It's 1999 for Net Zero
The carbon transformation will be as disruptive as the digital transformation
“It is difficult to predict, especially the future”
Danish Proverb
"Put newspapers and magazines out of business? It will never happen. People say the Internet will replace stores. It will never happen."
Charles Wang Founder/ CEO Computer Associates (1999)
"A computer on every desk and in every home" Bill Gates (~1980)
It’s a late on a dull Thursday afternoon in 1999….in a nondescript conference room ….in a nondescript building…. in some major city ….. a senior banking executive emphatically tells me that customers will never trust the internet enough to do real banking online….. he laughs out loud when someone mentions banking with a cell phone.
Later that month media executives explain the extraordinary bandwidth required to stream movies….. and the massive investment required will not happen in our lifetimes….. streaming over cell signals?!! …. howls..
…. a cell phone without physical buttons…. What??
In 1999 very few people could imagine the dramatic impact the internet and the digital transformation would have on business, healthcare, politics, social structure….. and human behavior…..
Yet in the span of just 20 years a massive digital economy has exploded - every industry and every function has been restructured - completely changing the way work, live and play. There have been unintended consequences in politics, war, crime, and mental health. And the change is accelerating…. the metaverse ?
And in 1999 we had no idea how much change would occur in the companies that would be the leaders of 20 years later.
It’s hard to believe now… AOL , Microsoft, Lycos and Yahoo were the top four web sites. (Top 15 web sites in April, 1999)
Google, Facebook, Amazon and Salesforce were mere startups….
AT&T and Microsoft were declared dinosaurs…..
And now is 1999 for Sustainability and Net Zero.
We are at the same place in our transition to a low carbon world today as we were in the digital transformation in 1999.
As the world adapts to climate change, we will experience the same magnitude of change and disruption we have in our transition to a digital economy. Every aspect of how we live and work will change. Every industry, every country will be impacted in ways we cannot imagine today. The economic value created and destroyed by the shift to a digital economy over the last 20 years is staggering. The same is beginning to happen as we transition to a low carbon economy.
The industry leaders in the low carbon economy today may not even survive – Will Tesla be the Google or Apple of the low carbon economy? …… or AOL ?
It is hard to grasp the breadth of changes we are facing. Bill Gates’ book, How to Avoid Climate Disaster, is, in my not so humble opinion, the most comprehensive and accurate picture of the scale, scope and challenges of reaching Net Zero of anything out there. One of the smartest and richest people in the world has tapped the best experts on the planet and summarized his finding in a form mere mortals can comprehend. Bill breaks down each source of green house gases, illustrates the challenges and potential solutions – without hysteria or evangelizing.
If you have not read it, you need to. It is not a perfect book… but is a great start. He is optimistic, maybe even naïve, about the power of technology and innovation to get us to Net Zero. I’ll forgive him for that – we need a bit of optimism in the conversation.
Over the last 24 months we have seen a dramatic shift - investors have now surpassed governments driving change. They are rapidly forcing corporate boards to make commitments and disclose how they are progressing.
NGOs are already calling out major for weak reporting and Net Zero declarations. A new analysis evaluates the transparency and integrity of 25 global company climate pledges – the report found largely fail net zero climate pledge tests.
So what? It would be easy to just skim the ongoing headlines of Sustainability, and climate change. The acronyms are overwhelming:
ESG, GHG, SDG, CDP, CSR, CRI, CCS …. And those are just the TLAs (Three Letter Acronyms)….
There are plenty of FLAs - IPCC, TCFD (part of TRWG)…. and of course ISSB
(thankfully the IFRS merged SASB and CDSB to form the ISSB to simplify things for us)
….. and don’t get me started on the FLAs - COP26, WBCSD,….
Not all of us can be or want to be an expert in climate change……..it can be quite technical and, as Bill Gates shows us, the range of issues and technology solutions is vast.
But if we are in the profession of helping clients make tough decisions about improving their businesses – and preparing them for the future, we cannot simply delegate this to experts. I assert that we cannot afford to be ignorant these critical issues. Imagine a professional in Retail or Brand Marketing or Supply Chain declaring that digital is just to complex to understand.
Being informed and tracking these issues is overwhelming….
I’ll follow up in a couple weeks with a Friday Thoughts dedicated on how a lay person can get up to speed and follow the Sustainability and climate change issues - I welcome suggestions…
In the meantime I would suggest reading Bill Gates book…..
…just a few thoughts…. how do you see it ?
Walt
Love it Walt!
I have seen this first hand.
I work for Goodyear tire now, a historically conservative manufacturing company by any way you want slice it. In the span of the last year alone, sustainability has gone from a talking point, to one of the key components of our strategy roadmap. It's front and center in our operations and manufacturing. We appointed our first sustainability officer, and we have published bold goals and KPIs internally and to the street. The senior leaders in Operations see this part of our organization doubling every few years for the foreseeable future.
Very compelling, indeed. My cars/trucks going back to 1999 all had (have) a V8 and are over 5L. I spent an hr this evening picking out a hybrid for our next family car.