Circling Back on Your Comments

Regular readers of this newsletter may have noticed by now that most editions tend to end in a similar manner: me asking you for your thoughts in the comment section. While I love being able to share my perspective each month, I want to make sure these thoughts are part of a conversation, not just a monologue. Just as economies become more sustainable as they add more connections, conversations become more powerful when more people participate.

While I am not always able to reply to comments directly in the threads, I do always enjoy reading them. To that end, I wanted to do something a little different for this edition: I am going to highlight a handful of comments from past editions, and add some short responses. There were many other comments that I would have liked to include as well, but in the interest of length, I tried to choose a selection of comments that covered a variety of ground, and where I felt I could provide some insight.

Sustainability Lessons from an Unlikely Source: My Grandmother

Beautiful story Garry and brought back fond memories of my mom mom, who also grew up on a farm (in NC) and who raised me in primary, and then high school. Your story reminded me that zero waste was a necessity and what a different world we’d live in if people cherished every material, every resource, and every being as precious? As far as we think we have evolved, there are so many opportunities to ‘get back to basics.’ The spiritual connection to the world around us can not be understated. Thank you for sharing and celebrating such a wonderful, strong woman -Sheri R. Hinish

OK, not much to add here, I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed seeing all the love for my grandmother, and to hear others appreciating their grandmothers as well! If we all are lucky, we will be grandparents one day. What will our grandchildren say or write about us?

Doomsday vs brighter days: how we think about our climate fight at COP27

In a 2021 study by Toronto’s CAMH, 50% of Ontario students (grades 7 to 12) said that worries about climate change were making them feel depressed about the future. How can we inspire youth to help identify and support solutions to the crisis if we constantly bombard them with doomsday scenarios? What’s so compelling about circularity is reframing the problem as an opportunity. We all have a part to play in this. -Patrick Marshall

Climate positivity is so critical in our attempt to rebrand with the promise of a circular economy. As one example, I really love the work that Pique Action is doing — their motto is “The Opposite of Doomscrolling,” and when they cover climate challenges, they also highlight the innovative solutions that are being created to solve them. Instead of scaring people with projections of how terrible our future will be if things go poorly, let’s inspire people with how even more amazing our world could be if we take action to protect and improve our planet!

Super (Sustaina) Bowl: My Favorite Green Initiatives from the Sports World

After seeing a stadium from my old home state that opened when I was just entering high school be torn down when I hadn't even reached the age of 50 (The Palace of Auburn Hills, Michigan), it was very exciting to see the renovation process of Climate Pledge Arena in my current home state. The initiatives inside the arena are even more impressive in person! -Sarah Dandy

I absolutely agree that it is disheartening to see the ever-shrinking shelf life of modern sports stadiums. Ideally we can find ways to renovate and upgrade existing stadiums, and build new stadiums that are built to last. But realistically, even the most sustainable, state-of-the-art new stadium won’t last forever; it may seem strange to plan for a building’s end before it even exists, but we must build with disassembly in mind — I highly recommend this article in Wired that focuses on the Olympics, an extreme example of short shelf life where buildings may only be in use for a few weeks. It’s important to remember that while we need to build structures as sustainably as possible, we also need their end-of-life to be just as sustainable.

What I’ve Learned from the Best Sustainability Plans

As a resident of the Town of Superior, I'm thrilled to see this.... and it's important to understand the data used for this. I'm a little disappointed that this hasn't been shared more broadly in our community- the irony of seeing it on LinkedIn over distributed through our community sources. Unfortunately, they don't talk much about the data required to really get started on tracking. That's always my biggest problem with these very pretty- very well meaning plans, is that these action plans are great- however, so many of them don't lay out HOW they're going to benchmark, collect and manage the data and then report- and the manage the ongoing data. For example, out of that entire 60-some page report, the word "data" is mentioned 7 times. Here in CO we're deregulated on the gas side- so the Xcel Benchmarking help (RE: ENERGY STAR Portfolio Mgr) will only support gas accounts that get their gas THROUGH that utility. Guess we know what I'll be working on for the next few months! Great share- thanks for pointing out these examples. Your write ups are always helpful and insightful. Appreciate it! -Katie Becht

I like both of the points that Katie made here, and it’s important to remember that even some of the best plans can be improved. The environmental world certainly has some catching up to do in regards to harnessing the power of data, and doing so will greatly benefit the effectiveness of our initiatives. As for the sharing of these plans, that actually partially speaks to why I and my co-founders started Rheaply in the first place. ESG frameworks have traditionally been built by siloed teams, and we wanted to democratize reuse by connecting individuals in businesses. We’ve had a number of power users who were not in traditional sustainability roles — the interest in contributing to green initiatives is there, we just need to make sure those opportunities are being presented to the wider public.

Sustainability Employees are Essential Workers — Why Are They Getting Laid Off?

There is a similar trend in social impact or DEI, as the type of work is not seen as 'core' to the business. My question would be: is there a way that sustainability can become ingrained more deeply in other core areas of work? For instance, can employees in facilities or manufacturing be cross-trained to understand ways to improve sustainable efficiencies in their processes? Does it make sense for sustainability to continue to be a separate area of the business, or could it be a part of *all* the functions of the business? Genuinely curious to know folk's thoughts. -Jennifer Stojkovic

In another article (mild spoiler: it’s linked at the end of this piece) I wrote about the new “unsung climate heroes” who can affect sustainable change from roles in procurement, real estate, and supply chain operations. But the truth is that every employee is a sustainability employee in today’s world. The cross-training you mentioned is highly important, and as discussed in the previous answer, we need to go beyond training to also providing opportunities for action. And to answer your second question, I’d argue that it’s both: sustainability should be a part of all functions of a business, but it is also important to have specific sustainability experts who oversee implementation, manage initiatives, and innovate new ways to stay on the cutting edge of climate tech.

Why furniture (yes, furniture) should be your reuse priority

Davies Office diverted 828,000 pounds of office furniture waste from the landfill in 2021 just through remanufacturing! The Circular Economy is not just a buzz phrase. Our future depends on reusing what we have in a sustainable way, for our communities and for the planet 🌎 Michaela Beck

Biggest furniture problem is laminated particle board. Alex Ham

I remember long ago reading in Paul Hawken's Ecology of Commerce examples of sustainability in furniture production and life cycle. I hoped we'd be further along by now.  Craig Landes

I chose three different comments here because there were a lot of comments on this article, and it’s a topic that’s top of my mind these days. Additionally, I think the comments are all interconnected, stemming from the fact that the lifecycle of furniture is broken; that is due to the lack of visibility in the marketplace. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve heard people call out the materials that matter most to them, like Alex did with laminated particle board. We must create easily-accessible, connected marketplaces that allow participants to clearly view materials, and the resources contained in those materials; then, through processes such as reuse, sharing, and remanufacturing, we can unlock the benefits of circularity.

New unsung climate heroes: the critical role of procurement, real estate, and supply chain leaders in reaching net zero

Great thoughts Garry Cooper - It's truly amazing the power that procurement holds and can exert to drive sustainability improvement at scale -- when incentivized, adequately resourced, and supported to refocus strategic skills on this new imperative. We at #sustainablepurchasingleadershipcouncil see and support their impact every day. Thanks to #Rheaply for your part in enabling progress! -Sarah O'Brien

To close, and in the spirit of engaging in conversation, I just wanted to mention that I will be attending SPLC’s summit in Atlanta this August. Discussing sustainability through virtual mediums like this is important, but doing it in person is even better — I hope to see some of you there!

I want to again thank everyone who has taken the time to draft comments on any piece I’ve written over the past couple years, and I hope all of you have enjoyed hearing from some other voices in addition to mine. And as always, please keep the conversations going!