The collaboration between Edison, RENEW, Manufacture 2030, and Honda aims to remove barriers across the automotive industry.

NEWPORT BEACH, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES, March 10, 2022 / — Edison Energy (“Edison”), an energy advisory firm working to empower companies to overcome the challenges of reducing carbon and cost, and RENEW Energy Partners (“RENEW”), a firm dedicated to speeding carbon reduction by making it financially compelling, have established a $50 million fund for decarbonization efforts aimed at suppliers within the auto industry.

The announcement comes on the heels of the launch of Accelerate℠, an innovative flexible funding program funded by RENEW Energy Partners. The new endeavor will make progress towards decarbonizing the commercial, industrial, and institutional markets via flexible funding structures including Power Purchase Agreements and Energy-as-a-Service agreements for various behind-the-meter carbon reduction projects.

“Edison has long served some of the world’s largest automakers,” Edison Energy CEO Oded J. Rhone said. “Those clients have come to us recognizing that to achieve their sustainability goals, they must drive deep decarbonization throughout their supply chains, which can contribute more than 80% of the vehicle’s embodied greenhouse gas emissions. We want to remove as many barriers as possible for suppliers to engage with their customers and reduce emissions, and we believe that our partnership with RENEW will help achieve this.”

Edison has developed a robust supply chain program to help suppliers decarbonize and is pulling in partners to drive this effort. Manufacture 2030 (“M2030”) has a well-established presence in the space, working with several auto manufacturers and their suppliers to ease the collection and sharing of data.  Along with the ability to streamline this process, M2030’s platform is also able to identify energy efficiency measures at the site level using artificial intelligence and provide glide path reporting on progress towards environmental targets.

“Our mission as a company is to provide certainty that carbon reduction targets will be met by making supply chain decarbonization happen faster and more efficiently,” M2030 CEO Martin Chilcott said. “By partnering with Edison Energy, we are able to leverage each other’s skill sets to create a greater offering, accelerating climate action across the value chain.”

While suppliers have expressed a desire to comply with more robust sustainability targets set by their auto manufacturing clients, they do not always have the capital available to deploy these efforts. This is where RENEW Energy Partners comes in.

“By focusing on a particular industry, we are able to identify energy efficiency projects and distributed energy opportunities that would be the best fit at specific facilities,” RENEW Co-founder and Principal Charlie Lord said. “As a company dedicated to funding carbon reduction projects, we have a greater understanding of the value of these projects and can expedite projects, ultimately benefiting the entire industry. M2030’s ability to identify projects and Edison’s capacity to validate and implement these projects, combined with RENEW’s funding capabilities, means we can create the most efficient and cost-effective process possible. We look forward to building momentum around this innovative partnership.”

Automotive leaders like Honda have been working with suppliers to reduce supply chain carbon emissions. Since its inception, the Honda Supplier Excellence Program has been focused on sharing best practices, improving data collection for sustainability metrics, and implementing projects across the manufacturing space that positively impact the triple bottom line.

Specifically, Honda has been working to green its supply chain through a variety of initiatives, including partnerships with Edison and M2030 that help suppliers identify and move energy efficiency and renewable energy projects to implementation. However, suppliers often cite the cost of capital on projects as a roadblock to implementation. The funding partnership with Edison and RENEW is seen as a first step towards removing these barriers.

The collaboration of these established entities has caught the attention of auto industry association leader Suppliers Partnership for the Environment (“SP”).

“We’ve been working on advancing the environmental sustainability of the auto supply chain for a long time and are always looking for innovative and thoughtful new approaches to spur action on reducing Scope 3 emissions,” SP Executive Director Steve Hellem said. “The combination of Edison Energy, M2030, and RENEW puts several key pieces together to help drive real impact in the supply chain.”

SP will be hosting a webinar on Thursday, March 24, with panelists Edison Energy, M2030, and RENEW, where they will discuss the Accelerate Auto initiative. To register for this webinar, click HERE.

For more information about the Accelerate Auto initiative, please click HERE.

About Edison Energy   
A wholly owned subsidiary of Edison International (NYSE: EIX), Edison Energy LLC is a global independent advisory firm that helps large corporate, industrial, and institutional clients better navigate the choices and risks of managing energy. As stakeholder expectations around corporate sustainability increase, Edison helps companies rise to this challenge by designing and implementing specialized strategies and solutions for clients across sustainability, renewables, energy optimization, transportation electrification, and energy supply. With a commitment to promoting a sustainable, resilient, and equitable future, Edison enables organizations to deliver on their strategic, financial, and sustainability goals by addressing today’s key energy challenges: carbon, cost, complex choices, and creating energy justice across communities. For more information, visit https://www.edisonenergy.com/accelerate-funding/

About RENEW Energy Partners  
Renew Energy Partners provides turnkey solutions for funding, installing, and managing energy efficiency and on-site clean power generation projects. The company helps building owners reduce their carbon footprint and save money while making their buildings cleaner, nicer, and more resilient. With its energy-as-a-service model, energy upgrades and retrofits are funded by future savings and are at no cost to the building owner. Notable customers that represent RENEW’s range and flexibility of solutions include YMCAs, Northrop Grumman, and the historic Waldorf Astoria Building in New York City. For more information, visit  https://www.renewep.com/  

Media Contact:

Peter Kelley
RenewComm LLC
+1 202-270-883

 

Green Universities

This month, RENEW is reading about sustainability on college campuses. While the COVID-19 pandemic is putting a strain on colleges, sustainability goals have not been forgotten or abandoned. The effects of COVID-19 on sustainability will not be fully known for years to come. However, it remains true that the challenges of climate change are not going away and that universities are leaders in education about research and reduction of climate emissions and their impacts.

The sustainability movement is a worldwide phenomenon that is being led in many countries by students. Around half of the universities in the United Kingdom decided to move away from fossil fuels last January. The University College London, Manchester Metropolitan University, the University of Nottingham, and the University of Gloucestershire are just some examp­­les of universities with sustainability programs. Projects include expanding environmental education and initiatives to increase their sustainability. According to Fiona Goodwin, who is the director of the Environmental Association for Universities and Colleges (EAUC), schools can implement environmentally friendly practices, the resources to educate and involve students in the work, and the duty to utilize these to become a role model for others to follow. In 2019, the National Union of Students (NUS) founded the Students Organising for Sustainability UK (SOS-UK) in order to push universities to reduce their carbon levels and update their goals. The president of the NUS and SOS-UK, Zamzam Ibrahim, stated, “We need all universities to be committing to net-zero by 2030 right now. Sadly, many vice-chancellors still see sustainability as a nice-to-have, not core business…”.

In the United States, universities are also focused on increasing sustainability and “going green.” Many campuses are planting gardens to have fresh food for the dining halls while involving the students to take care of the farms. Other initiatives include increased environmental curricular offerings, which many students and professors are eager to expand and introduce at their college or university. Two significant organizations, the American College and University Presidents’ Climate Commitment (ACUPCC) and the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE), were founded to increase campus sustainability and the number of environmental classes offered. Both organizations partner with other organizations and work with hundreds of colleges and universities. The AASHE has a special program, the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System (STARS) which sets a standard for university environmental reporting. As of October 2020, there are 1,010 institutions that signed up with STARS and 669 have a rating. STARS works with the universities to complete the reports and ratings based on their guidelines. Some of these schools include Emerson College and Houghton College (a RENEW customer). Many universities have uploaded their reports earlier in 2020. Other organizations, including The SIERRA Club have used the STARS ratings to rank schools based on sustainability.

One notable school that is at the top of such rankings is the University of California, Irvine. They published their University of California Sustainable Practices Policy this year and have numerous initiatives currently in place. UCI notes their “…perseverance to achieve sustainable progress in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.” Notable practices include energy efficiency, waste diversion, water projects, food options, programs for students, biking, and sustainable student housing, among many others.

In 2019, Boston University published their Sustainability Annual Report, which explains their plans to increase sustainability. BU has partnerships with the City of Boston and other universities as well. The initiatives cross a broad range of practices at BU including waste, transportation, and buildings, just to name a few. While BU has a Zero Waste goal, the Coronavirus pandemic has complicated that project. In the student newspaper, The Daily Free Press, a student published an article about the use of to-go containers in relation to the waste initiative. During the pandemic, BU is having students order food from the dining halls to be picked up in to-go boxes, but “…while all meals are packaged in containers made of either plant-based or recyclable materials, the plant material renders some unrecyclable.” In addition, BU has issued instructions for students and staff to follow for how to dispose of food and containers. While this is just an example of an issue arising at a university due to COVID-19, all universities are facing dilemmas between pandemic rules and budgeting with the continuing challenges of addressing climate change. Even though managing the virus is the main priority for campuses, the environment should also remain at the top of the list because global warming does not go away during a pandemic.

Universities are just another sector that is setting and following environmental sustainability goals. Universities hold an important role because they are significant players in society and the students have an impact on the campus and the world at large.

Titans of industry-leading the way

This month RENEW is reading about the companies setting sustainable goals in the effort to fight climate change. While governments have set various regulations, organizations around the world have taken it upon themselves to implement their own rules. After The Paris Agreement, entities including the Science Based Targets (SBTi), have been formed to create guidelines to oversee the sustainability goals companies will follow. Focusing on the services and consumer goods industries, these news articles have caught our attention.

Among these industry frontrunners is the technology company Apple, who announced in July 2020 their plan to use low-carbon aluminum for their products. Not only will other businesses be able to follow Apple’s footsteps, but there are other possibilities to decrease the carbon footprint of aluminum, such as a tax. Incidentally, “Apple said aluminum represented 27 percent of its product manufacturing footprint in 2015…Such efforts have reduced Apple’s aluminum-related emissions by 63 percent, the company reported in March.”

Focusing on institutions setting goals according to the SBTi, in January 2020, the technology company Microsoft announced its new sustainability goals to decrease their emissions and become carbon negative. In doing this, they vowed to remove “…all the carbon the company and its suppliers have emitted since its founding in 1975.” Since January, Microsoft has been reporting their progress on their goals.

Another impressive headway is the electronic commerce company Amazon, who announced in June 2020 their $2 billion fund to supply them with technologies in order to decrease their greenhouse gas emissions. The Climate Pledge, which Amazon began in September 2019, was the beginning of their plans to be carbon neutral by 2040. This June reporting was only a step to help Amazon reach its goals. In addition, “Amazon also announced today that by 2025, it will rely on renewable energy for all its energy use.”

The advancement of energy goals has spread to other fields, such as the AptarGroup, which is a packaging and supply company for various goods. They announced in August 2020 the SBTi’s approval of their emissions goals. This is in accordance with the SBTi’s regulations for Scope 1, 2, and 3. Aptar said it will decrease greenhouse gas emissions by 28% (Scope 1 and 2), raise their use of renewable electricity by 57%, and decrease their total greenhouse gas emissions by 14% (Scope 3) all from 2019-2030.

During the last week of August 2020, the Dairy Farmers of America (DFA) reported that their sustainable goals were accepted by the SBTi, and they are the first U.S. dairy cooperative to do so. By 2018-2030, the DFA proposes to decrease their “…direct and value chain greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 30%…”, and work to sustain the global temperature under a 2-degree Celsius increase. In addition, the DFA, the Innovation Center for U.S. Dairy, and the whole dairy business will work to be at least carbon neutral by 2050.

At the start of 2020, Ahold Delhaize, a food and supplies retailer, released their plans to become more sustainable and updated it in August 2020. By 2030, Ahold aims to reduce carbon emissions from their stores, manufacturing locations, and buildings by 50%, and including their supplies, to raise their low-carbon product assortment and decrease leftover materials in the effort to lower emissions by 15%. Their most recent plan is to provide new labeling measures and requirements for suppliers to identify any genetically modified food and guidelines to prevent animal mistreatment during the process.