The Panacea Distraction

The #panaceadistraction - While searching for the panacea, non-decision-makers keep running their business as usual.The #panaceadistraction disqualifies many #impactinvestments as greenwashing. A look at realpolitik in impactinvesting.

The Trigger: Lubomila’s COP21 statement

"Our Obsession with technology will slow down the green transition.” [Lubomila Jordanova]Having been reminded again of Lubomila Jordanova‘s statement for the U.N. Climate Change Conference 2021, it bugs me, how little has changed in those past two years. Working with climate activists up to United Nations levels, I find a lot of what we call #academicthinking, more about Science Fiction than about taking what we have to the market. A #panaceadistraction if I’ve ever seen one.

And while #buzzwords used by investors are #disruptiveinvestments, #sustainableinvestments and the like, a big part of the #panaceadistraction is their focus on (classic) “boxes” to invest in. Can’t tell, how many times in the past decades I have heard, that our ideas wouldn’t fit the box. #thinkoutsidethebox and #thinkbeyond.

The Sustainability Lie: Stay inside Your Box

Illustration by Hans-Jürgen Marhenke (loaded directly from and linked to the Heise.de website)

The direct “impact” is that #impactinvestments are mostly #greenwashing on #lifecycleassessment and #circulareconomy – very often blindsiding the #energydemand, using the cheap excuses of “we purchase #greenenergy or #climatecertificates … I was recently told that the industry creatively sells multiple times the amounts of “green” energy we create. I can imagine that. Aside of my #railshame-article, cleaning the green color of the mighty German #greenrail. Just another reference to the Sustainability-Energy Dilemma.

ASRA 2008 brainnodes vs. internet equals AIOr #artificialintelligence (just like space) – being a big dream (some consider it a threat). A big investment interest! Whereas most if not all of AI I’ve seen fits the statement that most AI is IA: More (or often less) Intelligent Algorithms. Yes Athena, Minerva and Mike Holmes, I’m waiting (wondering who understands that reference on the fly)…

So how #sustainable is #impactinvesting really? And which #impactinvestors in reality are part of the mighty #greenwashingindustry? Or do they focus a bit too much on the #panaceadistraction instead?

A Look Back: Pioneering and Disrupting

As a kid, I saw those pioneering constructions on those triangle-shaped hang-gliders, today both bureaucracy and investors wouldn’t invest a penny. But they lead to paragliders, a huge industry today.

Back in 1995, the big four in aviation technology (Amadeus, Galileo, Sabre and Worldspan) actively and with might opposed the development of booking flights on web-basis. How “disruptive” was that “stupid” idea? And yes, I made it happen, together and funded by a visionary Louis Arnitz (RIP). And yeah, that was the time Bill Gates disqualified the Internet, promoting his Microsoft Network.

Hydrogen powered Wing in GroundIn 2008, I developed another “disruptive” idea of a hydrogen-powered WIG, to promote the need to think sustainable on a global aviation conference. While it made it through viability study into serious negotiations by a tropical government and a major green fund, it fell victim to Lehman, but I still think it should have been developed. Though since #synfuel came up (2019ish), my bets are on that technology, I even applied it to our plans for Kolibri, closing the huge black hole where before our ideas of #biofuels were more or less a band aid on a searing wound. Aside that I prefer we grow food on the fields and not biofuel-rape. And why is it rape has such a bad double-meaning?

Though I’m a caller in the dark it seems, at least when talking with mighty investors – they fall back to their boxes and disqualify “aviation” as “not something we invest in”, without even a second look. #talkthetalk, focusing on the #panaceadistraction instead.

Think Positive: The Solutions are There!

There is so much #disruptivetech out there with a business case (aka #impactinvestment), beyond that I integrated into the plans I have for Kolibri, lacking the funding support, lacking the vision of those self-proclaimed #impactinvestors. And a lot of #talkthetalk again. i.e. #energybuffer technologies, alternative energy sources such as #tidalenergy – why only offshore-wind? Though nothing we do, nothing comes without a toll. Remember the #butterflyeffect and the Sustainability-Energy Dilemma.

As a direct result, we have an exploding #sdgfundinggap for sustainability and climate developments. It’s not the first and not the last time, U.N. Secretary General Antonio Gutérres called and calls this #fartoolittlefartoolate.

Butterfly Effect, e-Mobility Lie and the Panacea Distraction

e-mobility Life Cycle Assessment Greenwashing Volkswagen AGWhile my readers and followers know that I question #windpower and emobility for #greenwashing and short-term thinking, I also promote the fact that we need the change. We must act. Today.

And while e-Mobility ain’t the panacea, politicians and media tries to make you believe, hydrogen and synfuels ain’t as impossible as they frequently claim either. It’s ambitious to turn our world away from cheap, endless “green” energy and the believe of endless resources. Earth Overshoot Day is bad enough, this year August 2nd. Looking at the country level I feel even more devastated (Germany was May 4th)

Country Overshoot Days 2023
Country Overshoot Days 2023

The Fairy Tale of Zero-Carbon

Basic physics: Movement requires energy. Anything we do requires energy. Travel from A to B, even when using a sail boat (as Greta Thunberg did to cross the Atlantic) requires Energy. And resources. As an economist, I know that anything comes at a price.

So there is no #zerocarbon. If we achieve #carbonneutral, we do very good! If we can reduce our abuse of our natural resources – beyond carbon – we do good. Our target must be to move Earth Overshoot Day to December 31st or later. Next year, in two years. Not even Kolibri will be 100% resource neutral. But if we can turn it 90-100% circular, if our energy consumption is renewable, we will have a major impact to Earth Overshoot Day.

Why Fossils are Problematic

Don't Choose ExtinctionFossils conserve climate gases. While Venus consists of very similar chemical setup, the climate gases on the planet are uncontained. In turn, temperatures there are above 400°C. If someone tells you, we can keep using conserved energy like fossils or the latest ideas using deep-sea manganese nodules, this is climate gases we add to a heavily saturated Earth atmosphere. This is, why yes, I believe we must end fossil consumption (incl. excessive use of plastics) as quickly as we can. Or reduce it to an absolute minimum. Yes, plastics have advantages, but mostly can be replaced by more sustainable solutions. And keep in mind, plastics are used and globally applied by the mighty, rich industry nations. Who’s richness being a result from securing and using cheap fossil energy.

So mostly, this is about fighting the people who rely on cheap energy for their business models. Do I hear “digital” somewhere? 😂

So true #greeninvesting must focus on energy conservation and intelligent use of the energies we have. Personal, fossil, “renewable”. And yes, I put “renewable” into quotes… Just: #dontchooseextinction!

Holistic Approach and All-In

Offshore Windpark (Husum)Another issue that keeps coming up in my discussions is that we must stop competing on sustainable solutions. This is a major, not even just an industry or generational challenge. It’s a global one. So let’s stop competing and start joining forces! Back to my example of offshore wind farms and tidal energy turbines. Why not using them side-by-side in the same sea region we anyway impact by building those humongous wind farm structures? Why not using old Oil Rigs to apply tidal energy turbines, clean them, make them an artificial island structure for sea life (also arial one)?

Live Cycle Assessment and Earth Overshoot Day

Circular EconomyWhat I learned in my discussions with “green” activists up to government and U.N. levels, is that there is a lot of #wishfulthinking out there. A lot of #cognitivedissonance, reasoning to oneself that the bad-doing ain’t “that bad” or even good. And a #greenwashingindustry that uses that to protect their status quo. Not just at “all cost”, but in fact at the cost of our living and breathing environment!

To identify Greenwashing quickly, I mentioned to look at energy bill. United Nations urges to look at the #lifecycleanalysis and an end to end #circulareconomy. We must stop #raisinpicking to fake green, but what is our impact to the planet. Then we talk about #realimpactinvestment. And not at another #panaceadistraction

Food for Thought!
Comments welcome

Too Many Chiefs …

… and the Question about System Relevant Jobs

Managers vs. Executives

Today I had a very emotional discussion about the need for new IT, new processes and all that other stuff the consulting industry keeps telling us, we got to have. Consultants, that have a standing relation inside the aviation company, with constant projects to “improve” and streamline the work.

At what cost?

Having addressed Consulting, Outsourcing, Cloud? COTS or tailormade back in August 2020, we meanwhile discussed over and again the issue of “System Relevant Jobs”. Back in my economics studies, 40 years ago, the general manager of my intern company questioned the increasing “management jobs” by academics, reminding, emphasizing that in the end, it is all about products. Even in whole sale (it was a central logistics warehouse) it’d be a question about benefit for seller and buyer, where the warehouse we worked in distributed the goods to the own satellite stores. He warned, that every intermediary becomes a leech and products becoming more expensive, not cheaper, by adding more and more intermediaries into the pool. His assumption was that 50% management surplus would be viable. And I should mention that he warned about dependencies from “rogue countries”, like China. Cheap but at what cost?

Being very pro globalization in general, he did call it hypocrisy to buy cheap in China, knowing that this is simply based on abuse of work force and stealing of patents and other ideas from other countries – back in the days, China did not much invent themselves, they were known copycats. In Germany meanwhile called “precarious jobs”, that don’t provide decent living, the living standards of workers in China at the time were at best questionable.

System Relevant Jobs

System RelevanceIs your job “system relevant”? If you work in home office, I can tell you the answer is No. If you work in consulting, I can very likely tell you the answer being No. Working in aviation and transport, the answer very likely is No. And if your salary is above average, the answer also very likely is No.

It’s all about leeches. Draining the money out of the really system relevant people, who normally are overworked, but underpaid. Not on the picture are farmers, friends of the family farming, living since I grew up on the brink of bankruptcies over and again. With more and more demands and pay for their products (milk, meat, grain, etc.) being often below the cost of production. Then they get generously state aid, to keep them working on subsistence levels.

The NHS personnel is on strike, the medical situation there in the U.K., also in Germany, being devastating. 24 hour shifts, 3 days “on call” duty?

Logistics drivers, the one delivering all those fancy goods we all buy, paid at minimum wage or just very little above for good feeling? Uber being a gigacorn? Delivery “Heroes”? But the managers in their offices having a “decent salary”? Who’s doing the work and what do we pay them?

U.N. Sustainable Development Goals

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals

There are 17 SDGs. But all statistics show that all of them are actually still deteriorating. And if companies call themselves “sustainable”, they usually focus on the easy SDGs, most times at the cost of the others. Yes, we invest into climate, we buy CO2-certificates. And buy our growing hunger for power from the grid. Sure we buy “green power”… We upgrade our HR Director to “Chief HR Officer” and call it a board position, but only on paper to look good. We invest in R&D to find solutions how we can become sustainable in the future, while we fight the unions and deny salary increases for our workers. We add the (female) position of Chief Sustainability Officer to express our commitment to the SDGs. Oops, we forgot to give her a budget or empower her responsibilities? Examples aplenty…

We need companies to do the right thing. To embrace sustainability and evolve. It’d give them a competitive edge, a USP. When I was a child, it was common that people worked for “Daimler” (Mercedes-Benz) or “Bosch” all their live. You looked after your stuff from post-school training to retirement – often even beyond. Then they became “Human Resources” to managers who turned “shareholder value” from “what’s good for the company” and “long-term thinking” into “what’s good for my bonus” and “who cares about the time after I’m gone”.

A Question of Respect

My “intern” boss (again) taught me respect for everyone. The guy on the fork-lift, the cleaners, truck drivers and “secretaries” (yeah, we still had those). He taught us to set up the coffee when it was empty and not bother the secretaries. To clean up ourselves to make the cleaners’ jobs easier. To think beyond our petty box as “office workers” and value the hard work of the real workers. Also to question, but then also embrace the value of our work. IF we added value.

And in the pandemic, we should have (but obviously didn’t) learn the other lesson. That it’s not enough to sit at the windows “applauding” the system relevant workers that went above and beyond any perceivable “line of duty”, but to pay them decently. To look after them and keep in mind that they also have families to sustain, vacation wishes that go beyond the balcony on an old residential block they only can afford with added state aid.

Beyond White- and Greenwashing

I recently attended a multi-week project by United Nations Climate Action on Circular Economy. And the need for lifecycle-assessment. But it was also mostly #talkthetalk and academic ideas. And I had several objectives that then led to my image about the panacea distraction.

Aside me wondering, of that lady in the image might be an unpaid intern? Another reflection of the value HR managers and their bosses have about the value of training and labor. Any employer not paying their interns should be put in the pillory. For labor abuse!

Oh yes, and that goes in line with midwifes that quit their jobs as governments don’t reduce but add to the legal strains in the job. Or riders asked to bring their own bikes – and repair, all at minimum wage and abusive “time management”. Or airlines outsourcing their pilots forcing them into bogus self-employment without vacation or sick-leave cover, paid wages below their own pilots. Back in my intern-days, there were “personnel agencies” too. But to hire someone for short-term was always about 50% higher cost than employing someone directly. What went wrong there?

Yes I could go on.

Food for Thought
Comments welcome!

Yes. Comments welcome: Do you agree, disagree, partially, am I right, wrong, do I oversee anything? Have your own examples? What would, could and should we do?

 

A (Fast Forward) Look Into 2022/23

In the recent weeks, there were some discussions about hopes and expectations for 2022. Related to aviation, tourism, Corona and politics… So let me share some expectations here in a (fast forward) look into 2022/23.

And sure, let’s start with

La Linea Corona 2022

The Pandemic …

MeaslesIn the first year of the pandemic, in the first wave in May, I voiced my expectation already of Corona CoVID-19 as the new Measles. It’s even less, it will be more like the Flu. Get vaccinated one year for the latest SARS-variants. And keep in mind that SARS is in the wild for almost 20 years, it ain’t new! So to take it with the former German Minister for Health Jens Spahn, we will (globally) have 3G; in German Geimpft (vaccinated), Genesen (recovered) or Gestorben (died).

Omicron being good, as it spreads aggressively with a focus on unvaccinated people, who will then be recovered (or dead). Yes, Yulia and I are boostered, the kids are “officially vaccinated”, got their second shot early January, about as quickly as it was possible for 5 to 11 year old’s. Both wanted it, both had friends suffering the infection with side effects.

But now a new variant hits from Portugal, that seems immune to the vaccines or body’s own defense from previous infection. And Germany is hit by another peak. Whereas the infection rates a mere year ago would have called for lock-downs…? But our airlines promote travel without masks… And what happens, if the next variant is a more hostile version again?

… Turning Endemic (in Europe and U.S.)

Endemic vs. Pandemic

There was a very good article on Al Jazeera about why the WHO refuses to turn Covid from a pandemic to an endemic state. Including the graph linked here on the impact of existing endemic diseases.

So given we have covered European and North American countries with enough vaccine for anyone who wants to be vaccinated, three, even four times, the times for lock-down will slowly be past. That will have impact to recovery of intra-European and North American air travel.

The only reasoning allowing for lifting air travel restrictions will then be the the hospitalization rates, though I expect those to go down to more manageable levels. Though we have ongoing reports of countries less privileged with vaccine access that report problems:

#vaccinationalism

#vaccinationalism (Source: Deutsche Welle)The next big challenge is the look across borders and out of the “industry nations”. Over and again, news about vaccines that expired in the richer nations were met by the ones of i.e. African countries being delivered expiring vaccines or even ones that were not certified in the donor countries. At the same time, vaccines like the Russian Sputnik were still not “certified”. In turn, my own mother-in-law was denied entry into Europe as she got Sputnik, to visit to take care of my kids in my absence, while Yulia (my wife) works full time too.

Air Travel Industry #testingregime

“Principle Hope” and the Saint-Florian’s Principle dominate our industry: “Oh holy dear Saint Florian, don’t burn my house, take the neighbors one.”

During the recent handball European Championships, the German’s team played. With a mere four players from the core team, all others infected. Airlines and their lobbyists demand to end mask requirements and testing regimes in gross negligence and full knowledge that all those new variants can only spread that quickly globally by means of air travel.

It is my personal understanding that aviation needs to improve health rules and not hide behind the individual, political rules in place somewhere. How expensive would it be to have temperature scanners added into the check-in- and or security-process? And if someone has high temperature, to demand wearing of an FFP2-mask in flight. A mask that should then be provided if needed. They are no longer excessively expensive. A requirement shared by security with the airline, to ensure safety of the other passengers (and the flight crews). We must think beyond the current pandemic, as this is nothing new, just the worst case so far in “aviation history”.

Thermal ScreeningAirports would be well advised to have processes in place to ensure #testingregime for the current and future infections., demanding and assuring the ability for pre-flight testing.

Given the issue of #vaccinationalism, I expect a first “recovery” in the rich industry nations, but also future variants swapping across those countries like Tsunamis from the neglected countries. Again, what happened to #weareallinthistogether? Or #thenewnormal?

This week I got reminded that the next variant-rise in infections that the experts predict for coming fall (again) is so much like airline winter ops. It hits every year again. To the surprise of the airport and airline managers…? Why is it that the mask requirement is liftet in Germany and I still enter shops with a mask? With about 50% of the shop visitors doing likewise – while the others play Russian Roulette?

Airline Loads and Revenue

IATA Air Passenger Analysis 2022-04
IATA Air Passenger Analysis 2022-04

Also “again”, we had discussed load and revenue just recently. Whereas aviation experts report own experience with flights cancelled on short notice. Which is met by reports from many airports, that airlines register more flights than sensible, with a large number cancelled in advance due to lack of passengers/revenue.

I keep voicing my concerns that airline management must rethink. The KPI “load factor” is useless by itself, even dangerous. The KPI we must focus on is “revenue”. But in the recent IATA Regional Economic Briefs stopped reporting KPIs that reflect on revenue. Likely as they try to avoid “bad news”? Good-weather-mentality. Works well, when there is sunshine, but we are now in a thunderstorm. Even with some brief respite, we’re anywhere but “back to normal”.

Cabin Crew FFP2+GlovesReports I read fed hopes again about a summer recovery in Europe. A recovery now threatened by the new BA.5 variant spreading throughout Europe. And again, what is the airlines’ role in spreading those new variants so quickly across countries? And Lufthansa recently cancelled 600 flights (5%) for lack of staff. A main reason being the infection of their own. Mainly infected “at work”. What was that again about employee health protection? Naaaw, let’s not play it safe, let’s go back to old normal?

Personally, I’m a bit afraid, we are just in the eye of the storm…

Back to (the new) Normal?

Change Resistance (shutterstock_210479080 licensed)Speaking to airline and airport managers, they prioritize no “new normal” which they promoted in the beginning of the pandemic. But they focus to “renormalize” back to the old normal. Which bites them in the butt over and again. Demands are to lift mask and testing requirements. In an obvious ignorance of the pandemic development. In line with political developments, but not in line with the infection rates.

As I asked before: Why do the new variants spread globally in a matter of weeks, if not days. I am quite sure, they are not contracted that quickly by air. Nor by rail, bus of freight. This should have been a wake-up-call for aviation to understand their role in globalization, not only in commerce, but also in health, in the spread of diseases. How many pandemics does it need for us to start “new thinking” and take responsibility?

What about #weareallinthistogether and #thenewnormal? Ain’t this the “safest industry in the world”? Safety first? What happens if we stray from that priority towards maximized returns, we have learned all watching and commenting on Boeing and the Max (and the 787) disaster(s).

Flying Empty

Hibernating Aircraft at BRUThere can be reasons to fly an aircraft even empty.

One being to avoid aircraft hibernation. If an aircraft is not used for too long (and that time frame is rather short), the requirements to “reactivate” the aircraft explode the complexity and cost to do it. So it makes sense to consider which aircraft to take into hibernation, which ones may come soon back into service. And rotate the reserves to make sure they are ready to fly when needed.

Empty CabinAnother would be to rotate the pilots to make sure they all keep their “type rating”, their license to fly the aircraft. Which also expires just too quickly. And while airlines now recognize the shortfall on pilots that they had either “laid off” (fired) and (or) didn’t support in keeping their type rating, the current feedback from pilots is that airlines still fail to have programs in place to rotate the pilots as good as they could to keep the type-ratings.

The Role of IATA?

IATA mask mandatesI am very much missing the leadership I’d expect from IATA. Not a leadership towards the next disaster, but same rule for all. Like requirements to implement measures helping to identify sick passengers. Standards how to handle such. What if it’s not a single traveler, but a small child traveling with its family? But in the end, I believe if in doubt, a medical flight readiness certificate may be required. But also made available at airports offering commercial flights. Maybe demanding FFP2 mask. Maybe even plastic gloves or a hazmat-suit. What about the ticket? Will it be allowed to rebook. Airlines and/or travel insurances may need special rules for handling medically denied boarding? Maybe that we must add certain insurance as default to tickets?
But looking at the current line of communication by IATA, it does show a frightening ignorance, promoting future infection spread.

All things, the IATA could set up and require. Or ICAO if IATA doesn’t have the balls. #talkthetalk #discouragechange …

Side note: There was a nice article back in December ’20 from Simple Flying, Why You Shouldn’t Expect Masks To Disappear From Planes Soon… But who cares about the crap we thought reasonable yesterday?

War in the Ukraine

Donetsk Airport
Donetsk Airport – 2014 before and after

Being married to a Russian with close friends in the Ukraine, I would have never, never-ever believed an invasion of Ukraine. And while NATO-expansion threatened Russia – reminding of the political uproar when Khrushchev attempted to base nuclear missiles on the U.S. “doorstep”. Whereas NATO territory in fact is as close or closer to the Russian capital cities of Saint Petersburg and Moscow. That taken into account, there is no reasoning for an invasion of the Ukraine or the claims of a denazification. C’mon, I’m from Germany and Russia is the aggressor, too close to comfort following the propaganda and strategies of the Third Reich.

It became more obvious, when the “special operation” failed to achieve the Russian targets, when they invaded from Belarus towards Kiev and when they leave scorched earth (and hundred of massacred civilians) behind. The entire Donbass region now looks like Donetsk Airport, as does Mariupol.

The streamlining of the Russian media is totally in line with German propaganda. Control the media, promote your side, anyone voicing other opinion is taken to jail. Gestapo like. The next level being Stasi-methods jailing people already if there are unqualified claims of opposition. I am indeed afraid we will see that coming.

So with a focus on the impact of aviation? We are back into cold-war times. No overflying of the Russian territories is #thenewnormal for years to come. There will be exceptions – there are still flights between Russia and Turkey or Russia and China. How that will backfire on long-haul airlines though? There are discussions in the U.S. to ban those airlines from connecting to U.S. airlines. Which in turn would sure be followed by Europe. And then? This war has a big impact on our industry.

The Energy Crisis 2.0

Primary Energy Demand vs. CO2While the aviation industry and it’s Powers-That-Be (PTBs) argue that we must delay sustainable flight in face of the crisis, I am on a complete opposite belief. We must, but we failed, to take the crisis as a chance for overdue change. Instead of investing into sustainable fuels and developments, into optimizing the airspace, our PTB try to go back to old normal. Then finding reasons to delay the change further.

Power from the Plug Greenwashing
The Sustainability-Energy Dilemma

It’s the very same with the necessary transition on ground, in Germany, fuel is subsidized now, not forcing consumption to be reduced, but we keep using more and more energy. Which in turn does result in increasing demand for crude oil, not in a reduction.

All “sustainable investors” come up with is “green tech”. Demanding more power, not less. And we produce more plastic every year, even in this crisis and even knowing we hit the 1.5°C target by 2026 most likely, not even by 2030. As we consume more and more crude oil, wind, solar and even nuclear power being a drop on a hot stone. And while there are ideas aplenty out there, I know of too many projects that happen to fail triggering investor interest.

"Our Obsession with technology will slow down the green transition.” [Lubomila Jordanova]In my humble opinion, most “impact investors” are greenwashers. It’s beyond cognitive dissonance when they focus their investments on “green tech” but in turn increase the energy demand instead of focusing on solutions that safe and conserve energy. Yes, I can sing not just a song but an entire opera about “green investors” that either look for max-profit under a green umbrella or they look for the next “tech unicorn”. It’s what I said before. If you want to invest into sustainability, pick your industry. Pick your “brown” company and invest into solutions that change that industry. Or. Look at energy consumers and how you can improve their energy consumption. Or replace them. And yes, any of your investments should target a reduction of energy consumption. Which can be, to provide the same service in demand, but having a clear strategy on your energy source.

Kolibri SDGs7+13 - saving 2 Gigatons CO2 by 2030And we talk about leveling the energy to a sustainable level. Use as much energy as you return. Like Kolibri. Not just launching the airline, but having plans to develop your own sustainable fuel-source. Which can be Synfuel. Which still uses energy and creates CO2, but no more than it takes from the air to create it. A circular solution. Which we assume would trigger the use of SynFuel locally, which works better on a global scale than e-mobility, which has the worse life-cycle impact then. But so far, all “impact investors” we talked to expressed our idea to be very good and worthwhile, but they did not intend to invest themselves. Then they invest into money-graves like Uber or

The Fairy-Tale of Travel Recovery

LaLinea Corona 2023Just like last year (2021), we will have a careless “Corona summer”. We will very likely hit another infectious peak by fall – all the pandemic experts are warning of that, we better start listening. With BA.5 now spreading and aircraft full of mask-free travelers likely much faster. So here I go early this year with the update of LaLinea Corona extending into 2023.

While most our political and industry leaders lead us from the darkness into deception and back into the cold.

aircraft interceptThe war in the Ukraine will impact not just long-haul travel, like the reestablishing of the polar route avoiding Russian air space. And that we can not trust in “neutral air space” we learned when Belarus took down a civil aircraft from transit with the sole reason to jail a political opponent living in exile abroad.

We have rules. But I see too many of them “bent” to commercial or political benefit. Rules the international and aviation communities leave unpunished if broken or bent.

Greenwashing Demon (shutterstock_1170455851)

So my outlook 2022/23 is kind of bleak. Given our own and our leaders ignorance, the pandemic ain’t over, Putin will continue wreaking havoc (not just to the Ukraine) and the planet will continue warming. And the people who could make a change keep focusing on maximum financial ROI, wearing a cheap “green” mask.

#talkthetalk #greenwashing #cognitivedissonance #cheapexcuses #nochangeleadership etc.

Food for Thought
Comments Welcome

Biofuel SynFuel SAF – What is it?

Honored to be sharing my thoughts on sustainable aviation at ASTM, the Association of Swiss Travel Management (the Swiss successors of ACTE.org), at their Earth ’21 sustainability conference (their first, definitely not the last), the main question, not just in the Q&A but also in the following discussions and messages was the issue to understand the difference between BioFuels, SynFuels and Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF).

Greenwashing Demon (shutterstock_1170455851)

There is a lot of greenwashing and intentional abuse by using especially SAF for unsustainable fuels. So let me give you a short definition and help me and all others on the road to sustainable aviation to understand the greenwashing and using the proper wording for the proper thing!

Fuel Blending

At first, we started to blend biofuels into our car fuels. It is what you use in your car, blended as E5 (5%) or E10 (10%) into to fossil fuel. So it is lipstick on pigs, as in reality, it is still 90% or even 95% fossils! And may be very likely the reason, why fossils (and CO2) are still on the rise and growing.

Primary Energy Demand vs. CO2Anything not Zero-fossil such by definition is not “sustainable” in reality. At max it can be a step on the road to sustainability. Mostly an attempt for Greenwashing!

Biofuel

Rapeseed fieldsSo first we had biofuel. Which by definition is from a biological source, like rapeseed. With environmental activists for years complaining that valuable agricultural space (fields) are abused for biofuels instead of human food. And Amazon and other forests are being burned down to plant such seeds.

Biofuels to date comes always blended, engines are not able to operate on unblended biofuels without major modifications! There was another greenwashed development, where Lufthansa in cooperation with DB Schenker operated a 100% Carbon-Neutral cargo flight, offsetting the CO2 from unsustainable fossil fuels. As was openly discussed at and reported from COP26, offsetting is #greenwashing. It’s not in itself “green” but a sale of indulgences.

While we also planned with Biofuel when we developed the Kolibri business and financial plans, we back then already understood that as the only option then available and such the maximum step we could do to fly somewhat sustainable. But then I learned about

SynFuel (my choice)

Synkerosene, Powerkerosen, eKerosene, synfuel, powerfuel efuelJust about three years back, I stumbled across a report about Sunfire.de, developing something they called SynFuel. I still use that word, whereas SynFuel is also called e-Fuel or PowerFuel. I do not like those two “modern” terms. As e-Fuel implies (I believe intentionally) “electric” (e-Mobility), which has nothing to do with it. And PowerFuel implies a higher power efficiency which as as missleading. So I file those namings under attemps for white- and greenwashing.

SynFuel by definition is Synthetic Fuel, refined by CO2 and Hydrogen. The name is program. So I encourage use of SynFuel and not those other names that are rather distractive.

Speaking to Sunfire back then, I triggered their understanding that aviation is a key target market for their SynFuel, which they originally envisioned as a Diesel-replacement. So I speak about SynFuel for the generic addressing of fuels, SynKerosene and SynDiesel for specific replacements.

SynFuel has been proven to be able to operate unblended, at 100%, both for cars, trucks, ships or aircraft. It might be noteworthy that the Hamburg SynFuel pilot facility at Hamburg Airport is said to not have been just opposed, but in fact boycotted by Lufthansa there. For the fear to be pushed towards it’s use, which they are not ready for. Unwilling. A clear sign about their real “sustainability interest”, which is pure greenwashing!

brown blue gray green SynFuelIn my opinion, SynFuel is the main, in fact the only candidate to replace fossil kerosene in aviation. At this time, the production of SynFuel requires quite some energy; 15.3kWh/liter. Energy that taken from the grid, especially in Germany with the worldwide highest grid cost, will make it very expensive. But.

But if you develop green energy sources and use those to refine SynFuel, you have several advantages. The energy cost drops drastically. You replace grid-power, which is not green, no matter what you “buy”. The demand for green grid power by far exceeds the supply today. So that’s just more greenwashing! Only green SynFuel is sustainable and Grid-Energy is not sustainable either!

It’s rather new, which might explain conservative politicians and industry leaders still holding on to the less sustainable e-mobility. Or wishful thinking like liquid hydrogen flying, which will not have any impact by 2030, realistically a lot later than 2050! And a meek excuse by most of our industry leaders to delay investment into real sustainability.

Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) – the Greenwashing Lie

When IATA commits to 2% blending of SAF into fossil fuels by 2030, that “SAF” is used to pretend sustainability. In IATAs definition, that includes both BioFuels, as well as any-colored SynFuel. If they would be honest, their commitment would require to amount for 2% net sustainability. Which in itself remains an embarrassment! Even on cars we have already E5 in most countries as a standard, E10 an option. And aviation commits to E2?

The only real SAF is 100% green SynFuel
meaning the source energy is green!

Even waste-to-liquid is not really SAF, as the waste often is not from sustainable sources. But experts agree so far that it is “circular” and helps to reduce the carbon-footprint. There it is more the waste-producing industry to replace i.e. fossil-based plastics with bio-degradable alternatives. Though I just had some lobbyist trying to convince me (seriously!) that plastic is good for climate…

Further Reading

I addressed this in The Road to Environmentally-Friendly Flying, which I work on to turn into a WhitePaper.

Where my WhitePapers are meant as articles I keep updating occasionally. Different from such posts, which reflect my knowledge, opinion and ideas at time of writing. They are also rather nice in review, seeing my head still being round, but my ideas mostly sound.

This all is

Food for Thought!
And as usual, comments, disagreement, discussion and ideas are welcome!

The e-Mobility Lie

This weekend German ZDF’s planetⓔ released a documentary about the electric car myth subtitled revolution or barrel burst. In addition, there was an emphatic discussion about hydrogen and mobility on LinkedIn, with very noisy advocates for e-Mobility. So I just wanted to summarize from the documentary some findings that are quite in line with my understanding of the Sustainability-Energy Dilemma and the Road to Climate-Friendly Transportation (beyond flying). And why I consider e-Mobility a lie.

Don’t get me wrong. We need e-Mobility. No better solution for a household with  solar panels on the roof, a battery buffer and a range-demand that allows them to rely on the car. But.

Issue 1: The Batteries

Batterie Raw Materials

National Geographic - Lithium MiningAs you may remember, I keep referring to this article by National Geographic on the devastating cost of Lithium Mining. Lithium being to date the most important component for batteries. And the replacements ain’t any better! In addition, they need some rare minerals, the prices of which are exploding. Guess the “impact” if we replace not just some 100 thousands but millions of cars by electric. We talk about 56 million cars having been produced in 2019 world-wide.

Experts already worriedly question the viability of battery-powered cars and the overly optimistic believe that the battery prices will continue to fall. China is reported to secure world-wide Lithium deposits, European car makers demanding governments to do the same! It just got to public attention recently on the U.S.’s retreat from Afghanistan (source-sample).

Safety

Tesla on FireAnother issue that slowly reaches the public is the issue of batteries catching fire. First major reports were on the Samsung Galaxy 7 catching fire, forcing i.e. an entire airplane evacuation. But searching the Internet, you find also more recent reports aplenty. Also the Boeing 787 experienced a problem with it’s battery catching fire (fortunately on the ground). Attributed by experts to the attempts to miniaturize and push up the battery capacity beyond their “safe margins”. The scientific term used to distract the public attention is Thermal Runaway

Electric Car Fire - CoolingWorse, recently despite their relative low numbers, electric cars are increasingly reported to catch fire. Some at first loading at a standard, approved home loading facility, others while driving. Different from gasoline, a thermal runaway and the resulting battery explosions cause a much higher real danger to the cars passengers. And it does not help to distinguish the fire, but such car must be placed into a water tank for several days to cool down the batteries. And after a fire, such cars usually are beyond any recycling. The picture just one example of the many that can be found on the Internet.

Recycling

eMobility Battery RecyclingIncorrect disposal of Li-ion batteries can have a devastating environmental impact on the environment, sparking the need for recycling (Source). But as the ZDF-report also questions, there is virtually no recycling yet and the recycling comes with a bunch of issues. Like non-standardized components and liability issues, that currently result in a very limited recycling. As mentioned in safety, those liability issues are expected to be quite an issue for anyone attempting recycling. And the missing standards resulting even in different battery packs within the model family of the car makers. Making it even harder to recycle them!

Issue 2: The Energy Consumption

Loading Infrastructure

Full eMobility Loading Stations
Oops. Sorry, all loading stations in use

Again, now today we have the loading stations for electric cars and they are not enough. With the family in “Car City” Braunschweig (Volkswagen), at our owned apartment, there neither are possibilities to load the cars, nor even nearby. Publicly accessible loading stations are usually for 1-2 cars. But what if all cars are electric. You simply got to be kidding, right?

I have personal reports from friends frustrated about their electric car about unavailable loading stations and long waiting times, but there are also many on the web, like this one. Now let’s imagine a parking house that must be equipped with electric vehicle charging stations for all cars? Then imagine, one of those cars catches fire from a thermal runaway…

And here we talk about an industry country like Germany. Now think about less privileged countries…?

Range and Refuel

The three biggest fears of our generationGerman Automotive Club ADAC just recently reported the average range of electric cars being about 350 km (220 miles), up from 250 km (150 miles) five years ago. Thinking about my role as an airline sales manager some years ago, for a road trip, I traveled frequently more than 500 km a day. Then I shall load the car after a half day, sitting around while waiting? Keep in mind, that corporate fleets and rental cars are the main buyers of new cars! And they don’t buy them because they park them most of the time…?

As mentioned before, then we talk about the loading infrastructure i.e. on highway truck stops. Just been stopping at one on one of the busiest German highways. With 8 lanes and 16 loading columns for fossil fuel, and two for electric cars. With two more already waiting in line.

It goes very much in line with the 3 biggest fears of our generation and the Sustainability-Energy Dilemma… Just in case you’re wondering why people still buy (and rent) mostly gasoline-powered cars.

Power Consumption

Power from the Plug GreenwashingThe new Volkswagen ID.4 uses 22.8 kWh per 100 km (Source ADAC). Considering a “typical” average range for a car of 10-15,000 km, we talk about 300 MWh/a. Given 48.2 million cars registered in Germany (German source), we would need about 15 Petawatthours (15,000 TWh/a) one year alone. Any green energy source for that? Germany used 545 TWh/a in 2020… In 2020, about 252 TWh/a were produced from “alternative sources” (aka. green). That would be enough for the power requirement for about 850,000  electric cars…? Reminder, there are 48 million cars roaming German streets.

And sure, all that power comes from the Jack. And sure, it’s all green? Just like German Rail.

The CO2-Saving Lie

Volkswagen ID.3 Life Cycle AssesmentLooking at Volkswagen’s own Life-Cycle Assessment, planetⓔ just compared the CO2 on a single car. And how they used a European basis to lower their CO2 impact, instead of using the German statistics, where the impact is worse than on a normal Diesel. So planetⓔ also understand that in order to reduce CO2 is an energy-challenge, we must reduce the energy consumption, all else is blissful ignorance, cognitive dissonance or simply an outright lie!

The e-Mobility Lie

Change Resistance (shutterstock_210479080 licensed)Like I found on the research for the Sustainability-Energy Dilemma, we must look at the complete picture. Taking a look at some 50 million cars, which is excluding trucks, at 30 tons CO2 on a 15 year life cycle we talk about 2 tons a year per car. Or 100 million tons of CO2 just in Germany. Make your own maths on Europe or the World.

So to make electric cars “sustainable”, green energy is needed. Which takes us back to the Sustainability-Energy Dilemma. And it confirms my opinion that while we must turn aviation climate friendly and start n.o.w.! There are a lot of other areas that all boil back to the Sustainability-Energy Dilemma. Good ideas mentioned by planetⓔ at the end of the report were needs to rethink transportation. The need to reduce the number of cars. Car sharing, better public mass transport systems, etc., etc. And to develop integrated transportation that works for both, the major cities everyone uses as the role model, but also the rural regions.

The Necessity for a Holistic View

outside-inAs I mentioned in my post about Flygskam, we have a very … strange? … view on aviation. As on sustainability. And I hope that journalists like planetⓔ, real impact investors and family office principals interested in real impact start more questioning those views. Stop “airline bashing” as addressed in Flygskam, stop worshipping the golden calf of e-Mobility and understand that we don’t have the luxury to do this or that, but that we need this and that!

Ready Player OneReady Player One? I love SciFi. There’s a lot really good ideas how we could merge individual transportation needs with “public” transportation. But that’s SciFi. We need to take the best ideas and evolve our transportation to sustainable ways in the real world. We must reduce energy. Integrate transport modes. Why does it remind me of the question why the big train stations are not at the airports? The “new” Berlin Airport being a perfectly bad example on this!

Greenwashing Demon (shutterstock_1170455851)
The Greeenwashing-Demon – it’s all about Electricity

But if we don’t solve the Sustainability-Energy Dilemma, if we don’t focus on ways to reduce energy, it’s all lip-services and greenwashing! And if you know investors who are interested to address this on an industrial scale and make real impact while making profit, I have a lot of ideas. Including profitable plans for myself and my industry, turning aviation environmentally friendly. But that’s only my part of the big picture. Though it covers already many complementary ideas we want to realize in other areas.

Food for Thought!
Comments welcome…

Sustainability and Time vs. ESG + Greenwashing

Today, two articles triggered with me, quite in line with my experience about ESG greenwashing and priorities and my impression that thinking about sustainability and the busted Paris agreement! There is no “Planet B”!

What the Others Say

The Tasks at the End of the Road
© Lucas Varela/Financial Times

The first article a LinkedIn-post by Satish Bapat referred to. A Financial Times article (FT*) by Oliver Burkeman considers how we burn up our time, how emptying the e-Mail inbox naturally refills it (from our responses), etc., etc. But how little time we truly have.

The second one was referred to in response to a LinkedIn-post by Harald Walkate on another article from FT Moral Money about the mislabeling of ESG. To which Alan Hayes commented with a link to a Bloomberg Article* about the U.S. SEC challenges companies for abuse of #greenwashing.

That triggered with a discussion at the recent GITA Unconference by Abdelrahman (Abdo) Wahba about the management of all the Marketing Bullshit (BS) we are confronted with (YouTube link). Which includes unfortunately more massive #greenwashing.

GITA Unconference

At the Unconference of the Green Impact Tech Alliance, I spoke about the Bumps on the Road to Sustainabilityspeaker notes, Youtube link and Channel). Summarizing my thoughts about why all those claims for carbon-neutral and energy-transition are bland lies and far from real. More in line with “wag the dog”, distracting from the real problem. An issue just in line with Abdo’s message that most of what we hear is “shit, packed in chocolate cake” and we should believe only half of what we see, half of what we hear. And apply a reality check before we believe all the BS.

If you are into sustainability (beyond aviation) and ESG, I strongly recommend you have a look! And yes, I’d much like to discuss it.

Assuming you know my page addressing The Sustainability-Energy Dilemma, it all boils down to Energy consumption. But while we need to make smarter energy use and reduce the overall energy consumption, this is a challenge I don’t yet see addressed at all. “Digital” will solve the climate challenge? Adding more and more data centers that account already for more than half the electricity in the Frankfurt region will solve the climate challenge? How??

IPCC: We Busted 1.5°, 2° will be Busted 2025

EU climate plansSo IPCC leaked that we busted our fancy climate goals already. As I do not believe that there will be enough change by 2025, looking at the crap our politicians, the industry and impact investors make us believe. Or as I also heard last week: We must stop talk-the-talk and start to walk-the walk!

It goes in line with my images in Bumps on the Road to Sustainability about the fancy idea to place big turbine generators into the Gulf Stream on the coast of Carolina (USA), with reports questioning if the Gulf Stream, so vital for European climate, will make it to Europe by the end of this century. Anyone remembers The Day after Tomorrow? I’m not as much worried about New York under an ice shelf, but what about Northern Europe?

ESG … Believe the Numbers …?

I think this time we got the numbers right ... we just don't know which ones to use.

Countless how often I have heard impact investors disqualifying the ESG goals as 99% #greenwashing. Attempting to establish Kolibri with the commitment to drive true carbon-neutral flying, we sure have all the other SDGs in mind too (there are 17). With mostly quantifiable targets. And beyond (Human Rights as they go beyond SDGs).

But this brings me to those articles about ESGs and green funds and pension funds turning green but investing still large scale in BlackRock (who also has funds for fossils and weapons industry). And to Abdelrahman (Abdo) Wahba’s discussion at GITA I referred to above:

Question The Numbers!

Most of them are just marketing.

Industrial Change

Power from the Plug GreenwashingWhile we see a lot of small investments into “green tech”, most of those don’t qualify for “sustainable investment”, neither “impact investment”. As they add to the energy consumption without much of a plan aside using carbon credits from the real green ones that struggle as they are not on the investor’s radar.

None of the investors – and I’ll be happy to be proven wrong – invests into real climate change and sustainability. The pick the easy-to-achieve raisins. Sustainable needs a holistic view. No raisin picking. Any investment, any business plan not having a document about how they want to address all SDGs, plus diversity, ethnicity, human rights, is #greenwashing.

Go Carbon-Neutral This DecadeTalk- the-Talk or Walk-the-Walk?

Given the example I daily work with: Kolibri. To achieve our goal of carbon-neutral flying, the technology is there. No, it doesn’t need new inventions. Just application of what we have. But the technology is one thing, the energy-conversion from fossil fuels to SynFuel is the real challenge. One we believe can be achieved in 10 years. If we walk-the-walk!

But wait a minute. While I am very sure, this is real impact investing, I was just told by an investor that such long-term does not qualify for ESG! ESG would not be about such future commitments, they require hard goals. Though burning green Synfuel instead more than a billion liters of fossil kerosene in 10 years ain’t a hard goal? Not according to their ESG-#greenwashing-tool…

Long-Term Planning: 2050 and beyond

What about the cargo fleets on the oceans, rivers, in the air and on the road? If ESG doesn’t have a way to set targets and adjust to plans, what is it really good for? Are “data centers” and “digital” part of the solution? Or more part of the problem? Don’t get me wrong, there are good IT projects that will make impact. But most are just more #greenwashing.

IPCC says we busted 1.5°C, also known as the Paris Agreement. We are to bust 2.0°C by 2025. And while aviation accounts for only a fraction of global warming, to change it seems to ambitious for impact investors. And politicians. Better to invest small and manageable and blend out the reality: #cognitivedissonance. Or outright lie.

Norsk e-Fuel a nice example disqualifying the EU’s talks.

Walk-the-Walk or Talk-the-Talk?

Food for Thought!
Comments welcome…

 

Foot Note:
* As FT and Blomberg often requires a subscription to view articles, I have a saved copy of the article on file for friends.

So What Is YOUR Impact?

Discussing about the individual impact we make, the topic gains interest. What is your own, personal net-impact to our planet? So I decided to summarize some of the posts and comments I had on the topic on LinkedIn.

In line with previous posts about #lipservices, #cognitivedissonance and #wishfulthinking. And a #realitycheck for others, claiming “sustainability” that they do not deliver upon.

Self-Esteem over Sustainability

Bezos Musk Gates (c) CNBCA clear article on it was today’s post by SEDO-founder Tim Schumacher Search: “People should only be classed as billionaires when they remove a billion tons of CO2 from the atmosphere.” referring to the CNBC article questioning the sustainability investments of Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Elon Musk (Tesla, SpaceX) and Bill Gates (Microsoft founder).

In my comment, I emphasized that we need no ESG, but #sustainabilityaccounting. And much of what I see from these and other investors is showing their response to their conscience, focusing their activities on things they understand, but also things that have an impact to their self-esteem. And there was also this Open Letter to Bill Gates, reflecting on his #cognitivedissonance or #lipservices. I believe it’s simply cognitive dissonance. Keep in mind, these people also live in their social (media) bubble.

Role Models

Image Daily MailYesterday, there was a report about industry leader/face James Hogan, former CEO of Etihad, caught in the act, trying to circumvent the Corona rules in place. It underlined my post two weeks ago, that we have airlines skipping pre-flight corona-testing regime. A disservice to an industry trying very hard to make flying safe! I’m sure he regrets that idea now, not having considered the repercussions of being caught.

#cognitivedissonance: While flying itself may be safe, passengers aren’t! Anyone claiming flying to be “safe” shall better keep in mind that the virus spreads and new variants keep spreading by travelers. Also and a lot pre-tested passengers are infected but not yet positive, they then spread the virus in their destination.

#weareallinthistogether and the only safety I see in the vaccinations. And this ain’t the new measles I compared to early in the pandemic (May ’20), but more like the flu. A vaccination not available to everyone (yet). About which U.N. Secretary General António Guterres warns of #vaccinationalism. Also claiming the climate emergency. A caller in the dark?

The European Sustainability Bank

Then, let me talk about the decision makers at European Investment Bank (EIB). Claiming to be the European Sustainability Bank. In a conference by Geneva Macro Labs, I asked their head of climate office Elina Kamenitzer on her claim that they do green investments: Are there any success stories that proof the impact, the “impact” targets achieved ever since? Well, no. They “have to look into that now.” It’s about time.

Others are faster, but we have a PLANI also reached out to my now ex-point of contact in EIB, about a co-investment into our impact plans. With (a cheap) reference to their Roadmap and the decision there to not finance conventionally fueled aircraft (page 102), he disqualified any investments into aviation. In utter ignorance of what I believe he understood (I did remind him), that we have plans that are not aircraft-funding related. But i.e. development into a synfuel-ecosphere. Our plans cover all of the 17 SDGs, mostly with quantifiable targets that we sure plan to exceed on. If you’re convinced to do the right thing, that comes as a natural.

But that ain’t what the bureaucrats at EIB look at, is it?

So back to the article topic:

What is Your Impact?

Impact InvestingThere is a petition against greenwashing on Change.org I urge you to sign! Discussing on that one, we had several discussions on how to define greenwashing. Whereas family office principals told me ESG would be the role model for greenwashing. A good idea, meanwhile abused. There may be some investors who understand the meaning of it. But not many.

It is the same about claims to be “sustainable”. Another family office principal told me, that out of the 2020 impact investments, only 4% were having clear impact to improve on SDGs. 96% were disqualified as they just claimed without goals and targets but simple claims misreading the causes. Nice if you plan SDG5 Gender Equality on your hiring process, but without clear targets on how to improve. Or if you abuse SDG9 Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure for your “innovative IT project”.

Only Net Impact is Real Impact

We came to the conclusion that real impact is about net impact. And that “impact” is about reduction of the strain we put on the planet. To reduce power consumption by 10% but planning to increase the total power needs by 30% is intentional abuse of the sustainability claim.

There are many good examples out there, beyond what we plan at Kolibri. But we speak a lot with investors that want to cash-in on us before we launched. And investors, investing little money into small projects, more like a philanthropy, but an impact investment. Paying for a clean conscience, paying for their other daily sins. I just told one of the family office principals. We are looking not for those classic investors. We are targeting the family office space, as there are more investors than elsewhere wo take sustainability to heart. Who focus on it. Who are understanding that an impact investment might not be as profitable as i.e. Bitcoin. But it’s the right thing to do. And

Impact Investment ain’t philanthropy. Do good and make money!

So this time, not just Food for Thought, but a clear question:

What is Your Impact?

Feedback welcome…

And the #Greenwashing Continues

While we have sound plans to establish a profitable airline, planning to operate carbon-neutral, #greenwashing and lip-services dominate responses we get from “impact” investors, why our model cannot be supported. And the same what is heard and seen from politicians and public funds.

Now the last weeks, the “green strategy” is a big issue in the media. European Investment Bank claiming to be be the “Sustainability Bank”. The Mission Hydrogen 24 hour workshop. The reality check on to German Rail’s sustainability. Or the facts about the “global recycling champion” Germany. So let me summarize these reports. And call for any serious investors interested to make a true impact, to talk to us and learn the big impact we want to make. While establishing a profitable, future-focused airline.

German Rail & 100% Sustainable Power?

The Myth about Green German RailDon’t get me wrong, this ain’t new. There have been reports about this ever since they started their fake promotion about 100% sustainable power. But just this week, German Television did a reality check, with rather devastating results!

Just 61% of German Rail’s power comes from renewable energy. 28% come from coal and natural gas, where German Rail partly owns the latest built coal power plant, built against all public opposition. German Rail has long-year delivery contracts for atomic power. And only 33 out of 5,679 railway stations are powered from renewable energies, 0.5 % … And by 2038 (17 years from now) German Rail wants to increase the use of sustainable power to only 80%, targeting 100% only for 2050.

That excludes non-rail business, like Schenker logistics, clearly focusing on Dieseltrucks. Where container transport by rail is more than six times more ecofriendly than trucks. But having demolished most of the industrial accesses, parallel tracks and being delayed on major infrastructure projects like the European North-South rail axis, now backfires and cannot be remedied quickly.

ECB & EIB – the Sustainability Banks?

While we talk with impact investors, we do also understand the European Central and the European Investment Bank claiming to be “Sustainability Banks”. Talking with the very same investors being “naturally” and clearly interested in sustainable projects, we asked why they would not make use of those funds to complement an investment into Kolibri or other impact investments.

The feedback I get is painfully clear. They do not work with the EIB (or other government fund programs) for the bureaucratic process required to be “approved” as an investor. I have multiple statements that attempts to support the investment failed. Assumption being voiced that those funds again go to the big players and into unqualified “green projects” that are mostly about #greenwashing. That includes a claim that EIB funds new aircraft for the dinosaurs – without any requirement(s) for those aircraft or the airline to develop a strategy to reduce their carbon footprint.

I also reached out to one of the experts in my network, working closely with those banks and doing studies on their sustainability, asking why venture capital or family offices don’t work closer with such government funds: “But what you report from your interactions with public investors is true even for smaller and less ambitious projects and companies in that public VC funds invest only if the concept is validated by the market in one way or the other. In other words, only if someone else confirmed the commercial success elsewhere.

Germany – the Global Recycling Champion?

Reality is, that Germany is the global champion in export of plastic trash. Instead of a strict recycling regime, 80% of the trash collected from the recycling bins is being either exported or burned.

The drop in export results directly from China having stopped and banned the import of plastic trash. So now, the pictures of plastic from African countries dominate the respective stories about German “recycling”.

At the same time, the plastics industry is booming. And instead of developing sustainable packaging, the trend is clearly towards mixed-use, the known bad example being “Tetra Pak®“; a packaging made of several layers that make it exceptionally difficult to recycle. And the few recycling factories being more for greenwashing than for recycling any meaningful amounts of that stuff.

There was also a report on TV this week on Coca Cola and how they changed from the recycling glass bottles to throw-away plastic bottles and Aluminum cans. Which was the beginning of the end of bottle recycling. And how their lobbyists ever since fight any recycling requirements…

Aviation – the Scapegoat?

ContrailNow, how about “my industry”, how about aviation? And why is it constantly the scapegoat and blamed for global warming?

When the aviation industry claims that it’s only responsible for 2% of the CO2-emissions, this is also green-washing. As aircraft engines exhaust contains also other “greenhouse emissions” and many if not most not on ground level, but at high altitude. The “contrails” being a visual reflection that people “know” and can identify. Experts in a report about Airbus this week accounted the greenhouse emissions by aviation to 6%. Not much, but only 4% of the world population flies. And 6% is substantial.

So aside our plans to use Kolibri.aero to establish the infrastructure and certify the use of 100% synkerosene to fly carbon-neutral, we also understand the issue of the aircraft-engine exhaust will require further research into greenhouse-effects of the remaining exhaust. But which only can start, once we start flying “carbon-neutral”! And yesterday, I was challenged twice about synfuel and that we’d need to look at use of battery, hydrogen and fuel cells. Referring to a very academic presentation by Prof. Dr.-Ing. Josef Kallo of the German Aerospace Agency (DLR) about How to fly with Hydrogen, addressing fuel cells at the European Hydrogen Workshop by Mission Hydrogen GmbH (Ltd.).

See my recent blog about The Road to Environmentally Friendly Flying

Electric, Fuel Cells and other Aviation #greenwashing

Cheop's Principle: Nothing is ever finished on time and/or on budgetSpeaking with one of those “challengers”, he argued that in 10 years the first regional aircraft will fly on fuel-cells. Being “project planning”, I’d say better add 50% reserve to that, then we talk about 15 years. And personally I still doubt that time line. And then we will have aircraft with 10, 20 or maybe 30 seats. With a range of one to two hours. When we will have aircraft that transports 100 seat? Or ones that can replace the 150-250 seats used by the low cost airlines? When do we expect aircraft to transport 250-350 passengers long haul? Hiding behind “Research”? Science Fiction…

The argument given was that batteries and fuel cells will become more effective. Which I file under “cognitive dissonance“. What excess in miniaturization results in, we all experienced with the B787 batteries self-enflaming. Or the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 “fiasco”. Trying to mend the rules of physics is a true challenge. And that does not even cover the devastating ecological footprint not only of Lithium. If you want to wait for that to be resolved, we talk about “dirty” kerosene still in use in 20, 30 years!

And if that happens, our industry is worth being used as a scapegoat…

Change Happens – NOW!

Salzgitter AG ElektrolyzerSustainable economy and global warming are big issues today, but most that we see is lip services. An investor group just recently checked impact investments for the “real” impact. They reported about 4% of all investments having a quantifiable impact or quantifiable targets. Only 4%. All others to be #greenwashing. On the “impact programs” of the 100 largest companies in Europe they found not a single one having more than one or two percent impact to global warming. Most of them being “lighthouse projects” that are being developed inside a “bubble” that does not immediately impact the company. Mostly lip-services addressing already established programs, but don’t really change the existing processes.

One example mentioned being the Electrolyzer delivered to Salzgitter AG for delivering hydrogen to be used in their steel-making process. A “research project”, largely funded by the hydrogen program. And now, being still in research phase, trialing it’s impact, it’s a “lighthouse project”?

The Fight against #Greenwashing + Lip-Services

We choose to fly Carbon-Neutral in this decade
We choose to fly Carbon-Neutral in this decade

And today I was confronted again with “avoid flying” as the first and foremost advise to stop global warming. While people will fly, economy needs flight connections as well. What we need is to stop blaming aviation, but start changing it. And the governments and public funds won’t help, so we need bold investors with a mission to help establishing the environment that allows us to work together on the common goal. Clean flying. Flying without remorse. Flying with a conscious mind.

We choose to fly Carbon-Neutral in this decade. And do the other things. Not because they are fashionable and easy, but because they must be done. But we can’t do it alone, we need investors that are interested in more than greenwashing their conscience, but the ones supporting the real thing. Investors that understand this is a big deal, it’s disruptive, it’s a journey. A journey that needs conviction, founders with the commitment and vision to make it happen…

Food for Thought
Investors welcome!

 

Clean Aviation Whitewashing and the Real Deal

The Future of Clean Aviation is Now

I’ve started to write this as a part of my post on Impact Investing vs. Whitewashing, but I decided to take this into it’s own article and only summarize and refer to it. This article addresses the known ideas about clean flying and why I believe there is a lot of whitewashing and intentional delaying. But if you want to go carbon-neutral for a start, the technology is there. Even with the bureaucratic hurdles, we can start flying carbon-neutral within a matter of three to five years. The challenge is the speed we can secure the funding to build the necessary facilities.

Investors interested to turn aviation carbon-neutral, here is our reasoning which technology you should look at. And why helping us making this happen will be disruptive. Not because noone else could do it, but because to succeed you need the right people who want to do it, not the ones considering it disrupting their plans…

Electric Flying

Zunum 50 seat electric plane“But how about electric flying?” you might ask? Yes, how about it? In December 2013, a battery on a Boeing 787 Dreamliner caught fire. It was later attributed to a “design flaw”. Yes, Boeing had quite some trouble even before the MAX-disaster.
In 2016, the Samsung Galaxy S7 batteries happened to explode. It was found that a manufacturing defect in the phones’ batteries had caused some of them to generate excessive heat, resulting in fires and explosions. And as much as they research possibilities, there are no ideas yet how you can “minimize” batteries (size and weight) further without risking them overheating. But given existing battery size and weight, the battery will only allow for very short flights with relatively few passengers. Commercial flying over two, three hours? You got to be kidding…

I find Zunum’s story (their jet pictured here) quite interesting. From Wikipedia: “In November 2020, Zunum Aero filed a lawsuit against Boeing alleging that Boeing tried “to gain access to proprietary information, intellectual property” and then used its dominance “to delay and then foreclose” Zunum’s operation, “in order to maintain its dominant position in commercial aviation by stifling competition”, using this proprietary information “to provide a hybrid-electric propulsion system for a different aircraft design” with Safran. Zunum said that Boeing tried to poach Zunum’s engineers.”

Electric Flight is a nice idea, but without a breakthrough in batteries, in my opinion it’ll be too inflexible a niche market and in best case need 10-20 years of active development to come up with a sizeable aircraft for mass transportation. And then there is the devastating ecological footprint of the mining of the needed Lithium, Nickel, “rare earths”, that experts expect to become a likely killer issue for Tesla – now thinking about battery-powered flying?

Hydrogen

Hydrogen powered Wing in GroundMany of you remember that back in 2008 I worked with investors and potential climate-sensitive customer we worked on a hydrogen-powered WIG (wing in ground). Combining the then existing research platform SeaFalcon with a common hydrogen-engine and refining hydrogen from solar power. Back in the days, we got a viability study funded to work out the business case based on Maldivian Air Taxi. Very successful business case in fact. Then came Lehman and we never further followed up on it, something I regret to date. Back 2009/10, we could have proved the business case for carbon-free flying.

Airbus Zero EmissionBut I also learned the downsides of Hydrogen, disabling it for large aircraft. Say what? Didn’t Airbus not just promote their vision of hydrogen-powered planes? Just the required cooling and/or pressure tanks for any sizeable aircraft sure is a challenge.

On the picture I found it interesting to see the focus on small aircraft and how much of that they already assume to be used for the hydrogen-tanks… Given Corona, I doubt they will give this the focus to keep the development timeline at 2030 (ten years). And I believe this is just another case like Boeing on e-flight, a means to proof failure to justify continuation of “dirty flying”. I doubt their managements real interest in clean flying!

Synkerosene, Powerkerosen, eKerosene, synfuel, powerfuel efuelSynkerosene – Hydrogen reloaded

Since I learned about Synfuel in early 2019, I understood that quickly as true impact, a disruptive technology. Given it’s “circular” nature, it will not provide “clean flying as quickly. But carbon-neutral flying and substantially less side products in the exhaust. Then I was surprised recently that Sunfire had secured a joint venture as Norsk e-Fuel, building an “industrial-sized facility” in Oslo. Okay, their annual output I learned is rather small, only 25% of what we assume as need for an all-synkerosene fleet at our bases, enough for seven regional aircraft.

But yes, we believe that given Synkerosene can transform all existing fleets in a matter of years. Starting with Synfuel for company cars, energy generators beyond emergency, but also as a buffer for the solar power needed for a 24/7 operation will require a large sized facility at our headquarters. Developing the plans and securing the funding for the large-sized facilities needed at the bases, we expect first bases to be 100% carbon neutral realistically within three to five years. But only, if we get it started. If we overcome lip-services, white- and greenwashing but join forces with investors interested doing the real deal.

Now back to the investor who told us this week that we’d not be innovative enough. I don’t care to be innovative. I want to use innovation available to make a change. A real one.

Challenge: Three years to the first carbon-free base. Ten years for all bases to be carbon-free. And looking at 10 years, this will be profitable development! Real IMPACT INVESTING.

The Truth About ZERO-Emission

ContrailSynkerosene is not emission-free. But even Airbus “Zero-Emission” is a lie! Sure there will be emissions, though using hydrogen, it will mostly by H2O, simple water.

Synkerosene is refined from hydrogen and carbondioxide (CO2 + H2). The chemical components of the engine exhaust must be researched and we expect a journey to further optimize the exhaust. Amateurish ideas are a catalyzer. I was also introduced to a team working on a contrail-free engine. If I understood that right, they use ammonia (NH3), but how that then impacts the high altitude atmosphere?

Yes, there are questions that will demand answering. But Synfuel is an answer available now. And it is definitely much better than the crude-oil product. Not only for aviation, but also for all those used cars with combustion engines around the world! And be real, the number of e-powered cars is rather limited, both e- and hydrogen-powered cars are quite a bit more expensive if you don’t build your own infrastructure.

Aviation Beware?

Ryanair precarious staff salariesThere is a very strong force of inertia in aviation about turning “green”. Like other problems in aviation management, such as their disbelieve in branding, the resulting focus on “cheap” as the sole difference and a missing loyalty for partners and employees alike. that, plus missing USPs made airlines a running gag about ROI. But as in all other industries, you cannot expect change and disruptions with blind managers. You need vision.

A real impact investment, with managers that breath “impact” and commit themselves “naturally” to the U.N. SDGs will be countering the greed-driven likes of Ryanair or others, saving on the backs of their employees, their customers, the airports and regions they serve to maximize their evil impact. And their profits. Especially their senior managers’ profits. Everyone complains about Ryanair, then why do people fly them? Why do airports and regions fund their “semi-legal” (illegal) subsidy schemes? Why does no-one divest to stand up to them? Why don’t they name and shame them? Why still investing in them?

Or look at Lufthansa, securing for the group more than 10 billion bailout, grounding Germanwings as they’re too expensive, firing their staff aplenty, grounding airplanes. The bailouts multiple their worth before the crisis, what is left of the formerly proud crane? And guess, one day they have to repay all those debts. At least they use those with professional care. Will they invest into anything “sustainable”? Their government did not bother to require something like that. And accusing the pandemic, I was told they oppose the development of the Synkerosene-pilot in Hamburg. That being likely the reason the German-lead Joint-Venture to develop a first industrial-sized facility chose Oslo instead…?

But yes, at KOLIBRI.aero we have the understanding of the necessity to make an impact. To disrupt aviation to force them to become “green” and sustainable. And keep in mind that for decades, aviation was a growth market. And will be. The demand is there.

Impact Investment or Whitewashing – What is it?

I do believe that we will find family offices and may even trigger the interest of some of the institutional investors. Maybe even EU monetary bodies might understand the impact we can make. And different from existing players, we neither have Corona debts, nor do we have “hidden agendas” or different plans. We want to do this. Do you?

And if you’re no (real) impact investor reading this, but one of my many friends and followers, please share this.

Food for Thought
Comments welcome!

Impact Investing vs. Whitewashing

Impact Investing

I am very, very happy that I started speaking to Family Offices and regret that the Pandemic forced a reschedule of one event and kept me from attending another this week. But I am grateful to be allowed attending the first Family Office virtual conferences. It’s a rather steep learning curve. I am grateful for any event reference or invitation that I got and hopefully will still get.

European Climate Goals

Given today’s jabbering by the EU Commission (Mme. von der Leyen) that they – wow – will reduce the CO2 to 55% of the 1990-level … Oh wow? Shall I be impressed? Or cry? EU parliament would have been okay with 60% the news say. But even as is, this “deal” is full of small-print and not really worth the paper it’s written on.

We must be better to make an impact. And we better stop lip-services, white- and greenwashing but address the issues we can address today. Or this expert saying we’re way too late is right.

Though this is totally in line with my initial experience about “impact investing”. Lots of talk and lip services, with little substance too. Hard to find the ones that believe that this is something real.

And what industry is more in desperate need for a sustainability makeover. And having the chance for it?

Aviation Impact Investment
… a Barrel Burst?

Zunum 50 seat electric planeWhile we have clear plans to become Carbon-Neutral in realistically in three to five years, you got to start. And an “impact investor” told me this week that we are too little innovative. Really?

The EU plans give airlines 15 more years to fly dirty. Yes, that is a barrel burst! You got to be kidding me. But sure, it’s completely in line with German and European aviation lobbying, managed well by Lufthansa, Ryanair and the likes. Lufthansa, the airline with the single-largest bailout package in Europe but with virtually no ties attached, especially none about job saving or evolution into turning “green” and flying clean(er). And in Hamburg I heard the synkerosene pilot suffered from disinterest by Lufthansa, aside of a single carbon-neutral flight by Lufthansa Cargo. A nice example of greenwashing!

I’ve summarized the possibilities to turn aviation carbon-neutral for a start (and what comes then) into another article Clean Aviation Whitewashing and the Real Deal, which I publish simultaneously with this article. But the Future of Clean Aviation is Now. It just needs someone with a real interest to start the process. No talking, no lip-services, no whitewashing, but the real deal! With a real ROI.

Impact Investment in IT & AI … What Impact?

AI Impact InvestingThere is a lot of buzz ongoing about Impact Investment in IT and AI. Whereas I just wrote about Big Data & AI, feedback from family offices principals recently confirm my assumption. Of one emphasizing that ESG “tools” are usually a means to white- and greenwash family offices’ IT investments. And as I posted that on LinkedIn, got a lot of feedback from other family office principals that IT hardly makes a real impact by itself. It’s simply a profit-focused investment, mostly just improving existing processes or digitalizing them.

There also was a discussion this week about “decision making AI” or “decision support IT”. From my aviation background, I see IT as an important support tool. One that improves productivity, but more important safety. I do not see an IA-tool taking more than a supportive role at the time being. But I see a lot of claims that direction, which I can only consider white- and greenwashing.

It’s a Trust Thing

Use a magnet to find the needle in the haystack
Oops. Didn’t we tell you? We seek the toothpick…

In my opinion, there is no “impact investing” if you don’t find the right managers with a mindset to leave the beaten path and find profitable developments in the industry. For KOLIBRI.aero we don’t just think about carbon-neutral aviation. Or some solar parks. We think beyond! We understand it’s our duty to make an impact. Investing into our people and the regions we serve. To foster gender equality, diversity and to develop a future beyond our own. In turn, KOLIBRI.aero addresses not two or three, but all 17 of the U.N. Sustainability Development Goals.

In the overall plans, there is one issue being in the U.N. SDGs and EU’s TEN-T, regional connectivity at affordable price. Going carbon-neutral is more important on that in our opinion, but there are obstacles that must be overcome, that is a journey. Decently paid, qualified jobs and ongoing, structured training to fight against poverty. Ideas aplenty on how to establish a disruptive airline, that shows how sustainable aviation can be. If you look outside the box. If you embrace “sustainability”, even the notoriously loss-making scapegoat aviation can change.

The Quick and Dirty

If you want to go Fast, go Alone. If you want to go Far, go TogetherOn the other side – and back to the topic of my previous article, Big Data and AI provide quick success stories. So much easier to use those for white- and greenwashing. But real impact investment may not be so sexy, it may take a longer breath. To turn around our world is a journey, no sprint. It’s why even UBS recently confirmed in a webinar that family offices are more likely the ones truly investing into impact. Because they think long-term. About family impact across generations. Not as politicos or banks or “institutional investors” and venture capitalists in quick, maximized returns, happily overlooking the negative impacts for an improved profitability.

… or The Neverending Story

The concept of the Hyperlook has long ago been visualized by Roger Leloup.A German investor this week told me: “There is too little change in what you’re doing.” That investor referred to either air taxi or hyperloop. Whereas I’ve often enough expressed my concerns about air traffic control taking individual mobility into the third dimension and into potential conflict with commercial (and military) aviation. Just thinking about the increasing drone-warnings disrupting airport operations the past year. That is a very long way to go.

The same for hyperloop, which may connect high-density routes, similar to (German) Transrapid in China. Will this be more successful? The concept is around for more than half a century. And I don’t like the pipes over ground, even Roger Leloup planned them underground. I’ve written more than a year ago in the #flygskam Reality Check about it and about the so much smaller footprint an airport has.

… Academic Thinking – Research Forever

Academic ResearchGlobal CO2 emissions dropped by 7%, with 11% in Europe due to Corona. Especially aviation reduced due to the lockdown by 22% global, some regions by 30%. But those are expected to come back quickly (Source).

Now the EU says it turns the European Investment Bank into a Climate Bank. And they will focus on research. Or to give the dinosaurs a facelift. Maybe it makes more sense to look for ideas to apply the research results to the real world? Why is it that German Transrapid only runs in China, European Skype is now U.S. Microsoft, the first industrial Synkerosene-facility is being build in Norway (EU associated)? Examples aplenty. We research but we’re utterly incompetent turning research into practical products.

Others are faster, but we have a PLANPeople should take rail the politicos wrote. Yeah, I can see Merkel spending a day to travel from Berlin to Brussels. An interesting LinkedIn post, and German Tagesschau reports “Strategy falls short of what is possible and necessary”. A carbon-neutral aviation we plan on existing technological solutions for 2025, latest 2027 for Kolibri and by 2030 operating +200 aircraft carbon-neutral.

It’s embarrassing! Why does everyone find reasons not to invest in large-scale change? No, it is not quick, requires industrial site funding, but it’s about real change! Which in turn would apply pressure on the “establishment” to get their butts up and move. Get out of your comfort zone and make a change.

Divesting the Bad, Investing in Sustainability

Scottish Widows For 200 YearsThere are exceptionally good examples recently, like Scottish Widows devesting “bad stocks” in the value of almost half a million Euro. Whoops?

And whoops again. But they work with Black Rock, a company with a very bad reputation, funding most of the dirty stocks in the world. But on the other side, Black Rock may have started their journey to change? Maybe the money divested may be well invested into those change makers?

Corona is a testing time for about everybody. But also an opportunity for new methods and thinking to rise.

Impact Investment for better ROI!

Kolibri - disrupt aviationThough also notable, there is a bad misinterpretation that impact investment would mean low ROI. I think our business concept for Kolibri is looking at very competitive ROI at a residual risk below other investments. But it is so much easier to accuse impact investment to justify one owns look the other direction, right?

Impact Investment ain’t Philanthropy.
Invest into the future and benefit from it!

And as real impact investment gains support and more and more investors look at their investment portfolio and clear out the dirt, suddenly your “max-ROI”-investment in crude oil, guns or other “bad investments” will turn foul on you. Investment into the main investor in “bad business”, namely Black Rock will backfire on your own reputation. So Black Rock will likely recognize the headwinds and start divesting too? Not to be caught in the fray.

Funds, Indices, Shares or what?

Change ResistanceWell, it’s always easy to invest into existing business. Buying in on indices or major shares, you don’t need to understand anything beyond their “performance” and “marketing message”. If they wash well enough, they might appear shining green or white, right?

As if we did not learn the very recent lessons from German Property Group, Wirecard? On a report that week, a Shortseller mentioned that the higher the interests and dividends, the likelier they are on a rush against the wall. So they look at those stocks first. As do greedy investors…

My very personal experience includes working for a company that became one of the “New Market winners” when they entered the stock market. Happened, after a short flash in the pan, they ended up a penny stock.

Grounded Aircraft FleetsThe “typical” aviation investment is aircraft funds. Whereas KPMG valued them at an average 4% return in 2019, look at all those assets now. Liabilities in most cases, because they had and have no USP. And even back in 2019, the big aircraft lessors being well established with the airlines made good returns, but many funds also underperformed or failed completely.

Shareholder value got a very bad reputation, didn’t it? As if all shareholders would believe in Max-ROI? How about some long-term benefits, how about impact, sustainability and a return that is above the inflation rate and what your bank pays? But that is to my experience and observations the normal “manager type” our world suffers from. Maximizing the own short-term remuneration and bonuses, leaving a wreck behind. Back to IT-investments?

… or what?

Another version has a third question: Who wants to lead the change. Whoops, all gone…

Especially thinking about impact investment, we need long-term thinking. Something bank managers, institutional investors and venture capitalists fail to provide. We need people thinking in decades, in generations. We need Family Offices, private investors. And we need company managers, entrepreneurs, founders thinking not in three years at max ROI, but in 10 years and a real ROI, including but beyond monetary. Maybe at a much better ROI than those straw-fire-startups burn up?

What Impact Do You Target?

What’s the “Impact” you want to make? Is Tesla truly the future? Or is it more hydrogen? How about impact on poverty? Why not investing in “developing countries”, poor countries? Giving them the infrastructure and tools to develop themselves. Another German history lesson. While the leading industry nations cannibalized German technology, machines, entire factories, it left a void in it’s wake. A void that was filled with the help of the Marshall Plan leading Germany into the Wirtschaftswunder.

The investments back in those days did not target the surviving companies, but enabled startups. The remains of those funds are known as KfW, Germany’s Bank for Reconstruction.

Impact vs. Whitewashing

My final topic today is to take a look at the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals or U.N. SDGs.

United Nations Sustainable Development Goals

Good Health & Wellbeing = biotech, right? Every biotech something claims to be SDG3, even the pharma-giants o chem-giant BASF.
Or Decent work and economic growth also used a lot for good argument to be “sustainable”. The Real Estate industry talks a lot about their focus on 9 and 11. Those are just the ones I see a lot “abused”. But also tech companies claiming sustainable under 3 ,4, 5 and 10… Be careful if someone tells you they’d be “sustainable” under consideration of the SDGs.

I like the approach of some family offices very much, that they qualify the real impact. Over time, what is the change. Targets, Milestones. And understanding that real change takes real efforts.

Food for Thought
Comments welcome!