The Triple Bottom - 🌱 Skis from Wind Turbines

President Biden invokes Defense Production Act (DPA) to accelerate domestic manufacturing of clean energy 
The DPA: A 71-year-old-law permits the White House to deem certain materials essential for national defence and coordinate with industry to obtain those goods (same one President Trump used to support coal plants). In this case the act is deployed to increase the US’s energy security.
What does it mean? The act provides access to a government money-pot ($900bn) which serves as a guaranteed buyer (at any price) for clean energy tech. It also demands businesses must fulfil government contracts ahead of others. This incentivises private businesses to quickly scale production of clean energy products including solar and heat pumps. 
Importance: Rather than focussing on preventing bad actors, climate policy is increasingly about incentivising good ones. A short-term cash injection in lieu of long term legislation. A start!

More allegations of greenwashing leads to police raids 
Asset manager DWS, and its majority owner Deutshe Bank, were raided as part of a probe into potential greenwashing 
What are the details? DWS have allegedly made misleading claims in its 2020 annual report that over half the the group’s $900bn assets were invested using ESG criteria. 
The immediate consequences? Reports of the raid have had an impact on both companies with the group’s shares falling by 7% while DWS’ CEO immediately resigned.
The importance: Scrutiny of ESG claims is being combined with more willingness to use police powers to gather evidence leading to a closer relationship between regulators and law enforcement - reducing the ability to hide unscrupulous activity relating to ESG investing.

EU to propose law to reverse decades of biodiversity loss 'imminently' 
Challenge: The EU has consistently missed its pledges to reverse the decline of nature on its territory. In 2021, only 15% of habitats had a ‘good’ conservation status.
What has changed: A leaked document about a new ‘nature restoration law’ would propose legally binding objectives to protect more of Europe’s ecosystems. 20% of the Union’s land and sea would be protected under law by 2030, and all ecosystems in need of restoration by 2050.
Why should we care: Healthy ecosystems help to mitigate global warming, prevent natural disasters, and strengthen food security. 

Circular innovation aplenty

• Japan’s Discarded Kimonos: Shifting fashion tastes and a declining consumer base have created a huge supply of vintage kimonos, which Japanese creatives are now crafting into modernised clothing.

• Dutch Wind Turbine Blades: After 25 years of generation, blades from the Irene Vorrink wind farm just north of Amsterdam are to be made into snowboards, skis and construction materials for solar farms as Vattenfall AB starts a pilot project to improve sustainability of its turbines

• Kids Clothes: UK supermarket M&S Kidswear joins a peer-to-peer resale marketplace in bid to encourage 'hand me downs’

• All new buildings in the UK to have electric car chargers from 2022 and EU Lawmakers Uphold Ban on New Combustion Engine Cars by 2035

• Climate change: Bonn talks end in acrimony over compensation

• Agribusiness Task Force: Sustainable Markets Initiative launches new regenerative agriculture push

• Largest ever farm-led restoration project launched in Kenya to restore 1.9mn hectares of land across 6 African nations

• UPS unveil battery-powered, 4-wheel “eQuad” to efficiently haul cargo in congested cities.

3 of these stories are true, 1 is not, guess which…

• Gravestone for Internet Explorer goes viral

• Uber release food delivery robots onto the streets

• Elon Musk sued over alleged Dogecoin pyramid scheme

• Jeremy Clarkson plans hydrogen plant on his UK farm