Green Matters – December 21, 2020

Environment: The not silent crisis.

• Seven wins that gave us hope for the environment in 2020 (nationalgeographic)

• The top eleven must-see sustainability documentaries (triplepundit)

• Should carbon credits count if the forests are already preserved? (bloomberg)

   

Companies: It’s time to step up. 

• Why brands need purpose to survive now more than ever (sustainablebrands)

• More companies holding cash reserves at Black-serving banks (forbes)

• Leading car maker (accounting for 1% of global CO2 emissions) to link top executives’ pay to ESG targets (yahoofinance)

• 45 of the 50 largest US companies turned a profit since March, yet the majority cut staff and gave almost 80% of total profits as buybacks and dividends (washingtonpost)

• Here’s how corporate America did on their 2020 climate goals [visual] (bloomberg)

Tech: The good and the bad. 

• How COVID-19 accelerated automation (futurism) 

• 425 of the Fortune 500 companies may have been victims of massive cyberattack (cnn) 

• Capella Space’s new satellite is eerily observant (input)

Energy & Renewables: Powering our future.

• The world’s largest renewable energy ‘Megapark’ will be the size of Singapore (sciencealert) 

• Electricity from a new coal plant is now 177% more expensive than electricity from new solar panels (fastcompany)

Economy: People & ideas.

• Putting the green in greenback? ESG investors call for companies to report on “extinction accounting” (reuters)

• Small business optimism falls by the largest amount since April (fanniemae) 

• Wholesale traders have outsized influence on global food markets and are engaging in collusion for more profits (AEA) 

• How people spend their time globally (visualcapitalist)