This Climate Business

Imagine being able to bring climate into long-term financial forecasts - not just this year but 100-years ahead. Canopi is the latest climate tool to come from the climate powerhouse The Lever Room. Rebecca Mills is the founder of The Lever Room, a strategy and technology company working across carbon, climate and nature. Rebecca helped build The B Team, the global initiative founded by Richard Branson and Jochen Zeitz, and now leads Women in Climate Tech Australasia and lectures at the University of Otago.

Vincent attended the Sustainability Business Live conference in Melbourne recently and met an impressive array of experts and entrepreneurs from Australia and New Zealand - all chasing what one speaker called the triumph of the transition. In the next few episodes we'll meet some of these transition trumpeters. First up, Ben Symons, a senior natural capital advisor with Climate Friendly, one of Australia's leading carbon and biodiversity consultancies. https://www.climatefriendly.com/

<p>Biodiversity credits remain somewhat the holy grail in conservation. Imagine being paid to manage nature - not for farming or mining or fishing - but simply for being, nature. Yet like the holy grail, the promise outshines the reality. Carbon credits have struggled to meet expectations. Various attempts like He Waka Eke Noa and the ETS have failed to link markets to nature.</p><p>But a new report by the BNZ, Deloitte and The Nature Conservancy predicts a brighter future. ‘Connecting Nature, Climate’ and Capital says demand for high-integrity nature-based carbon credits is strong and growing – with carbon market...

<p>Jack Bobo is a food futurist and keynote speaker at E Tipu New Zealand Future Food and Fibre Summit. He argues the food system’s hardest problem after climate is social. We all disagree about what food is, how it should be grown and how it should be distributed. It doesn’t have to be this way. In a wide-ranging conversation, Vincent asks Jack to reflect on the future of food to 2100.</p><p>Jack Bobo is the author of ‘Why Smart People Make Bad Food Choices’ and is Executive Director of the Rothman Family Institute for Food Studies at UCLA...

<p>Sustainable transport advocate Kirsten Corson tells Ross Inglis that the war on Iran both exposes our dependence on imported oils and offers an opportunity to move away from them.</p>

<p>Wondering how well we are doing with cutting emissions? London-based climate communicator John Lang runs the ruler over NZ's performance and offers Ross Inglis a take on the maturity of the climate debate here, why institutions matter more when governments duck their climate responsibilities, and quick answers to three top climate whataboutisms. </p>

<p>The outgoing chair of major NZ insurer Tower says climate change is costing lives and money but there are bigger fish to fry before we cut emissions. Ross Inglis asks him to explain.</p>

<p> What does October's energy policy announcement mean for the future of NZ's electricity market and the climate? Law professor Barry Barton steps Ross Inglis through a package big on fossil fuels and very quiet about renewables. </p>

<p>Earlier this year New Zealand's first and largest big storage battery began selling into the grid; there are signs that it is already softening prices. So, are we on the cusp of a low-emissions electricity transformation? Climate and energy modeller Dr Jen Purdie tells Ross Inglis that we are...to a point.</p>

<p>Every year the fashion industry produces over 24 billion shoes made largely of synthetics, with little regard for the materials sourced, the wellbeing of the people involved or impact after disposal. Orba shoes are different. Designed in NZ, made from entirely natural materials every part of every shoe Orba makes for the next 100 years will be gone before any synthetic sneakers discarded yesterday.</p><p>Orba is also included in this year’s Next List - the definitive list of the most sustainable products and businesses as judged by the Sustainable Business Network.</p><p>Vincent was joined by Gillian Bo...

<p>Auckland builder Paul Webster-Young is turning a new home for his sister into a case study for construction that sends less waste to landfill and costs less over time. The key, he tells Ross Inglis, is careful selection of materials and a new kind of collaboration with architects.</p>

<p>New Zealand's houses have come a long way since the '70s but there's plenty we can do to make them more sustainable. Auckland architect Mike Hartley is designing for less building waste and that, he tells Ross Inglis, starts by talking with the builder. </p>

<p>Ken Webster is one of the world’s leading thinkers in the circular economy. For eight years, he led innovation at the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, the world’s leading circular economy network. Visiting Professor, Cranfield University, UK; Fellow, Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership. He is the author of The Circular Economy: A Wealth of Flows (2017) and co-author of The Wonderful Circles of Oz: A Circular Economy Story (2022), Sense and Sustainability (2008) and ABC&D Creating a Regenerative Circular Economy for All (2022). He also contributed to the Handbook of the Circular Economy (2023).</p><p>And he is a keynote speaker at the...

<p>A chubby feline is the star of an awareness campaign for the B Corp certification that says your business is getting real about sustainability. B Lab's Australia and NZ CEO Andrew Davies tells Ross Inglis about fat cats and how B Corps are making progress even in difficult times. </p>

<p>Think Like a Forest is a beautiful short film about NZ’s ngahere or native forest and is now showing on TVNZ On Demand, PureAdvantage.org and soon Air NZ In Flight Entertainment. Produced by Pure Advantage as part of its Recloaking Papatuanuku programme, the film is fronted by Sam Gibson aka Sam the Trapman. Pure Advantage’s Simon Millar joined Vincent for a chat about the film, pines and thinking about forests.</p><p>https://pureadvantage.org/think-like-a-forest/</p>