Sustainability is good for business as well as the planet

As sustainability takes centre-stage, carbon capture, storage and removal, sustainable fuel, energy storage, etc, are becoming part of boardroom conversations and agendas. More and more organizations are expected to craft their business strategy with sustainability embedded in its design.

While the pandemic did throw us off Sustainable Development Goals, it is important for businesses, government and society to collaborate and get back on track. When it comes to businesses, every company has a role to play. Over the years, data has shown us it makes business sense to embed sustainability by design in business plans. There are multiple ways to get there and technology is one of the biggest tools to help achieve that.

The pandemic saw organizations move to the cloud to facilitate remote work and it has now become part of their business continuity plan. Today, the cloud not only continues to help firms offer employees hybrid-work environments, but also help them bring costs down, provide flexibility to staff and attract top talent irrespective of location. Additionally, studies have shown both small and large enterprises can reduce their per-user carbon footprint by anywhere from 30% to 90% by just moving to the cloud. If you wonder what happens to the carbon footprint left behind by the energy consumed by these large data centres,the latter are also moving to renewable energy, looking at innovative chip architecture and ways of keeping cool with immersion-cooling technology. Depending on their cloud provider, firms can also use a ‘sustainability calculator’ to track greenhouse gas emissions arising from their cloud use.

Let us look at how specific industries are adopting technologies for decarbonization, while also reaping business benefits.

Building technologies: Buildings are central to our existence. However, there has been little innovation in this area until the recent past. Smart buildings today have allowed us to triangulate people, spaces and assets better by increasing productivity of the assets, making energy utilization more efficient and creating accessible and secure spaces using technologies like Internet-of-Things (IoT), collaboration tools, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). For example, a 500-acre campus with 125 buildings can save 6-10% of energy, address 48% of faults in less than a minute using technology.

Intelligent manufacturing: Manufacturers are facing pressure to expand and build differentiation through sustainably manufactured goods. Technology is now enabling them to decarbonize their core operations, reduce scope-3 emissions across their supply chain and create products by connecting and monitoring factory performance using data from assets to apply operational insights and optimize production processes. It helps integrate digital factories with intelligent supply chains to increase agility and reduce waste. Siemens Gamesa saved 6,000 hours a year at just one facility by using cloud, IoT and Bluetooth technology for equipment searches. The solution also helped it improve environmental health and safety scores. Using technology today even a vacuum pump can be located in an area equal to 65 soccer fields.

Banking: Banks across the world are trying to attract millennial and new-age customers. A broader study by KPMG among financial service providers showed customers prefer firms with better sustainability track records as demonstrated by their ESG (environment, social, governance) initiatives. Flowe, a digital only bank, is a great example of how a bank embedded sustainability goals within its business, which helped it drive customer stickiness. Flowe went beyond banking to integrate green living and personal health goals into its offerings targeting millennials. Its value proposition helped it differentiate from other digital banks and scale up in a short span of time.

Agriculture: Technology is playing a big role in helping farmers and producer companies sow seeds at the right time using spatial technologies, manage soil parameters using IoT, and manage the health of their farm produce using drones and IoT. At the same time, it is helping procurers optimize the supply chain using IoT data and also aiding the socially-conscious consumer in identifying the origin of a product using traceability technologies. In the process, it helps maintain the quality of produce and also prevent wastage. For example, Mars Food uses a tech solution that helps it closely monitor its global supply chain and give consumers detailed information on where and how its rice is grown.

There are numerous other examples in industries like mobility, energy, healthcare, telecom, etc, where technology is helping businesses manage their objectives in a sustainable manner.

Sustainability is no longer ‘nice to have’, it is at the very heart to our existence and that of future generations. We should, hence, be prepared for increased pressure on businesses—from regulators, consumers and other stakeholders—to report and reduce their environmental impact. And there has never been a better time to start than now.

Rachna Nath is executive director, customer solutions, Microsoft India