global woodfibre group.

“At Sappi, we recognise that sustainability is about investing in people-centric, positive change,” says Tracy Wessels, Group Head of Investor Relations and Sustainability, Sappi. “We are immensely grateful for the ongoing collaboration with EcoVadis, and we look forward to continuing this strategic approach, regionally and globally, thereby innovating our sustainability efforts in areas where we can have the greatest impact.”

Understanding that EcoVadis can help Sappi’s suppliers on their own sustainability journey, Sappi partnered with EcoVadis since 2021 to benchmark and assess the sustainability Sappi Limited For further information practices of its suppliers. This strengthened Sappi’s ability to identify risks, assess social and environmental performance, and encourage commitment to sustainable choices across the value chain. It also aligns with Sappi’s commitment to create shared value, especially in the communities where it operates.

About EcoVadis 

EcoVadis is an international institute based in France which awards ratings for corporate social responsibility. As a globally recognised sustainability assessment platform, it measures the quality of companies’ sustainability management systems through their policies, actions, and results. The assessment ratings currently include bronze, silver, gold, and platinum. Over 130,000 companies across 220+ industries and 180+ countries are assessed, helping companies improve their sustainability across supply chains and to comply with growing global regulations. EcoVadis focuses on 21 issues grouped into 4 themes (Environment, Labour and Human Rights, Ethics, Sustainable Procurement).

About Sappi 

Sappi is a leading global provider of everyday materials made from woodfibre-based renewable resources. As a diversified, innovative and trusted leader focused on sustainable processes and products, Sappi is building a more circular economy by making what it should, not just what it can. Its raw materials offerings (including dissolving pulp, wood pulp and biomaterials) and end-use products (packaging papers, specialty papers, graphic papers, casting and release papers, forestry products) are manufactured from woodfibre sourced from sustainably managed forests and plantations. Many of Sappi’s production facilities use internally generated bioenergy, enabling many of its operations to be energy self-sufficient. Sappi produces 5.5 million tons of paper, 2.6 million tons of paper pulp, 1.5 million tons of dissolving pulp per year. Globally, it has over 12,000 employees, 400,000 ha of owned and leased sustainably managed forests in South Africa. Sappi Limited (JSE) is headquartered in Johannesburg, South Africa with manufacturing operations across three continents and sells its products in more than 150 countries.

Learn more about Sappi at: www.sappi.com

Jessica Ching
Communications Manager, Sustainability Sappi Limited
+32 (0)490 309 300
jessica.ching@sappi.com

In a recent article for Mission Critical magazine, Brandon Marshall, Global Marketing Manager, Immersion Cooling at The Chemours Company, shared the context behind today’s need for improved data center cooling solutions. Below is an excerpt from the article and you can read the full article, originally published by Mission Critical, here.

Air-cooled systems can no longer ‘beat the heat’ generated by IT equipment 

By Brandon Marshall, Global Marketing Manager, Immersion Cooling at The Chemours Company

Based on publicly available product road maps from major chip manufacturers, by 2026, air-cooled systems will no longer be able to meet the cooling needs of most next-generation, high-performance computing chips. In other words, in less than two years, the most widely used method in the more than 5,300 data centers in the U.S. today will fall short in its ability to cool the components that support exponential growth in the world’s data processing and storage applications.

Thankfully, scientists and engineers anticipated the challenges data centers will soon be facing and innovated technology solutions with the capacity to meet elevated cooling requirements. Beyond simply allowing for effective cooling of next-generation computing chips, this technology comes with a host of other benefits, ranging from greater energy efficiency to a smaller physical footprint. However, before diving into the details about this new technology — known as two-phase immersion cooling (2-PIC) — it’s important to understand the background behind today’s need for improved cooling solutions.

Criticality of better cooling

High-powered computing and faster-than-ever processing speeds are no longer considered a future need. These capabilities are now established as critical to the operation of businesses, governments, organizations, and other entities that support the way today’s communities function, survive, and thrive. Whether it’s health and wellness, financial institutions, economic growth, safety and protection, entertainment, education, or any other service supporting our way of life, successfully providing that service fully depends on the ability to obtain, store, and process data quickly and reliably. Moreover, just because this need is established doesn’t make it static. According to a U.S. Market report from Newmark, “The U.S. data center footprint will absorb 35 gigawatts by 2030,” which is more than twice the data center power consumption of 2022.

When most people hear “data centers,” their thoughts first go to big players, like Microsoft, Google, Meta, and Amazon, but equally important — and equally dependent on high-performance, high-speed computing — are the enterprise data center operators. These operators are our governments and military, financial institutions, health care systems, educational institutions, and more. They provide the services we draw on every day, with the expectation they will keep our information secure and readily available. In addition, when considering what is “heating up” data centers, we must include an ever-escalating appetite for everything from AI to streaming.

All of this has resulted in the development of next-generation chips — graphic processing units (GPU) and central processing units (CPU) — that are emerging to meet demands. Simply stated, to do what they need to do, these chips generate more heat than their predecessors and, as mentioned above, the traditional air-cooled systems in wide use today will not be able to “beat that heat.” Consequently, the world needs the proverbial better mousetrap — which is where liquid cooling comes in.

The emergence of liquid cooling

Ironically, 2-PIC — emerging as the technological frontrunner to provide superior solutions for the cooling needs of modern-day data centers — has roots dating back to the 1940s, when liquids were used to cool high-voltage transformers. Approximately 20 years later, IBM developed a system of direct liquid cooling, which remained popular until the 1980s, when new chip technology required less wattage for the processing needs. In this environment, air-cooling systems proved more effective and efficient. However, because the needs of the 2020s are much different than they were 40 years ago, the industry has circled back to liquid cooling as a solution to provide the required cooling capacity and address the numerous shortcomings — including high energy and water consumption — of air-cooling systems.

Offering the ability to remove heat more effectively than air cooling, liquid cooling uses a liquid, such as water or a dielectric fluid, to cool the heat-generating components of servers by coming in contact with these components, either directly or indirectly through a heat exchanger. One type of liquid cooling is single-phase, which uses a pump to circulate the liquid through a closed-loop system. The other type, two-phase liquid cooling, uses a phase change material, such as a refrigerant, which evaporates and condenses as it absorbs and releases heat…

Continue reading here.

Meet Hiro Muraoka & Jorge Alvarez: the creative force behind Kohler’s commitment to global water and sanitation solutions.

As we continue celebrating our 150th anniversary, Hiro and Jorge’s story exemplifies our legacy of innovation and the power of creators to drive change. From past pioneers like Herb Kohler to present-day visionaries like Hiro and Jorge, we celebrate creators who dare to shape a better world.

Join us as we honor their journey and invite all creators to join in shaping the next 150 years.

Learn more here.

Driven by a new major sustainability program, a model predictive control solution from Rockwell Automation (NYSE:ROK) is helping a leading global cement producer spearhead process digitalization efforts.

Compagnie des Ciments Belges SA (CCB), part of Cementir Holding group – a multinational building solutions company and global leader in white cement – is examining its processes with the goal of becoming more sustainable. It has formulated an ambitious roadmap to significantly reduce CO2 emissions by 2030. The Group’s 10-year roadmap includes the replacement of fossil fuels, the development of a new low-carbon cement, and several investments in sustainable development, coupled with the digitalization of manufacturing, maintenance, inventory, and spare-parts management processes in all its factories.

At two cement mills over two months, the Rockwell-installed solution helped reduce energy consumption by 6%, compared to a target of 3%, and it increased production rates by nearly 8.5%, compared to a 3% target.

Learn more about how digitalization is helping to drive new control targets to reduce process variability, improve performance, and boost efficiency.

PORTLAND, Ore., July 10, 2024 /3BL/ – The Global Electronics Council (GEC) is proud to announce the winners of the 2024 EPEAT Purchaser Awards, whose collective environmental impact reduction included cutting greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 565,000 metric tons of CO2 equivalents. This equates to taking 121,000 average U.S. passenger cars off the road for a year, accompanied by reductions in energy use, hazardous waste, water consumption, and more.

The EPEAT Purchaser Awards honor organizations demonstrating outstanding leadership in and commitment to sustainability by procuring EPEAT registered products. The awards highlight the substantial impacts these institutions empower by prioritizing environmentally responsible purchasing and showcase the demand for sustainable electronics.

“EPEAT has been instrumental in helping the DOE Office of Environmental Management achieve our sustainability goals by providing a reliable standard for sustainable electronics procurement” explains Jeanne M. Beard, Chief Information Officer and Director of Information Systems of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management. “Through EPEAT’s rigorous criteria and global recognition, we have significantly reduced our environmental footprint and promoted responsible purchasing practices across our projects. Our field site participation in this program is especially noteworthy in that it is voluntary and reflects well on their continued commitment to the cleanup mission.”

In addition to GHG emissions reduction, 2024 EPEAT Purchaser Award winners collectively reduced:

2,133 gigawatt-hours of energy, comparable to the annual electricity consumption of 175,000 average U.S. households.400 metric tons of hazardous waste, the equivalent to the weight of 3,300 refrigerators.4.4 billion liters of water consumption, saving enough to fill 1,756 Olympic sized swimming pools.

With total EPEAT registered products purchases exceeding 25 million, award winners are expected to collectively save more than $102 million over the life of the products.

“These figures demonstrate the commitment of EPEAT Purchaser Award recipients to drive sustainable technology procurement, leveraging EPEAT’s unique ability to calculate tangible results” remarked Bob Mitchell, CEO of the Global Electronics Council. “Impact measurement, along with third-party product verification and a user-friendly online registry make EPEAT invaluable to organizations working to realize their sustainability goals.”

By choosing EPEAT registered products, the 2024 award winners minimize their social & environmental impact and set a standard for other leading institutions to follow. GEC encourages all institutions to join the movement towards a more sustainable future by integrating EPEAT registered products into their procurement practices.

For more information about the EPEAT Purchaser Awards and to view the complete list of award winners, please visit globalelectronicscouncil.org/epeat-purchaser-awards.

Global Electronics Council

The Global Electronics Council (GEC) is a mission-driven nonprofit that accelerates the transformation of markets that prioritize the most sustainable electronic technology products and services, advancing the well-being of people and planet. GEC’s work is focused on high-impact sustainability issues, such as climate change and product circularity. It manages the EPEAT ecolabel and produces other resources to support sustainable technology procurement, including training, purchasing guides, sample procurement language, and more. Visit gec.org to learn more.

EPEAT

Managed by GEC, EPEAT is the world’s premier electronics ecolabel. It serves as a free resource for procurement professionals to identify and select products with reduced impacts across key sustainability issues. Since its launch in 2006, procurement professionals have reported purchases of 2.4 billion EPEAT products, generating cost savings of USD 24.6 billion and a reduction of 286 million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions. Visit epeat.net to learn more.

Contact

Erik Fessler 
Manager, Global Communications 
Phone Number: +1 971-380-4088 
Email: efessler@gec.org