Zoë's page

Hey just before you do, I've got to do a
quick little intro.

I first met Dr Alex a couple of years
ago, I think in 2018 when

the Deep Green Biotech Hub had a bit of
a launch party. I went for the beers and

left completely inspired by the 
power of algae, and I was like

"I don't know what algae is, I don't

really know what it has to do with
innovation" but

after seeing that presentation I was
absolutely hooked.

Dr Alex is doing incredible things at
UTS particularly, but

broadly in the ecosystem with making
sure that founders who are looking to

leverage the power of algae and the
facilities here at UTS are able to do that.

She supports startups, she runs
the deep green biotech hub, and the

Green Light Accelerator Program.
She's pretty much the go-to for me when

it comes to anything
sustainability, and we're so so lucky

that she's friends with us and helps us
along the way.

So I'd love you all to clap react, send a
little love heart, whatever it is

for Alex Thomson as she tells us how
not to greenwash your startup.

That was an introduction and a half Dave! [Laughter]

I have a couple of slides prepared but
I'm happy to kind of just do a little

bit of Q&A with you guys, whatever kind
of suits. I don't know how long people

have been on the, on the line here waiting for stuff, so

whatever suits you guys. 
But I'll pop, I'll pop a couple slides up.

[Dave:] Yeah, for sure. 
We'll watch for questions and

yeah, interrupt if we need to.

[Dr Alex:] Okay. So, hi my name is Alex Thomson.

I manage the Deep Green Biotech Hub
at the University Technology Sydney.

I also have a background in environmental
science and marine science. I have a PhD

in marine ecology, so when it comes to
sustainability it's something that I am

super passionate about. I have quite a
bit of science background

in that space, particularly with climate
and carbon science.

So if you ever want to talk about carbon
capture

carbon emissions, all that sort of stuff
I am your go-to person.

So we're going to talk
about sustainability, we're going to talk

about green washing, but first a little
bit of a shout out for Deep Green. So we

sit inside the Faculty of Science inside
a research institute called the

Climate Change Cluster,
and we're really all about driving

innovation supporting startups to
develop new products

with algae. I'm going to talk a little
bit about algae today, but it's not all

about algae, we are here to talk about
sustainability, greenwashing, all that

sort of stuff.
So first of all, why sustainability?

Why is this such a thing that we need to
address?

I don't think that this would be new to
many of you guys that

there is a lot of issues around
sustainability and why

we are trying to drive more sustainable
practice. When I talk about

sustainability by and large we're
talking about environmental sustainability.

So obviously there's a
lot of sustainability surrounding ethics,

treatment of workers, education,
public health, all that sort of stuff, and

that definitely does fall into the
sustainability category.

But specifically today we're going to
talk about environmental sustainability

because that's what
greenwashing really is all about.

So when we're talking about environmental
sustainability, there is a

massive suite of issues that people are
trying to address

by making their business, or their
organisation more sustainable.

They can be things like, making sure
that we have access to fresh water;

so by the end of 2020 we're going to
need 50% more fresh water,

we're going to need
70% more food,

50% more fuel- by 2050, sorry.
So when we're looking at our globe and

we're looking environmental issues,
if we are just wanting to continue as a

species living on this planet, there are
some requirements we need to meet, which

also mean that we need to reduce our
consumption

and reliance on a whole bunch of things,
so that we can continue to kind of exist

the way that we've been existing.

This is also going to require 80% reduction in carbon dioxide, and I actually

can't see my little number under there-
there you go! Because we are

going to see a 30% increase in our
global population by 2050.

So you might have seen, there's some
stats out there, by 2050 we need

somewhere between
three and five earths worth of resources

to sustain our growing population.
Obviously we kind of get that there,

there are some significant issues in
terms of our

need for resources, and just the fact
that our planet is getting

bigger; we've got more people on it, we've
got more things that we need to

feed them with, we've got more carbon
being emitted, so how do we kind of

address all these things? And it's by
being more sustainable.

When we think about businesses, I think
this is an important point to draw

because I think there's a 
couple of drivers

for businesses to be more sustainable.
And when I, I did a bit of a deep dive

for this presentation because for me
sustainability is really a no-brainer,

but for a lot of people,
sustainability- there's some

different motivations for people to be
more sustainable.

Certainly when- they did a survey, a
McKinsey Survey, I think it was about 10

years ago, why people were 
driven to be more

sustainable in their business, and also
what aspects of sustainability

were cause for concern. And there's some
common themes in terms of

energy use and waste, you know, 
how much emissions they're

putting out, their water use,
developing sustainable products...

Obviously there's a whole bunch of
different things, but what it kind of

boils down to is,
and I've gone too far- sustainability

is at this make or break point. If your
business isn't specifically addressing

sustainability, if it doesn't have a
sustainability pledge, if there isn't

something in
it's- say a "value statement" or things

like that,
or you know, your businesses is found to

be not sustainable,
it is a big issue not just for your

business as a whole, but in terms of it's
becoming a big marketing issue.

So, for a scientist that is a little bit
distressing to me, but

when we're kind of looking at these
companies who have been found to be less

than sustainable,
bigger corporations, we know that they

have a severe impact on their reputation.
So businesses are trying to be more

sustainable, sometimes it's for a
marketing perspective,

sometimes a reputational thing, sometimes
it's actually a core part of their business.

Whatever the reason, it 
is a big reason, and more and more

businesses are
wanting to engage in this space.

I kind of- I've mixed up the slides a
little bit here, so I'm going to

go a little bit further.
I think we first need to understand

what environmental sustainability
is before we take a deep dive into

greenwashing, and what you can 
actually do

to be on the right track for
sustainability.

So, there are a lot of different metrics for
sustainability. To be completely honest,

it's a little bit like the Wild West. 
People are kind of calling different

things sustainable
that may not necessarily be

environmentally sustainable. They may
have been environmentally sustainable 10

years ago,
but they're now no longer considered

environmentally sustainable.
They, you know, may actually forego

you know, a certain metric to take
advantage of another one.

It is completely the Wild West, I'm
going to be completely honest with you.

But, if you want a general 
benchmark for what

we should be aiming for
in terms of general sustainability,

including environmental and social
sustainability,

the UN's Sustainable Development Goals
are your go-to.

If you want to understand what it
means to be sustainable,

what we as a global population should be
working towards, this is your benchmark.

If you haven't heard of this before,
these are essentially

17 goals that have been formulated by
the United Nations,

for, which is essentially a
blueprint for our planet to work towards,

not just for environmental
sustainability, but also reducing poverty,

increasing education, decreasing
injustice, and addressing

climate change and environmental
degradation. So there's all sorts of

things in there- I'm not going to
go through them all because they're

pretty big, but if you're wanting a
general go-to,

sustainability is confusing you, you
don't know what is sustainable,

what isn't sustainable,
this is the best place to go.

There are some that specifically
address climate change and

environmental sustainability.
And they are things like

responsible consumption,
affordable and clean energy,

climate action, addressing our oceans,
life on land and clean water and sanitation.

So if we're looking at the benchmark for

environmental sustainability 
and addressing climate change,

they're your goals, there's some
amazing resources on there.

But if we're just wanting to kind of
work out what are the benchmark things,

that's definitely the place to go.

Before you kind of dive into this issue of
sustainability,

I think it's really critically important
to remember

that sustainability for different people
and in different businesses looks different.

And I think that anyone who is trying 
to go on a sustainability journey

with their business, should be applauded.

Because it's pretty confusing, 
and as I said it's

a bit of a Wild West, understanding what
you should and shouldn't do

is really confusing, and what me maybe
once-

sustainable one year, may no longer be
sustainable the next year.

So there's a couple of things that I
would recommend that any business does

when they're wanting to embark on being
sustainable.

First of all, ask yourself what is
feasible within the realms of your business,

your budget, and what does 
achievement look like for you?

Have a think about what is important for

you in terms of sustainability;
do you live in a place that is

drought-stricken like Australia
and is implementing a product that uses

a lot of water?
Sustainable? Probably not.

Do you live in a place where there's lots of water, and
so using the same amount of water is okay?

Then that's probably not a key issue for you.

Are you living in a place that you
may need to clear land to develop a product?

Probably not sustainable. 
So it's going to look different for you.

The next thing is, what does sustainability
look like for your business?

If you're working in the tech sector
that may mean addressing your

energy usage,
and your usage of cloud storage.

If you're working in food manufacturing,
that may mean

looking at your carbon emissions and
your wastewater emissions,

but looking at your energy may not be as
high of a concern. So it's about looking

at your industry and the practices that
you implement as well.

Having a look at standards; and this is
something with sustainability

that is really wild, there's not a lot of
standards out there

and the standards are different for
different countries.

So, it is all well and good for a company to
say we're carbon negative,

but what does that mean? Have you
actually assessed the life cycle

of your product?
Have you got certified? Do you know you

need to get re-certified every couple of
years for that?

And with recertification you actually
need to show how you're offsetting your

carbon as well.
Who can help you? So this isn't a

journey that you should undertake alone.
Ask for people, see experts.

There's companies that specialise in this stuff,
you can absolutely ask for help.

And how can you make sure that you are reviewing
and checking what you're saying?

Finally, the biggest thing with
sustainability, and a big issue that I've

seen with a lot of companies that claim
to be sustainable,

is to make sure that you are transparent
about what you're saying.

If you are saying that your product is carbon neutral,

put it out there. How have you calculated
it? How have you checked it?

How are you offsetting your carbon? This
stuff is really, really important

because if you're not [...] transparent with your

sustainability claims, people will come
for you. [Laughter]

And with that, it's about also
building engagement. So building

engagement in your company, building
engagement with your your staff, and your employees,

as well as like your board and your
stakeholders as well.

So, we know kind of where we should be
going with sustainability,

you know, water, carbon
emissions,

how much waste water you've got,
there's a whole bunch of different things,

it's going to depend on the
industry that you're in.

But, what sort of certifications and
accreditations can you be looking for?

If you're wanting to go out there and
say something like "our product is carbon neutral"

"Our product is sustainable"

"Our product uses renewable energy",
they're not actually statements you can

just kind of put out there in the
universe and just hope that no one's

going to check.
Because there are certifications and

accreditations that you can get, that will mean 
that you can actually back that up.

So a lot of the companies out there will be a

certified B Corp, you can have 
a look whether that's a right fit for you.

There's [...] some different sets of criteria and a ranking system

to become a certified B Corp. A lot of
them do address

environmental performance, effect on
climate change, that sort of thing,

so that may be a right fit for your
business.

Within Australia we have a certification
called Climate Active,

which will actually assess from say the
growth stage of your product

to the disposal stage of your product,

what your carbon emissions are, and how you
are offsetting that or maybe not

offsetting that depending on what your
product is, but you actually get a proper

certification for that.
So I see all the time companies claiming

that they're now carbon neutral, 
and I kind of go

where's the independent analysis? Who did
this for you? How much carbon are you

emitting? How are you offsetting that?
No, buying a paddock in western NSW

does not now mean you're carbon
neutral!

Because we actually need to understand
the complete life cycle of your product

to work out how much carbon you're
emitting,

and therefore how much you need to
offset

if that's how you're choosing to 
become carbon neutral.

And there's also some certifications for energy as well, so a bunch of different

Australian Government schemes looking at your use
of renewables versus your

energy reduction can help with those
certification processes as well.

The other thing I think particularly
with startups that's important,

there's a whole bunch of research out
there on how people adopt different

principles particularly with
sustainability,

and I think that we're in this stage now
where businesses are kind of being

almost
forced to adopt some part of

sustainability in their business.
People will talk about this in terms of,

are you a defensive? Are you just kind of
claiming you didn't know that your

product wasn't sustainable? Or are you
being civil? Are you actually being

innovative in this field?
I think for startups, the more

appropriate terminology would be
reactive, proactive, and disruptive.

So, reactive is companies that "hey, we didn't
know that there was single-use plastic

used in this product that we've been
shipping around the world.

Our bad. We'll try and fix it." Then there
is reactive, or proactive:

"hey, we have gone out by ourselves. We've
worked out a way that we can

manufacture, ship, and sell this product
without any single-use plastic,

and anything else that we have
is compostable.

Good for us." And then there is the
disruptive, which I think with startups

is just an amazing space to be: "we've
actually gone out and developed a whole

new compostable single-use plastic. You
plant it in your garden, it degrades by

itself, there's no emissions.
We are the disruptors in this space

making this whole area more sustainable."
So I think

when you are asking those questions of
yourself, it's important to ask:

Am I being reactive? Am I just
implementing these practices in this

business because I have to, and it looks
bad if I don't?

Am I being proactive? Am I trying to
figure out a way to make these processes

that I'm doing, that are part of my
business

more sustainable, in a couple of
different ways or one different way?

What's my focus?
Or are you being disruptive? Are you

actually coming up with a whole new
product, a whole new process?

A whole new way of things, that addresses
a lot of these issues within your

ecosystem,
and actually makes a way of doing

something a whole lot more sustainable?
To kind of look at how we can address

this, I've put together like a little bit
of a case study, and this has to do with

the food industry in Australia.
If you didn't know, the food industry in

Australia, encompassing
agriculture and farming, makes up 20% of

our carbon emissions,
and 29% of that is just packaging.

So, if we're looking at how [...] this
industry is sustainable, we first need to

understand where their emissions are,
what their

focus is for sustainability,
carbon emissions for this particular

industry is a key issue,
as well as waste and packaging.

When you have a look at how to work out
how to become more sustainable,

it's also important to
understand your pinch points.

So, with the food industry it's that nearly
40% of all food that's produced in

Australia is wasted,
and this number that's under this here.

A whole bunch of our carbon emissions
are actually

from the food industry. So how do we
actually work out how to make this

industry more sustainable?
You do something called a life cycle analysis.

This can be as complex
or as simple as you like, but it means

really scrutinising
your supply chains, where you're getting

stuff from, and trying to
identify the points at which you can

make things more sustainable. So for
something like food, this means looking

at how it was farmed,
looking at the water security that's

involved, looking at-
if food is going to change in availability

is this actually suitable
to be grown, or is this not sustainable?

How it's being packaged, if we're being
complete and proper

it's the nutritional aspect as well, and
then how that food waste is also being

disposed of. So it's a lot, and I feel
like I haven't really given anyone any

answers to be completely honest. [Laughter]
I want to get back to this idea of

greenwashing, and greenwashing is really
making sustainability claims

that you're not being transparent about,
and that you can't back up.

So if you are worried that you are 
greenwashing,

it's about going back, checking what
you're saying is actually true,

making that information transparent, and
really being open to scrutiny and

wanting to do better.
I would say there's a couple of things

that you can do if you're wanting to
start your sustainability journey.

This is actually proper published
research in terms of helping

corporations become more sustainable.
Making sure, as I said, you're aligning

what you can do with
your sustainability, making sure above

all that you are safe,
changing your reaction from being

reactive to proactive,
and even disruptive if you want to as well,

looking at how it's affecting your
business,

being transparent, and also engaging
people.

I would- my kind of go-to with this, and I
think transparency with sustainability

is probably one of the most important
things in all of this, and I kind of sum

this up by saying "shade's good for the planet 
it's not good for your startup."

Because
that is what's going to happen if you're

not transparent about sustainability
claims you make.

It's just all out bad, and I've seen this
happen to companies, companies that say

they are a sustainable product,
they have a sustainable product, and then

people pry into it and they want to
understand more about that product,

and it's not [...] sustainable
at all, in any way shape or form,

and the reputational damage to that
company is far worse than if they just

hadn't made that claim to begin with! 
So just some take-home messages;

any steps that you take to be more
sustainable

is good- we should be
applauding any business that is trying

to make steps
to make their business more sustainable.

Be aware that sustainability is going to
change

and that your direction your business
that you're going in, it's going to

change, and just be kind of 
fluid and sort of

roll with it a little bit.
Research what you're doing, review it and

ask for help.
Check your supply chains, check what

you're saying and review it regularly.
Check if there are any standards that

you can get certified, because that's a
really easy way to be a lot more

transparent and to engage with people,
and to make sure that what you're doing

is actually accurate. And also just being
transparent and being engaged.

That's kind of all that I had to say,
but I'm really [...] interested to

kind of hear people's questions. I mean
sustainability is such a hot topic,

and I think it really stems from that-
sometimes people don't really know

the best way to go, and what is
sustainable what isn't sustainable.

Yeah, throw them at me!

Well,
firstly thank you so much

for that little presentation, 
that was just incredible.

What my first question is, are we
allowed to have

the slide deck from the recording?

[Dr Alex:] Yeah that's fine! [Laughter]

Is it just cause Lourdes wants my
"shade's good for the planet not good for your startup"?

[Laughter]

I'm not sure why we have an echo.

No, I don't think that's us.

Anyway. I can see a few
great people on this chat and

so opening it up for questions, 
we've got probably a

few minutes here
where we could get Dr Alex to

shine a light on your particular
situation, your questions. I've got a few

questions written down, so 
if we don't have any here...?

Before the questions, 
I just

wanted to say Alex, that was an awesome
presentation.

And the part that I think is most
interesting, or is such an important

like takeaway, is that idea of
sustainability being a constant journey

and it needs to be built into your
company. It's not- "great, we've set this up,

tick! Like, we are 'sustainable' and we're
just going to run with what we do now".

Like, it is that constant checking in and
that constant accountability

for what your startup is doing. Which
is, yeah I guess is

essential to what greenwashing is.

[Dr Alex:] It's so much about accountability too. It was so interesting, when I was doing this I looked to see

what some corporations claiming to be
sustainable had implemented.

And there was one big corporation whose
name I won't mention, that their claim to

being sustainable is that they reduced
printing in their offices.

That was it. They had massive global
supply chains,

they were using plastic, they were land
clearing,

and their claim was that they were
reducing printing, and that was their

sustainability claim.
And really, it goes back to accountability.

[Dave:] Yeah. I mean, 
when I think about this stuff

and hear you talk about this, I guess the

whole triple bottom line
thing comes up- I'm a business student so

you know, hearing about how to-
I've learned how to make a profit.

Like I've learned how to, you know,  
people can mentor you, people can

you know, here at UTS Startups we
spend time helping people connect with

those who've gone before
to show us how to make profitable

businesses happen,
and if we're going to talk about

environmental outcomes being profitable 
in that way, can you think of any sort of,

I guess mentor type, or businesses that

you would look up to and say like 
"hey, have a look at..." I mean you mentioned a

case study there but, "have a look at some
of these businesses,

follow their journey and maybe draw some
inspiration from that"?

Do you have any of those sorts of...?

[Dr Alex:] Yeah so I think one of the 
big ones at the

moment, and particularly close to
probably UTS Startups home

is v2food. So that company
is really doing amazing things in the

Alt meat market,
but they're also building sustainability

into the core of their business and
you know, if we're talking about startup

scale,
investment, and just bottom line,

that is a company who have done all of
that, while also

one of their core pillars of their
business is being

environmentally sustainable.

[Dave:] Well yeah, 18 million investment wasn't it?

In their latest, something
like that...

[Dr Alex:] Yeah.

You know, there's the guys out of 2B that came out of

one of the Atlassian accelerator
programs,

who've developed that renewable energy, the
the solar panels that fall out

in regional Australia after the
bushfires. A massive

you know, in terms of scale up and again
profitability, they're addressing

renewable energy at a really easy, you
know

relatively- look at, in terms of
innovation completely amazing.

So if we're thinking about products,
you know companies that are

what I'm coining as "disruptive", so
actually making their whole industry

completely more sustainable;
two examples of companies that have been

so amazing, and also
like, Mike Cannon-Brookes- if anyone is

wanting, you know,
in terms of big global companies that

are trying to do the right thing in
terms of environmental sustainability

and climate change,
Atlassian is an amazing example of a

company that
that is a really part of their core

business, and he's so outspoken about
that as well.

[Dave:] Yeah, absolutely. 
And just a really quick question here;

Nick, has written something in. I'm
struggling to read it without my glasses

[Kat:] Do you want me to read it?

Yes Kat, thank you. [Laughter]

If you're disrupting a supply chain

that's not sustainable but they claim
that they are,

how do you ensure they're not 
greenwashing on what they're saying?

Like, how do you fact check a claim?

[Dr Alex:] Well that's, I mean it goes back to a

little bit about what I said about the
Wild West right?

Is that sustainability is kind of- it's,
for the most part

fairly unregulated, and there's not a lot
of fact checking

and there's not a lot of people that can
go and- you know there's, that

certification, when you're 
digging there's not,

there's not a lot of things that people can kind
of stamp on their product and say that

"we're climate neutral" or whatever.
People do it, but it's not actually

climate neutral. 
So I think there's two things there

and it's gonna depend on your investment
in that situation;

Do you actually want to make sure that
your supply chains

are sustainable? And that's going to take
a lot of work, are you going to go in

there are you going to check things, are
you going to audit it yourself?

Because there's no one that's doing
this stuff. Or are you going to trust

what they say,
work with those suppliers, maybe help

them to become a better business
in the process? And I think that's really

down to you and your investment as well.

[Dave:] Fantastic. 
Hey Dr Alex, we

appreciate you so much. 
I'm going to try and stick to time

because you have. 
How can people reach you or find out more about

the Deep Green Biotech Hub?

[Dr Alex:] So they can go to 
our website, just look up

Deep Green Biotech Hub at UTS, 
lots of information there.

They can email me 
Alexandra.Thomson@uts.edu.au

They can add me at Twitter: 
@drat_science

on Twitter.
Really just, just go for it,

however best you find me, I will respond
to you.

[Dave:] And I can attest that you do answer
emails very quickly. It surprises me

but I love it.
Hey, thank you so so so much Dr Alex.

All of the, all of the things that you
do to support UTS Startups, to support

all of us, all of the times you come
and have drinks with us after work when

we need to complain about our lives.
Basically all of the stuff that you do

is so appreciated.
We appreciate you and what you're doing

for STEM and science and
and all of it. So again, a big thanks.

Everyone hit that clap react 
and we'll let Dr Alex go

and finish her lunch, 
or whatever she's doing because-

[Dr Alex:] I'm on holiday.

I can't believe you're on holidays and 
you just did that!

Thank you again... aww!
[Kat:] We appreciate you!

[Dave:] That's so nice, enjoy your holidays.

[Dr Alex:] Worth it for sustainability, it's always worth it!

[Dave:] Hopefully the weather stays good 
for you. Cool!