Environment

For the past three years, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation has been on a journey to help the private sector and communities realize the value and implement the principles of the circular economy in the United States.

We’ve hosted tours and conferences, released research and case studies—but today, I’m excited to announce the next step in our circular economy journey: the city location for our Beyond 34: Recycling and Recovery for a New Economy project.

ENGIE NA and Holyoke Gas & Electric (HG&E) today announced plans for the largest utility-scale energy storage installation in Massachusetts. Green Charge, an ENGIE NA subsidiary, will operate the three-megawatt energy storage system at Mt. Tom Solar, which began operation in January of this year adjacent to the former Mt. Tom Power Station. The system will be used to optimize intermittent solar energy and reduce utility capacity costs for HG&E, the system’s customer, while reducing stress on the HG&E distribution system. This project will contribute to rate stabilization for HG&E customers over the next 20 years.

It is arguably counter-productive to think our modern business world will ever be entirely “paperless.” Focusing instead on production, consumption, and the supply chain connecting all stakeholders can lead to a sustainable “Less Paper” society. Though “Smarter Paper” may be a more accurate moniker.

Think about the energy that you use each day. Utility-generated electricity, gasoline-fueled mobility, and heat from natural gas are probably the largest sources, and each is powered by fossil fuels. If you wanted to “cut the cord” on these energy needs, how could you possibly do it?

Cargill today published its third report on the progress and achievements of the Cargill Cocoa Promise, our commitment to sparking a more sustainable cocoa sector for generations to come.

On September 12, 2017, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (NYSE: HPE) announced a new project with long-time strategic partner, PwC, to jointly create a Center of Excellence (CoE) in Kolkata, India, to advance development for future cities. Together, HPE and PwC are capitalizing on the Internet of Things (IoT) landscape to create opportunities for city administrators to optimize their assets and provide citizen-centric services.

Tetra Pak today published its 2017 Sustainability Report, highlighting the company’s annual progress and key achievements in the areas of environmental performance, social responsibility and corporate governance. For the first time since it started publishing a Sustainability report in 2004, the company has adopted Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) guidelines, the most widely-used international framework for measuring and communicating sustainability performance.

Rich Serino has more than 40 years of federal, state, and local emergency management and emergency medical services experience. Mr. Serino was appointed as the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) Deputy Administrator in October 2009. In this role, he worked directly with Administrator Craig Fugate to promote the “whole community” approach to emergency management, which seeks to build, sustain, and improve the agency’s capacity to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate all hazards.

Carol Hufnagel, PE, is Tetra Tech's National Wet Weather Practice Leader. She has worked on combined sewer overflow (CSO), sanitary sewer overflow (SSO), and stormwater projects for more than 30 years.

Bechtel is building Edmonton’s Valley Line light-rail transit extension, the largest infrastructure project undertaken by Alberta’s capital city in Canada. It will expand the commuter-rail system by eight miles (13 kilometers), linking the urban center to distant suburbs across the Saskatchewan River. Edmonton has committed to reducing its carbon footprint by 111,000 tons per year by purchasing renewable energy, which will provide electricity from cleaner sources to power the trains.