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How to Protect Your Pets From Pollution

Wildfire smoke, lead paint and other environmental toxins are health hazards for animals, too.

Wildfire smoke, lead paint and other environmental toxins are health hazards for animals, too.

Animals
Health

Solar and Wind Power Has Grown Faster Than Electricity Demand This Year, Report Says

A new analysis of solar and wind power shows its generation worldwide has outpaced electricity demand this year

Worldwide solar and wind power generation has outpaced electricity demand this year, and for the first time on record, renewable energies combined generated more power than coal, according to a new analysis.Global solar generation grew by a record 31% in the first half of the year, while wind generation grew by 7.7%, according to the report by the energy think tank Ember, which was released after midnight Tuesday London time. Solar and wind generation combined grew by more than 400 terawatt hours, which was more than overall global demand increased in the same period, it found.The findings suggest it is possible for the world to wean off polluting sources of power — even as demand for electricity skyrockets — with continued investment in renewables including solar, wind, hydropower, bioenergy and geothermal energies. “That means that they can keep up the pace with growing appetite for electricity worldwide,” said Małgorzata Wiatros-Motyka, senior electricity analyst at Ember and lead author of the study.At the same time, total fossil fuel generation dropped slightly, by less than 1%.“The fall overall of fossil may be small, but it is significant,” said Wiatros-Motyka. “This is a turning point when we see emissions plateauing."The firm analyzes monthly data from 88 countries representing the vast majority of electricity demand around the world. Reasons that demand is increasing include economic growth, electric vehicles and data centers, rising populations in developing countries and the need for more cooling as temperatures rise.Meeting that demand by burning fossil fuels such as coal and gas for electricity releases planet-warming gases including carbon dioxide and methane. This leads to more severe, costly and deadly extreme weather. Ember also dedicated part of its report to an analysis of China, India, the European Union and the U.S. Combined, they account for nearly two-thirds of electricity generation and carbon dioxide emissions from the power sector globally. In the first six months of the year, China added more solar and wind than the rest of the world combined, and its fossil fuel generation fell by 2%, the report said.India saw record solar and wind growth that outpaced the growth in demand. India's fossil fuel generation also dropped. In both nations, emissions fell.“It’s often been said by analysts that renewable energy doesn’t really lead to a reduction in fossil fuel use,” said Michael Gerrard, founder and director of the Columbia University Sabin Center for Climate Change Law, who was not involved in the report. “This report highlights an encouraging step in the opposite direction.” But in the U.S., demand growth outpaced the growth of clean power generation. In the E.U., sluggish wind and hydropower generation contributed to higher coal and gas generation, the report said. In both markets, fossil fuel generation and emissions increased.In his speech at the United Nations General Assembly last month, Trump attacked renewable energy and questioned the validity of the concept of climate change. Experts warn that Trump's efforts to block clean energy will have a long-term impact.“The federal government is greatly increasing the growth of artificial intelligence, which is going to massively increase electricity demand, and they’re also shutting down the cheapest new sources of electricity, wind and solar. That’s going to lead to a gap in supply and demand,” Gerrard said.Renewables “still have an opportunity to make inroads in to displacing fossil fuels, even with some demand growth,” said Amanda Smith, senior scientist at research organization Project Drawdown, who also wasn't involved in the report. But, Smith said: “I am very cautiously optimistic that renewables can continue to grow and continue to displace fossil fuels in the U.S. I am more optimistic on the world scale.”The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See – Sept. 2025

Climate
CO2
Energy

Along the Banks of the Mon River, Fracking Waste in a Landfill Once Again Poses a Pollution Problem

This story was originally published by The Allegheny Front, a public radio program covering environmental issues in Western Pennsylvania. On a rainy morning, Mike Frederick showed off the Belle Vernon Municipal Authority’s sewage treatment plant, about 30 miles south of Pittsburgh.  “This distribution box is where all the sewage comes in,” said Frederick, an operator […]

A judge barred the landfill from sending its "leachate" wastewater to treatment plants in the region. Now the company proposes to treat it on-site and then release it into the Monongahela River.By Reid FrazierThis story was originally published by The Allegheny Front, a public radio program covering environmental issues in Western Pennsylvania.

Waste
Water

From the telegraph to AI, our communications systems have always had hidden environmental cost

The telegraph was hailed for its revolutionary ability to span distance. Now AI is being hailed as a great leap forward. But both came with environmental costs.

The first attempt to lay submarine telegraph cable between Britain and France. Universal History Archive/GettyWhen we post to a group chat or talk to an AI chatbot, we don’t think about how these technologies came to be. We take it for granted we can instantly communicate. We only notice the importance and reach of these systems when they’re not accessible. Companies describe these systems with metaphors such as the “cloud” or “artificial intelligence”, suggesting something intangible. But they are deeply material. The stories told about these systems centre on newness and progress. But these myths obscure the human and environmental cost of making them possible. AI and modern communication systems rely on huge data centres and submarine cables. These have large and growing environmental costs, from soaring energy use to powering data centres to water for cooling. There’s nothing new about this, as my research shows. The first world-spanning communication system was the telegraph, which made it possible to communicate between some continents in near-real time. But it came at substantial cost to the environment and humans. Submarine telegraph cables were wrapped in gutta-percha, the rubber-like latex extracted from tropical trees by colonial labourers. Forests were felled to grow plantations of these trees. Is it possible to design communications systems without such costs? Perhaps. But as the AI investment bubble shows, environmental and human costs are often ignored in the race for the next big thing. The telegraph had a sizeable environmental and social cost. Pictured: workers coiling the first transatlantic telegraph cable in the bilge tanks of the S.S. Great Eastern in 1865. Universal History Archives/Getty From the “Victorian internet” to AI Before the telegraph, long distance communication was painfully slow. Sending messages by ship could take months. In the 1850s, telegraph cables made it possible to rapidly communicate between countries and across oceans. By the late 1800s, the telegraph had become ubiquitous. Later dubbed the “Victorian internet”, the telegraph was the predecessor of today’s digital networks. Building telegraph networks was a huge undertaking. The first transatlantic cable was completed in 1858, spanning more than 4,000km between North America and Europe. The first transatlantic submarine cables made possible rapid communication between the United States and Europe. This 1857 map shows their paths. Korff Brothers, CC BY-NC-ND Australia followed closely behind. European colonists created the first telegraph lines in the 1850s between Melbourne and Williamstown. By 1872, the Overland Telegraph Line between Adelaide and Darwin had been completed. From Darwin, the message could reach the world. There are clear differences between the telegraph and today’s AI systems. But there are also clear parallels. In our time, fibre optic cables retrace many routes of the now obsolete submarine telegraph cables. Virtually all (99%) of the world’s internet traffic travels through deep sea cables. These cables carry everything from Google searches to ChatGPT interactions, transmitting data close to the speed of light from your device to faraway data centres and back. Historical accounts describe the telegraph variously as a divine gift, a human-made wonder, and a networked global intelligence, far from the material reality. These descriptions are not far off the way AI is talked about today. Grounded in extraction In the 19th century, the telegraph was commonly thought of as an emblem of progress and technological innovation. But these systems had other stories embedded, such as the logic of colonialism. One reason European powers set out to colonise the globe was to extract resources from colonies for their own use. The same extractive logic can be seen in the telegraph, a system whose self-evident technological progress won out over environmental and social costs. If you look closely at a slice of telegraph cable in a museum or at historic sites where submarine telegraph cables made landfall, you’ll see something interesting. The telegraph was a technological marvel – but it came at considerable cost. Pictured is an 1856 sample of the first submarine telegraph cable linking Newfoundland and Nova Scotia in Canada. Jemimah Widdicombe, CC BY-NC-ND Wrapped around the wires is a mixture of tarred yarn and gutta percha. Cable companies used this naturally occurring latex to insulate telegraph wires from the harsh conditions on the sea floor. To meet soaring demand, colonial powers such as Britain and the Netherlands accelerated harvesting in their colonies across Southeast Asia. Rainforests were felled for plantations and Indigenous peoples forced to harvest the latex. European colonial powers drove intensified production of gutta-percha despite the environmental and social cost. Pictured: Kayan people in Borneo harvesting the milky latex around 1910. Wikimedia, CC BY-NC-ND Australia’s telegraph came at real cost, as First Nations truth telling projects and interdisciplinary researchers have shown. The Overland Telegraph Line needed large amounts of water to power batteries and sustain human operators and their animals at repeater stations. The demand for water contributed to loss of life, forced dispossession and the pollution of waterways. The legacy of these effects are still experienced today. Echoes of this colonial logic can be seen in today’s AI systems. The focus today is on technological advancement, regardless of energy and environmental costs. Within five years, the International Energy Agency estimates the world’s data centres could require more electricity than all of Japan. AI is far more thirsty than the telegraph. Data centres produce a great deal of heat, and water has to be used to keep the servers cool. Researchers estimate that by 2027, AI usage will require between 4.2 and 6.6 billion cubic metres of water – about the same volume used by Denmark annually. With the rise of generative AI, both Microsoft and Google have significantly increased their water consumption. Manufacturing the specialised processors needed to train AI models has resulted in dirty mining, deforestation and toxic waste. As AI scholar Kate Crawford has argued, AI must be understood as a system that is: embodied and material, made from natural resources, fuel, human labour, infrastructures, logistics, histories and classifications. The same was true of the telegraph. Huge new data centres are being built to service the growth in AI and the wider internet. Pictured: a new Google data centre in the United Kingdom. Richard Newstead/Getty Planning for the future Telegraph companies and the imperial networks behind them accepted environmental extraction and social exploitation as the price of technological progress. Today’s tech giants are following a similar approach, racing to release ever more powerful models while obscuring the far reaching environmental consequences of their technologies. As governments work to improve regulation and accountability, they must go further to enforce ethical standards, mandate transparent disclosure of energy and environmental impacts and support low impact projects. Without decisive action, AI risks becoming another chapter in the long history of technologies trading human and environmental wellbeing for technological “progress”. The lesson from the telegraph is clear: we must refuse to accept exploitation as the cost of innovation. Jemimah Widdicombe works for the National Communication Museum (NCM) as Senior Curator.

Animals
Energy
Forests

Scientists Are Uncovering the Secrets of How Fluffy, White Dandelions Spread Their Seeds

Their seed dispersal strategies have helped these ubiquitous plants flourish all over the world, new research suggests

Scientists Are Uncovering the Secrets of How Fluffy, White Dandelions Spread Their Seeds Their seed dispersal strategies have helped these ubiquitous plants flourish all over the world, new research suggests Sarah Kuta - Daily Correspondent October 6, 2025 2:50 p.m. Dandelions are strategic about when to disperse their seeds, new research suggests. Pixabay Chris Roh and his 4-year-old daughter have developed a sweet father-daughter ritual: Whenever they see a fluffy dandelion while they’re out walking, they pick up the flower and blow on it. But Roh is not just a dad, he’s also a fluid dynamicist at Cornell University. So this shared activity got him thinking: How, exactly, do dandelions disperse their seeds? Roh and his colleagues answer this question in a new paper published September 10 in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface, describing the mechanisms that enable the ubiquitous weed (Taraxacum officinale) to spread its white tufts on the breeze. Did you know? Dandelions of many names Dandelions have many nicknames around the world, from "Irish daisy" to "cankerwort." The weed is also sometimes called "wet-the-bed"—likely because of its diuretic effects. “How the seeds are attached to the parent plant, how they enable or prevent [detachment] based on environmental conditions—that moment is so important,” Roh says in a statement. “It sets the trajectory and governs a lot of how far they will go and where they will land,” he says, adding that the initial detachment process “is probably one of the most crucial moments in their biology.” For the study, scientists glued a force sensor to individual dandelion seeds. Then, they slowly tugged the seeds away from the stem in different directions, recording the force required to free them in each scenario. The scientists say this is the first time anyone has ever formally measured the force needed to detach dandelion seeds, per Science News’ Susan Milius. Pulling downward required nearly five times as much force to release the seeds from the plant than pulling upward, according to the researchers. The seeds were the most stubborn when the scientists pulled straight out from the seed head, requiring more than 100 times the force of pulling upward, per Phys.org’s Sanjukta Mondal. Next, the team looked at the plant under a microscope to see how the seeds were attached to the stem. The seeds are connected to the plant by a slender tether with a horseshoe-shaped structure providing support on one side, they discovered. The researchers theorize that when the wind blows the seed tuft toward the supported side of the horseshoe, it doesn’t budge. Only when the breeze blows the tuft toward the open side does the seed detach and float away. These findings won’t surprise anyone who has ever blown on a fluffy dandelion—only the closest tufts take flight, while those on the opposite side of the seed head remain firmly attached. Rotating the plant, while continuing to huff and puff, is the only way to free all the seeds. This asymmetrical arrangement is likely an adaptation to help ensure the plant’s seeds only detach when a wind gust is optimal for dispersal—that is, when the wind is poised to blow the seeds upward and away from the parent plant, instead of downward toward the ground. This, in turn, gives the species better chances of surviving and proliferating. “Seed dispersal over a wide area … offers seedlings the chance to thrive by avoiding being in close proximity to their relatives, which would limit resources for seedlings and the parent plant,” writes Mary Abraham for Nature News and Views. This unique, microscopic seed attachment architecture is likely a big reason why dandelions grow anywhere and everywhere—much to the chagrin of groundskeepers trying to maintain unblemished, manicured lawns. “Its seed dispersal strategies are at least partially responsible for its nearly worldwide distribution and evolutionary success,” the team writes in the paper. The researchers see dandelions as a model for other wind-dispersed plants, such as cotton and lettuce, so they hope their findings will have broader implications. Understanding the basic structural mechanics of dandelion seed dispersion could prove useful for scientists modeling plant and disease population dynamics, for instance, or for growers managing their fields. The findings may one day help improve “how crop seeds are distributed, especially in large-scale farming,” says study co-author Sridhar Ravi, an engineer at the University of New South Wales, Canberra, in Australia, in a statement. “It could lead to more efficient planting techniques that reduce waste and increase yield.” Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

Nature
Science
Waste

Amid Rollbacks on Environmental Protections, the EPA Goes the Other Way on Delaware River Water Quality

The federal government is raising the required oxygen level in an urban stretch of the Delaware River near Philadelphia to improve conditions for fish and humans, but the move faces pushback from wastewater utilities that will have to pay millions of dollars for infrastructure upgrades to comply with the new rule. In late September, the […]

Environmental activists praise the new rule, which will improve the health of the river for fish. But wastewater-treatment utilities face millions in new costs to make it happen.By Jon HurdleThe federal government is raising the required oxygen level in an urban stretch of the Delaware River near Philadelphia to improve conditions for fish and humans, but the move faces pushback from wastewater utilities that will have to pay millions of dollars for infrastructure upgrades to comply with the new rule.

Water
Government
Waste

Appeal seeks to force factory farms to disclose hazardous air emissions

A coalition of food, environmental and animal welfare groups is appealing a recent federal court decision that upheld a US Environmental Protection Agency rule exempting factory farms from publicly disclosing hazardous air emissions information.

A coalition of food, environmental and animal welfare groups is appealing a recent federal court decision that upheld a US Environmental Protection Agency rule exempting factory farms from publicly disclosing hazardous air emissions information.

Animals
Food

Cold-Water Immersion May Offer Health Benefits -- and Also Presents Risks

Claims about the benefits of cold-water immersion date back centuries

Dr. Mark Harper recalls his first cold-water swim in the south of England 20 years ago. It was August, but the initial jolt from the plunge took his breath away. The shock to his system lasted a minute or two until he was “recombobulated and able to think about something other than the cold," Harper says. A surprise sensation soon replaced his discomfort. “I remember getting out of the water the first time and feeling so good," Harper, an anesthesiologist who has since researched the potential risks and rewards of taking a nippy dunk. "I wasn't expecting that.”Claims about the benefits of cold-water immersion date back centuries. Thomas Jefferson, the principal author of the Declaration of Independence and the third American president, wrote toward the end of his life about using a cold foot bath daily for 60 years. He also owned a book published in 1706 on the history of cold-water bathing. But Harper, who became a regular cold-water swimmer after his initiation, said there are strong signs that people can derive mental health benefits from the activity. He mentioned a positive effect on depression and general well-being.“For now, we have a very strong base, but not hard evidence, that cold-water immersion is effective for mental health," Harper told The Associated Press. Harper said his own early experiences with cold-water swimming piqued his professional curiosity. As a physician, he wondered if the brief bodily shock had clinical uses for treating depression. He cited the biological phenomenon of hormesis, in which a stressor introduced at a low dose creates a positive response.Muscles and bones put under stress —for example, with weight-bearing exercise — also respond and grow.Harper acknowledged that the positive effects he's observed may be the result of the placebo effect, a phenomenon in which people who are given a medicine they think will help them report responding to the treatment even if it had no active ingredients. In the case of cold-water immersion, the benefits may come from meeting people, the exercise itself, or simply accepting a challenge and accomplishing it, which improves self-confidence, he said.“Personally, I think it’s all of those things, and the cold has an additive effect,” Harper said. “I think we have a good physiological basis for that. The basic science tells us the cold has a very strong effect on the body.“What we’re talking about is an intervention, when it's used clinically, that produces beneficial effects on mental health. So in a way it doesn’t matter which aspect is generating the positive effects.”Harper cited what he said was a common reaction among first-timers who have taken the plunge.They often say “the fact that I’ve done this means I can do anything,” he said. “It’s quite a confidence builder and it’s something people stick to because they enjoy it so much.” Know the risks when you start Dr. Mike Tipton, a physiologist at the University of Portsmouth in England who has studied extreme environments, authored a paper along with Harper and two more researchers several years ago. The title highlighted the potential advantages and dangers of stimulating the body with a sudden drop in temperature: “Cold Water Immersion: Kill or Cure.” “Like other environmental constituents such as pressure, heat and oxygen, cold water can be either good or bad, threat or treatment depending on circumstance,” they wrote after reviewing the research then available on the topic. One of their findings: The activity presents dangers. Deaths from cold-water immersion are not uncommon. The shock of frigid water can cause people to hyperventilate and drown. But Tipton told The AP the risks can be managed with common sense and precautions.You do not need to go to extremes to get a potential payoff. Entering water at a temperature of 20-15 degrees Celsius (68-59F) and staying for only a few minutes is sufficient.Tipton explained if the water is colder than that, you may get more benefit — but limit your exposure.“If you ask me what protocol you would follow if you thought this was going to be doing you good, I wouldn't go in water much below 12C (54F), and I wouldn’t stay in for much more than two minutes,” Tipton said.Tipton and Harper both said that any benefits from cold-water immersion come from the body's cold-shock response: the sudden fall of skin temperature, the release of the stress hormones, the release of endorphins, and the anti-inflammatory effect. Tipton cautioned against long spells in an ice bath.“Sitting in water for as long as I can fills me with horror,” Tipton said. "This could destroy small nerves, blood vessels in extremities and could result in amputation the same way frostbite can."Harper, who has swum as long as four-hour stretches in open water, advised vigilance.“People think it’s got to be super cold, super long and the longer the better,” Harper said, "and that’s wrong.” Be safe. You're a tropical animal Tipton said he's not trying to be the “fun police” but suggested caution and a medical screening if you take the plunge. He said humans are considered “tropical animals” who need to adapt to the cold and are better suited to warm conditions. A human’s resting body temperature is about 36.5 to 37.5 degrees Celsius (97.7 to 99.5F). Because of that, cold-water immersion is stressful and carries risks for the cardiovascular and respiratory systems. Not to mention the risk of drowning.“We don’t want to stop people doing it, but we want to make sure they do it in a way that maximizes the benefits and minimizes the risks,” Tipton said.He suggested swimming in a life-guarded area, or going with experienced outdoor swimmers. He also suggested knowing the body of water you're swimming in. Hazards, among others, include tides, temperature, depth and pollution.“Understand that taking a tropical animal and putting it in cold water is probably the greatest stress that most people will experience in their life,” Tipton said.He suggested entering the water in a controlled fashion instead of jumping in. "Be sensible about it,” he said. “Incremental is the key.”Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See – Sept. 2025

Water
Health
Pollution

If Your North Star Is Lost, New Techniques Can Point You South

The writer Tristan Gooley describes how a pair of familiar constellations can help a person navigate in darkness when other methods fail.

Long before GPS and magnetic compasses, written maps or even writing, people oriented themselves under the cosmos using rules of thumb. Orally transmitted knowledge has repeatedly shown that Indigenous peoples all over the world have sophisticated understandings of the stars. And in early literature like Homer’s “Odyssey,” the nymph Calypso teaches Odysseus how to sail home by keeping the Great Bear constellation to his left.By now, it should seem like there is nothing new under the billions of suns that make up the night sky that could help people navigate in the dark. But a British author, Tristan Gooley, writes in a new book about following environmental signs throughout the year, “The Hidden Seasons,” that he has identified a new pair of hacks to find one’s way through the world by starlight. The book is published by the independent publisher The Experiment and comes out on Oct. 21.Mr. Gooley, a proponent of what he calls natural navigation, preaches attention to common patterns in nature like a sommelier describing wine — the shadows cast by the sun here, the tree angled there, the moss greener on this side of the rock.As part of that work he has invented, or perhaps reinvented, a couple of wayfinding methods.For example: After sunset in midwinter in the Northern Hemisphere, dress warm and go outdoors to a spot where you have a relatively unobstructed view to the south. Rolling up to the sky from the southeast, you’ll see a letter “V” made up of bright stars in the constellation Taurus. When two particular stars in that “V” are stacked in an invisible vertical line, let that line drop down to the horizon, where it will point due south.Or suppose it’s a midsummer night instead. You can perform the same kind of trick (in lighter clothing) with a pattern of stars that resemble a teapot inside the constellation Sagittarius. When two of these stars, Ascella and Kaus Media, align horizontally in the sky, you’re in business.

Business
Indigenous
Nature

Report: Sustainability in supply chains is still a firm-level priority

Analysis from MIT’s Center for Transportation and Logistics finds companies are still acting to reduce emissions, but often lag in measurement techniques.

Corporations are actively seeking sustainability advances in their supply chains — but many need to improve the business metrics they use in this area to realize more progress, according to a new report by MIT researchers.   During a time of shifting policies globally and continued economic uncertainty, the survey-based report finds 85 percent of companies say they are continuing supply chain sustainability practices at the same level as in recent years, or are increasing those efforts.“What we found is strong evidence that sustainability still matters,” says Josué Velázquez Martínez, a research scientist and director of the MIT Sustainable Supply Chain Lab, which helped produce the report. “There are many things that remain to be done to accomplish those goals, but there’s a strong willingness from companies in all parts of the world to do something about sustainability.”The new analysis, titled “Sustainability Still Matters,” was released today. It is the sixth annual report on the subject prepared by the MIT Sustainable Supply Chain Lab, which is part of MIT’s Center for Transportation and Logistics. The Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals collaborated on the project as well.The report is based on a global survey, with responses from 1,203 professionals in 97 countries. This year, the report analyzes three issues in depth, including regulations and the role they play in corporate approaches to supply chain management. A second core topic is management and mitigation of what industry professionals call “Scope 3” emissions, which are those not from a firm itself, but from a firm’s supply chain. And a third issue of focus is the future of freight transportation, which by itself accounts for a substantial portion of supply chain emissions.Broadly, the survey finds that for European-based firms, the principal driver of action in this area remains government mandates, such as the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive, which requires companies to publish regular reports on their environmental impact and the risks to society involved. In North America, firm leadership and investor priorities are more likely to be decisive factors in shaping a company’s efforts.“In Europe the pressure primarily comes more from regulation, but in the U.S. it comes more from investors, or from competitors,” Velázquez Martínez says.The survey responses on Scope 3 emissions reveal a number of opportunities for improvement. In business and sustainability terms, Scope 1 greenhouse gas emissions are those a firm produces directly. Scope 2 emissions are the energy it has purchased. And Scope 3 emissions are those produced across a firm’s value chain, including the supply chain activities involved in producing, transporting, using, and disposing of its products.The report reveals that about 40 percent of firms keep close track of Scope 1 and 2 emissions, but far fewer tabulate Scope 3 on equivalent terms. And yet Scope 3 may account for roughly 75 percent of total firm emissions, on aggregate. About 70 percent of firms in the survey say they do not have enough data from suppliers to accurately tabulate the total greenhouse gas and climate impact of their supply chains.Certainly it can be hard to calculate the total emissions when a supply chain has many layers, including smaller suppliers lacking data capacity. But firms can upgrade their analytics in this area, too. For instance, 50 percent of North American firms are still using spreadsheets to tabulate emissions data, often making rough estimates that correlate emissions to simple economic activity. An alternative is life cycle assessment software that provides more sophisticated estimates of a product’s emissions, from the extraction of its materials to its post-use disposal. By contrast, only 32 percent of European firms are still using spreadsheets rather than life cycle assessment tools.“You get what you measure,” Velázquez Martínez says. “If you measure poorly, you’re going to get poor decisions that most likely won’t drive the reductions you’re expecting. So we pay a lot of attention to that particular issue, which is decisive to defining an action plan. Firms pay a lot of attention to metrics in their financials, but in sustainability they’re often using simplistic measurements.”When it comes to transportation, meanwhile, the report shows that firms are still grappling with the best ways to reduce emissions. Some see biofuels as the best short-term alternative to fossil fuels; others are investing in electric vehicles; some are waiting for hydrogen-powered vehicles to gain traction. Supply chains, after all, frequently involve long-haul trips. For firms, as for individual consumers, electric vehicles are more practical with a larger infrastructure of charging stations. There are advances on that front but more work to do as well.That said, “Transportation has made a lot of progress in general,” Velázquez Martínez says, noting the increased acceptance of new modes of vehicle power in general.Even as new technologies loom on the horizon, though, supply chain sustainability is not wholly depend on their introduction. One factor continuing to propel sustainability in supply chains is the incentives companies have to lower costs. In a competitive business environment, spending less on fossil fuels usually means savings. And firms can often find ways to alter their logistics to consume and spend less.“Along with new technologies, there is another side of supply chain sustainability that is related to better use of the current infrastructure,” Velázquez Martínez observes. “There is always a need to revise traditional ways of operating to find opportunities for more efficiency.” 

Transportation
Business
Energy

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