This Climate Business

The future of farming may be indoors. With eroding coastlines, droughts and unpredictable downpours, farming may be better done in controlled, indoor environments. Better for GHGs emissions too. We know that’s already happening for tomatoes and leafy greens – but what about large scale crops like wheat or fruits or sheep and dairy? Darryn Keiller is the founder of Way Beyond , a company specialisi...

How does change happen? And what can we learn from political and community leaders? Vincent hosted a live event during the Auckland Climate Festival to learn how three experienced climate leaders crossed the chasm from intention to action:  ●     Sophie Hansford - School Strike 4 Climate founder and Kapiti Coast District Councillor ●     &nbsp...

What does climate change mean for investing - is it a disaster, creating havoc due to storms and ecosystem collapse and ultimately stranded assets? Or is there an upside, as companies discover new tech, new markets and new ways of working? It's probably both! Vincent spoke with Shannen Barns (Mindful Money), Rohan MacMahon (Climate VC Fund) and Darcy Unago (NZ Everyday Investor) for a seminar duri...

Commercial property is more polluting that you might imagine. Twenty percent of New Zealand’s carbon emissions come from the property sector. What will it take to reduce those emissions? Scott McKenzie, CEO of Tauranga-based property investment firm PMG Funds, has a plan.

Andrew Caseley is outgoing CEO of EECA, the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority. He arrived in 2017 to launch a refreshed strategy and resigns as that piece of work concludes. Back then Judith Collins was Minster of Energy, there were 6000 EVs on the road and Bruno Mars was top of the pops. What’s changed since then, how is New Zealand progressing towards a renewable energy system, and ho...

Cornell Tukiri is the senior Māori advisor for Tataki Auckland United and also for Climate Connect Aotearoa – a climate action accelerator by Tataki Auckland Unlimited. Cornell recently launched He Kete Mātauranga, a resource for climate and community leaders to learn more about Māori approaches to climate change and regenerative practices. A photojournalist and highly competent interviewer himsel...

Next month is the biggest event on the  corporate climate calendar, the Climate Change + Business conference by Environmental Defence Society, the Sustainable Business Council and Climate Leaders Coalition. You could say it’s the CCBC by the EDS and SBC and the CLC. On the agenda are the ETS, the TCFD and of course IPCC by UNFCCC. To explain all those Cs, I’m joined by Rebecca Lowe, head of c...

In Aotearoa New Zealand, we throw away a staggering ​ 97 million single-use plastic drinks containers each year, with less than 7% of those ever getting recycled. Seems dumb especially when most of that drink is water. Brianne West is the founder of Ethique, the eco-beauty products business that took water out of cosmetics and saved millions of tons of plastic, water and emissions in the process....

Back in May, the government injected another $300m into NZ Green Investment Finance – or NZGIF – taking the green bank’s investment pool to $700m. Starting in 2019 the bank has committed about $300m in 16 transactions to-date. Given the scale of the transition, why is it such a small sum and why is it taking so long to spend it? What impact is it having on emissions reductions? And will the bank s...

Emily King is the author of Re-food, a challenge to reimagine and reconstruct the food system in Aotearoa . It’s a timely book, with farmers and growers hit by extreme weather, food prices at record highs and a predominance of highly processed food at the expense of ingredients and wholefoods. But what is Re-fooding and how do we know Emily’s cure will be better than the disease? She spoke to Vinc...

What happens to all that silage baling wrap you see when you’re whizzing around the countryside? Until recently, nearly all New Zealand farmers burned or buried it. That’s changing, largely due to a company called Plasback . Neal Shaw, Plasback’s Commercial Manager, stepped Ross Inglis through the fast-evolving business of recycling farm plastics.

Taranaki-based scaffolding and rigging company Cunningham Construction has deep roots in the petrochemical sector. It’s also on a journey towards sustainability. Managing Director Paul Cunningham talked to Ross Inglis through the why and the how of doing business differently.

It’s hard running a small business. It’s harder running a small business that takes it’s environmental and social responsibility serisously. And it’s suepr hard then auditing that effort and publishing it for all to see. Kōkako Coffee recently published its fourth sustainbility report – presenting a warts ‘n all analysis of its performance. As a small privately owned business it doesn’t have to. B...

You will know about cling film. Perhaps you wrapped your lunch in it this morning. Or you’ve seen swaths of it used to wrap suitcases at the airport. It’s ubiquitous and it’s pernicious. Jon Reed certainly thinks so and has created Compostic, a plant-based alternative that as the label says decomposes faster than an orange peel. He was joined by Vincent Heeringa.

Comvita is a publicly listed mānuka honey specialist – the OG of mānuka money if you like. For a moment it was a sharemarket darling peaking in 2015 but since then languishing as it posted losses and a stockpile of product it couldn’t shift. Enter David Banfield in 2020. A spectacular financial result in February this year signal perhaps a reversal in fortunes. With success in China and the USA, t...

Finn Ross is a young guy on a mission. He’s completing a PhD on seaweed carbon sequestration, he’s also co-founder of CarbonZ , a company offering voluntary carbon credits based on the restoration and planting of native trees on New Zealand farmland. He’s the son of entrepreneurs Geoff and Justine Ross, owners of Lake Hawea Station, New Zealand’s first carbon positive farm. As a worker on the farm...

A framework for any corporate, anywhere, to divert anything from landfill. That’s the promise from Auckland-based social enterprise All Heart NZ . Ross Inglis asked the irrepressible Joe Youssef, the company’s founder and Chief Encourager, how it does it.

What happens to all those acres of white plastic wrap that protect building sites? Ross Inglis talks with two people who know: Too much of it goes to landfill, and they’re doing something about it. In this episode: Tina Wieczorek (right) is the CEO of the industry organisation Scaffolding, Access and Rigging New Zealand, or SARNZ, and Penny Thomson, a research manager and designer with the Environ...

Conventional plastics recycling is fussy: it can handle only four of the 24 types of plastic, and even those have to be clean. Here’s the story of Auckland-based social enterprise Critical, which uses proprietary technology to turn a wide range of waste plastics, including more contaminated ones, into construction boards and countertops.

New Zealanders on average throw out textiles equivalent to 200 t-shirts every year. Finding a new home for all those garments is the mission of Australasian textiles recycler Upparel. Jeff Vollebregt, director of Upparel’s New Zealand operation talked Ross Inglis through the business of circular clothing.

The transport sector has experienced its share of drama this year, starting with Cyclone Gabrielle wiping out so many roads and bridges across the north island. The cyclone was blamed for a sudden change in the direction in government policy. Back in February, Minister Michael Woods announced a climate-friendly plan, in its three-year transport plan, the Government Policy Statement. For the first...

Last week the quarterly auction for carbon credits hit a remarkable snag: it failed to meet the clearing price. This means none of the 4.5 million carbon permits on offer were sold. The failed auction was attributed to Cabinet’s decision to allow more credits to be issued, in an attempt to keep the carbon cost low. And it worked! The carbon price slumped from $90/tonne to $65/tonne. Cost of living...

It's 10 years since the first companies were certified as B-Corp in New Zealand and since then the movement of ethical and environmentally responsible businesses has grown to over 500 in NZ and Australia and more than 6000 worldwide. But growing pains are emerging as the movement shifts from cutting-edge to mainstream. Last year a group of 30 B-Corps were horrified when Nespresso was certified des...

If the rain that deluged the North Island is the ‘new normal’, how are hard-hit growers meant to think about the future – and growing anything in the ‘normal’ way? Vincent Heeringa spoke to Brent Clothier, chief scientist with Plant & Food, about four ways to think about growing food in a warmer and (ironically) drier New Zealand. Note: this was recorded before Cyclone Gabrielle devastated Haw...

How can we make sense of the Biblical deluge that soaked Auckland, Northland, and the Coromandel in late January – and by the time this is being recorded is about to happen again. If only there was an articulate, slow-talking climate scientist who could explain what hell just happened. Oh, wait! Vincent just spoke with Kevin Trenberth a Distinguished Scholar at the National Center of Atmospheric R...