Are we doing enough to address these issues by adopting sustainable development as rapidly as we can? Can technology save us, and what are the climate-technology breakthroughs for a sustainable future? Climate experts are giving optimistic responses to get the world to zero emissions by 2050, but there is a need for urgent action.

Climate change touches everything from geopolitics to business to our quality of life. The question is who should fix this problem- the state or the private sectors or is it the responsibility of every individual. The preamble of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) notes: “… the global nature of climate change calls for the widest possible cooperation by all countries and their participation in an effective and appropriate international response, in accordance with their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities and their social and economic conditions.”

Given the stakes, companies are taking a step forward towards sustainable development by embedding progressive plans to achieve a bigger purpose, rather than just gaining commercial outcomes, into the DNA of their business. Going forward corporate thought leaders need to sidestep the mired conventional discourses about how to run a business and look beyond regular discourses on how to “give back” to society. They need to look inward and come up with genuine alternatives & solutions that can create large-scale impact. For instance, before COVID-19 no one would have believed that working from home could actually work out…why didn’t we think of it sooner?

So, perhaps, instead of simply adhering to mandatory environmental regulations and believing the ‘job is done’ – it’s time for the Corporate World to lead the global effort to roll back the damage we’ve caused. The biggest weapon we have is Technology itself.

Apart from participating in overall improvements being made across all Industries like moving to green energy sources, adopting carbon-negative technologies, and evolving sustainable supply chains- the IT industry, and more specifically emerging digital technologies like faster internet, the cloud, the internet of things (IoT), cognitive, digital reality, and blockchain, can play a pivotal role in tracking, measuring, and reporting the impact of our actions (both positive and negative) on the environment, which is critical to success. Thanks to the easy access to digital, leveraging a seamless connection across the world that allows for having important information on time. The availability of data through AI further helps to take prioritized actions on urgent affairs. After all, if we can’t connect the dots and understand what’s working and what’s not – we can’t hope to move the needle.

Let’s investigate some technological shifts the business community could take up to combat the unprecedented challenge of climate change.

The paradigm shift to digital technology to protect the environment.

The digital transformation services has evolved clearly for making a difference. Technologies like Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Internet of Things (IoT), etc. are widely being used for optimizing various climatic factors. According to UNEP studies, 68 percent of the environment-related Sustainable Development Goal indicators, there is not enough data to assess progress. AI is helping in ways more than we reckon to solve the climate change problems. A quick example would be the use of the smart grid and how AI allows to better communicate, control, and self-regulate energy consumption. As consumers of electricity our relationship is quite transactional- use power and pay the bills; being scarily ignorant of the amount of fossil fuels used to keep the power flowing to the grid. The self-learning and detection features of AI help to predict grid imbalances optimizing energy consumption.

AI is enabling experts to gather more and more data about the conditions of Earth. Collaborative data ecosystem or Big Data Analytics allows organizations to access data beyond the four walls and actively collaborate towards producing sustainable technologies. For instance, the satellite data gives out useful insights to detect landslide patterns as climate changes, determine if the land is being eroded owing to excess water or if there are erosion patterns in the mountains, identify critical regions for emissions reduction, track deforestation, and more. With increasing population and cities getting larger it is important to have prior information on natural calamities in order to send assistance on time. Technologies like environmental sensors further help in accelerating the process by sensing calamities like volcanoes, concentration of dangerous gases, forest fire, landslide detection etc. Adding to the problems of living in congested cities, we use a lot of energy and increase emissions sitting in the traffic. Vehicles in traffic waste more than 6 billion gallons of gasoline and diesel combined every year, according to Department of Energy (DOE) estimates.

Parallelly, Machine Learning (ML) is seen to effectively contribute to saving the world from imminent peril. As we know ML analyzes large amounts of data and extracts patterns to draw meaningful insights. ML Algorithms combat climate challenges across domains- from predicting how much electricity is needed and how to use renewable sources more effectively, to helping farmers with insights to predict which crops to plant when and helping to reduce the overall use of fertilizers.

“The danger of global warming is real enough for us to make changes and sacrifices, so that we do not live at the expense of future generations.”- said Margaret Thatcher at the Second World Climate Conference in Geneva. Hence, we must realize there is no planet-B and work unitedly towards establishing a sustainable future. While there are emerging technologies that are capable of saving nature more efficiently than manual human efforts, it all boils down to the motifs and motivation of humans to use the existing technology for good.

The post Climate Change and Technological Development. Time to Make a Difference! appeared first on Black Rock IT Solutions – Software Product Engineering Services.

Companies with consistently excellent environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance between 2013 and 2019 experienced 4.7 times larger operating margins and less volatility than low ESG performers during the same period, according to a report by the United Nations Global Compact and Accenture. 

A new poll from Google Cloud examining the potential and difficulties faced by company executives in regards to sustainability has been released. According to the survey, 63% of executives think their company views sustainability as a growth area, and 74% think it can lead to significant business transformations. However, the gap between how correctly businesses can monitor sustainability and how well they believe they are doing it is causing significant concern. 

An Analysis of Major Industries & How Technology Can Assist Them in Achieving Sustainability. 

An overview of three important industries is given below, along with an analysis of some of their environmental implications and how technology is assisting them in moving in a more sustainable direction.

• Construction and Engineering 

Buildings and infrastructure form the foundation of our civilization, allowing people to gather in places like schools, receive medical attention in hospitals, or buy goods at a local market. The environmental impact of building and infrastructure projects can be significantly reduced, thanks to current technologies. Early design processes, continued adoption of building information modeling (BIM), and the growth of technologies like mixed and augmented reality that allows project owners to visualize their projects before they are actually built, can all help lower the amount of rework, material use, fuel and other resource use, and overall energy consumption. 
 

• Agriculture 
   

Agriculture is the world’s largest industry. As a result, it ranks highly among the sources of pollution in many nations. Technology can also be helpful here. Today’s farms can function with less water and chemical input, thanks to precision application equipment, and cutting-edge technologies like robots, drones, and different kinds of sensors helping the agricultural industry become more ecologically friendly. The use of technology in agriculture has several positive effects on the environment, such as lessening the influence on natural ecosystems, reducing chemical runoff into rivers and groundwater, and ensuring safer food production. 

• Transportation 

As demand for travel rises, which is impacted by a confluence of variables including population and economic expansion, urban sprawl, and cheap fuel prices, it is anticipated that the environmental effects of transportation will worsen. The transportation industry does have a significant environmental impact, but there is also room for improvement. A more advanced infrastructure for electric vehicles, tools for better fleet maintenance, higher fuel efficiency, and routing, as well as the widespread usage of autonomous vehicles, are just a few of the many ways that technology can help in this situation. 

Heard of “Technology Ecoadvantage”? 

Technology may serve as a significant accelerator for businesses willing to think widely about how to enhance their sustainability activities. This approach of thinking, which we refer to as “technology ecoadvantage,” involves utilizing cutting-edge tools and methods of operation to facilitate economically advantageous solutions that simultaneously advance social, environmental, and political objectives. The capacity of businesses to create adoption roadmaps for new technologies that hasten the transition to sustainability is one of the major advantages of the technology ecoadvantage mindset. Rethinking conventional technology approaches is essential for implementation, notably in the areas of digitized operations, digital product and service design, cloud computing, IoT, and blockchain, application of AI and advanced analytics, data sharing, and ecosystem creation and management.  

Companies around the world are bringing forward a wide range of innovative solutions to ensure that our planet can thrive for future generations. Unlocking the solution to industrialization’s environmental impact will be difficult and time-consuming. But it is possible, and technology is unquestionably a part of the solution. 

The post How Technology Can Provide a Quicker Route to Sustainability appeared first on Black Rock IT Solutions – Software Product Engineering Services.