Australian Business: Ground zero for net zero

We’re just under halfway through 2022 and already we’ve seen significant changes throughout Australian society, particularly when it comes to addressing climate change. The battle ground for climate change will be fought in the corporate space, making businesses ground zero for action towards net zero.

Climate change was one of the major concerns that Australian voters had when they went to the polls in May. The newly elected Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, was quick to highlight the new government’s commitment on climate action. That plan is to reach a 43% reduction in emissions by 2030 as Australia’s target under the Paris Agreement, with a net zero target by 2050.

It comes off the back of many Australian businesses stepping up to take responsibility and action towards becoming more sustainable. While Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) reporting is still voluntary, there are repeated calls for it to become mandatory here in Australia.

According to the Australian Council of Superannuation Investors, nearly one quarter of the Top 200 ASX companies were committed to net-zero targets as of last year, and almost half had at least set carbon emissions reduction targets.

We also recently saw plans for an AGL demerger get derailed by Atlassian co-founder Mike Cannon-Brookes. His efforts to sway shareholders were successful and called for a faster end to coal-fired power stations and large coal investments by AGL.

It does feel like there has been a significant shift around the issue of climate change in Australia over the past year and a half. Talk has quickly turned to action and businesses are fervently exploring how to get to net zero as soon as possible. There are calls for our best efforts to happen in this decade, if it is to make a real difference.

Technology will be a major player on the centre court in this arena. Much of our carbon emissions reductions will come through innovation and efficiency gains. Without digital, we couldn’t even begin to track the carbon emissions of businesses and their supply chains effectively, to know where progress is at. 

Towards the end of last year at Cognizant we announced our global commitment to achieve net-zero emissions by 2030. As a business, we plan on leading the way by using technology to drive operational efficiencies, increasing the demand for renewable energy and energy efficient technology. Our actions flow not only across our company, but throughout our supply chains as well.

As a key technology partner for Australian businesses, Cognizant will support their net zero journeys through our expertise in cloud, IoT and AI as well as sharing insights from our own experience. This includes helping them; transition energy-intensive data centres to public cloud, designing IoT enabled smart buildings that manage electricity, heating, cooling and water more efficiently, and using IoT/cloud solutions across transportation and supply chain applications for real-time monitoring and better efficiency.  

What can you do to support these initiatives? Find out what your employer’s plans are and put pressure on them to develop plans if they have none. If they do, support their plan and look for opportunities where you can get involved. There are plenty of ways to show your support.