Last year, Whirlpool introduced a novel insulation technology that could represent a significant breakthrough in refrigerator design and sustainability. The technology, known as SlimTech™, replaces traditional polyurethane foam with a proprietary powder-like material held in a vacuum, addressing longstanding recyclability issues in refrigerator manufacturing.

Pam Klyn, executive vice president of corporate relations and sustainability at Whirlpool, joins the podcast to talk about SlimTech and the broader landscape for sustainable refrigeration and emissions reporting. Like many multinationals, Whirlpool faces challenges in managing Scope 3 emissions, which largely depend on product use in consumers' homes. They're developing systems to better estimate and report these emissions while focusing on tangible product improvements. Innovations like SlimTech support the company's goal for net-zero emissions in its operations by 2025 and a 25% reduction in Scope 3 emissions by 2030 compared to 2016 levels. But while appliance manufacturers like Whirlpool have made substantial improvements in energy efficiency, the source of electricity powering homes also has a major impact on emissions.

Highlights from Pam Klyn

Challenges with polyurethane in refrigeration (2:00)
What is SlimTech? (3:18)
Whirlpool's road map for SlimTech's end of use applications (5:26)
Global landscape for sustainable refrigeration (7:03)
Whirlpool's leadership in sustainability (9:12)
The role of the grid in modern home appliances (11:32)
Challenges and opportunities in reporting emissions (13:02)
Challenges in complying with different regulations worldwide (16:33)
Whirlpool's net-zero goals (19:10)

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Buildings are responsible for about 40% of energy related carbon emissions around the world. That means any conversation about reducing emissions and achieving net-zero goals will have to feature insights about the efficient construction and – perhaps more importantly – operation of buildings.

Mark Reinbold, vice president of Global Sustainable Infrastructure at Johnson Controls, joins the show to discuss what he gleaned from attending COP28 in Dubai about how business executives and other experts are factoring infrastructure into their sustainability strategies. Mark shares some of the key findings from research Johnson Controls conducted with Forrester Consulting about smart building trends and outlines the role technologies like artificial intelligence are playing amid the expansion of the concept of net zero buildings-as-a-service.

Highlights from Mark Reinbold

Conversations about sustainability with global leaders - (1:52)
Common roadblocks to more sustainable infrastructure - (6:28)
Have global gatherings like COP and Davos 'jumped the shark'? - (8:08)
Any deal follow-up from COP28 - (10:15)
Expanding Net Zero-as-a-Service - (12:59)
Key takeaways from Forrester Research on smart building trends - (16:09)
Examples of artificial intelligence delivering for smart buildings - (19:05)
Showcase project: University of North Dakota - (23:30)
How renewable energy is factoring into projects - (26:05)
Mark's bold predictions about sustainable infrastructure - (29:25)

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Mars, Inc., is a giant in the snack industry and also has a huge footprint in the petcare and food & nutrition sectors. Diverse lines of business usually present complex sustainability challenges. Autumn Fox, Climate and Sustainability Senior Manager at Mars, joins the show to discuss the details of Mars' Net Zero Roadmap. The roadmap outlines what Mars views as the 5 Fundamental Elements of Net Zero and offers details about how Mars is addressing major issues, like deforestation, water scarcity, and decarbonizing supply chains.

Our conversation, which also features SmartBrief Food & Beverage Content Editor Janet Kendall, delves into some unexpected areas ... like Mars' climate Boot Camp and what Autumn and her team do to solve the sustainability challenges related to pet anesthesia. Yes, pet anesthesia. This was a fun and informative episode. Enjoy!

More resources from Mars

Mars Launches New Coalition to Mobilize Suppliers & Accelerate Climate Action
Mars hails expansion of global coalition to mobilize suppliers on climate action

Highlights from Autumn Fox
Background info about the origin of Mars' Net Zero Roadmap - (2:36)
Getting buy-in from stakeholders across the company - (3:19)
Science-based targets and other aspects of Mars' Net Zero Roadmap - (4:14)
The 5 Fundamental Elements of Net Zero - (5:00)
Sustainable packaging - (6:20)
The impact net-zero goals have on Mars' recipes - (7:55)
Decarbonizing a complex global supply chain - (9:18)
Agriculture and regenerative farming -(12:52) 
Communications best practices with farmers - (14:41)
Tackling deforestation - (16:10)
Addressing water scarcity - (18:59)
Net zero when it comes to pet supply businesses and veterinary clinics - (20:51)
The energy Mars uses to power its operations - (22:30)
What Mars learned from looking in the mirror - (24:14)
Autumn's bold predictions about Mars' sustainable future - (25:39)
Climate Boot Camp - (26:55)
What other companies can take away from Mars' Net Zero Roadmap - (28:36)

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Few companies produce as many household products as Colgate-Palmolive. Vance Merolla is the Senior Vice President of Global Sustainability at Colgate-Palmolive and he joins the show to discuss how the company tackles sustainability across all its products and brands. And make no mistake, we're talking about a ton of brands. Obviously, there's Colgate and Palmolive. But there's also Ajax, Speed Stick, Murphy Oil Soap, Fabuloso, Tom's of Maine and Irish Spring. They also have an entire line of pet products.

Colgate-Palmolive has big sustainability challenges. Vance is here to talk about how they solve them, including advancements in recyclable toothpaste tubes, what the company learned from getting certain aspects of its Sustainability and Social Impact Strategy approved by the Science-Based Targets initiative and how Vance and the team recently went about signing a virtual power purchase agreement to help Colgate-Palmolive power its operations. Vance has a wealth of sustainability knowledge, so enjoy the show.

Highlights from Vance Merolla

Colgate's 2025 sustainability and social impact strategy - (1:59)
Setting science-based targets for net-zero carbon emissions by 2040 - (4:39)
Reducing emissions and achieving net-zero goals - (7:38)
Sustainability data management - (11:22)
Renewable energy purchasing strategy for Colgate Palmolive - (14:43)
Oral health initiatives and sustainability efforts - (21:55)
Making toothpaste tubes recyclable - (24:41)
Reducing plastic waste in Colgate's manufacturing facilities - (29:58)
Sustainability initiatives and consumer insights - (32:52)

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Sponsored by: ImpactAISummit

“The Future of the Responsible Company - What We've Learned From Patagonia’s First 50 Years” is a book being released today that was co-written by Patagonia Director of Philosophy Vincent Stanley and founder Yvon Chouinard. Stanley joins the podcast to talk about why the book, which is an update to a similar title that the duo released a decade ago, is even more important amid today's corporate, environmental and political landscape. The book is full of sage advice for people who want to conduct business with an eye on more than just profits and it also reveals some surprising details about the origin of Patagonia. Stanley also spendd a few minutes sharing his advice for startups and other companies that might want to follow in the footsteps of Patagonia's amazing corporate evolution.

More resources

Patagonia's Our Footprint

Highlight from Vincent Stanley

The Future of the Responsible Company - 3:31
How Patagonia got into the clothing business - 7:10
From startup to business travel conversations - 9:00
Shareholder primacy - 13:19
Measuring GDP vs TBL (triple bottom line) - 14:44
The B corp movement is expanding - 17:50
The fascinating business model of the Henokiens - 20:20
The process of finding responsible suppliers and farmers - 25:53
'Living in a world of fewer, better things' - 28:06
Expanding 'healthful' decision-making beyond food purchases - 31:04
'Strategy starts with the real story' - 31:40
Collaborating with outside organizations like Samsung - 37:11
Advice for startups who want to follow in Patagonia's footsteps - 40:19
The power of word choice in communication - 43:40
The history of "Our Footprint" - 46:09
Sustainability and the role of agency - 50:10

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Sponsored by: ImpactAISummit

Andrea Murphy, the Director of the Office of Environmental Affairs and Sustainability at Panasonic North America, joins the show to walk us through how a global company like Panasonic aims to boost the role it plays in the circular economy. Panasonic is aware of the amount of emissions generated by the manufacture and use of its products … and to the company’s credit, they’ve even put an actual number on it. Andrea is here to outline what Panasonic is doing to reduce the environmental impact the company creates not just up and down its supply chain, but also once it's products are sold to consumers.

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Sponsored by: ImpactAISummit

Sustainability presents different challenges for different organizations. For this episode, we partnered with the American Chemistry Council (ACC) to share the stories of companies that have been recognized for the efforts when it comes to sustainability. For today’s show, we conducted quick, 10-minute interviews with representatives from each of the winning organizations. Winners of the ACC’s Sustainability Leadership Awards for 2023 include: 

• Covestro - Social Responsibility & Community Engagement Award - Rebecca Lucore - Segment begins at (2:12)
• Dow and WM - External Collaborator Award - Adwoa Coleman and Ganesh Nagarajan - Segment begins at (11:44)
• DuPont - Environmental Protection Award - Anson Wong - Segment begins at (22:25)
• Evonik - Product Safety, Innovation & Transparency Award - Wolfgang Goertz - Segment begins at (32:29)
• SABIC - Circularity Award - Matthew Marks - Segment begins at (40:05)

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Denise Naguib, Vice President of Sustainability & Supplier Diversity at Marriott International, joins the show to outline what the hotel industry is doing to make travel more sustainable. Across its 31 hotel brands, Marriott International’s portfolio includes more than 8,500 properties spanning 138 countries and territories. This huge, global footprint presents an array of sustainability challenges because Marriott’s hotels are not cookie cutter. Operating a massive hotel and convention center in a metropolis like New York, London, Tokyo, Sydney or Cape Town is very different from operating a small, boutique resort in some exotic location. The variety of sustainability challenges those different kinds of properties present is seemingly endless ... and Denise and the team at Marriott work to tackle them all.

More resources

Serve 360: Doing Good in Every Direction
Marriott International's 2023 Serve 360 Report

Highlights from Denise Naguib

An outline of Marriott's Serve 360 platform - (3:16)
Marriott's specific sustainability goals - (5:07)
Tackling global goals at local properties around the world - (7:16)
Golf as an example of sharing best practices on a global scale - (8:56)
Sustainability as a way to attract travelers - (11:07)
How Marriott communicates sustainability throughout its supply chain - (13:39)
Collaboration within the hospitality industry - (15:53)
How the pandemic changed business travelers' preferences - (22:39)
How Marriott is doing on achieving its sustainability goals - (26:02)
Marriott's renewable energy portfolio - (30:37)
Innovative ways to conserve water - (31:47)
Advice on preparing to eastablish Science-Based Targets - (33:16)
The one challenge Denise spends the most time pondering - (37:20)
Denise's bold prediction for hotel sustainability in 5-10 years - (38:55)

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This episode is a little bit different. There are no segments from the Sustainability SmartPod gang. No debating what's sustainable or suspicious. No recap of the latest headlines. No roundup of cool sustainability initiatives from around the world. Instead, we're going to talk about one of the things that we like to hammer on every episode: the importance of communicating sustainability effectively. 

Mike Hower, one of the premier thought leaders on ESG and sustainability communications, joins the show to outline best practices when it comes to sustainability communications. Mike has an extensive background as a journalist, and now his firm, Hower Impact, helps companies shape their sustainability messages. As we've said many times on this show, it's really important for companies to understand that the messaging behind what they do when it comes to sustainability initiatives is almost as important as the initiative itself. Mike has got some great insights, so we think you'll appreciate what he has to say.

Highlights from Mike Hower

Consumer trust and ESG data - (1:33)
Tailoring communication for different audiences - (4:01)
Should sustainability communication be boring? - (7:23)
How companies in hard-to-abate industries can talk about sustainability - (11:28)
Are there times when companies should just stay quiet on sustainability? - (16:17)
Which companies are getting it right when it comes to sustainability communications? - (21:22)
The difference between accountability and transparency in communications - (26:49)
Advice for aspiring corporate sustainability professionals - (29:51)

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During one of the first episodes of this show, we mentioned the carbon accounting concept of environmental liability (E-liability). E-liability introduces a simple, accurate, and verifiable calculation for the total cradle-to-gate emissions of any product or service. On that earlier episode, we voiced a bit of skepticism about the concept … and guess what … the people at the E-liability Institute were listening. They got in touch and offered to have one of their co-founders join us on the show to do a deep dive on a concept that stands to revolutionize the carbon accounting landscape.

Karthik Ramanna is the Co-founder and Principal Investigator at the E-liability Institute. He's also the Professor of Business & Public Policy and Director of the Master of Public Policy Program at the University of Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government. Karthik explains the basics of E-liability and makes the case for why companies, standards setters and regulators all around the world should be familiarizing themselves with the concept of E-liability.

More resources

Inaugural E-liability Conference
Harvard Business Review: Accounting for Climate Change
Harvard Business Review: Getting a Clearer View of Your Company’s Carbon Footprint

Show Segments

Sustainable or Suspicious - (2:39)
Paris skyscraper ban

Top Headlines from SmartBrief on Sustainability  - (13:05)
The kids have had enough -- climate lawsuit comes to trial
Fungi play a major role in combating climate change
York, Pa., works to eliminate plastic waste

Here and There - (24:56)
European soccer and sustainability


Highlights from Karthik Ramanna

What is E-liability? - (31:51)
Smartphone supply chain as an example for E-Liability - (33:57)
Pilot project with Giti Tire Group (40:03)
E-liability vs. Other carbon measurement approaches - (43:00)
Plugging supply chain carbon accounting gaps - (43:48)
If Karthik was king for a day - (46:02)
E-liability's compatability with existing standards - (48:40)
What is preventing wider adoption of E-liability? - (50:22)
Engaging with regulators - Upcoming conference - (53:46)
Karthik's bold predicitons - (58:10)

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