Earth Day: Children, Snowball, and the 权力 of People

我认识的大多数人都有 啊哈! 在他们生命中的某个时刻. The moment in which climate stops being an abstract concept, 变成了真实的, 说, 你现在坐的那张桌子.

For me, that moment came when my children started talking about climate change. What they were discussing was their future: the world they would be living in, in 20 years’ time. 这当然不是我想要的世界. The only positive was that as a leader within a large industrial company, 我有能力帮上忙.

鼓励转向铁路

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我在全球最大网赌正规平台工作了20多年. 在那个时候, I’ve spent four years running the group’s 交通 business prior to my current role as 首席战略和可持续发展官.  从我的角度来看，我相信这一点, 我们可以解决气候危机, 这激发了我对工作的投入.

全球最大网赌正规平台 operates in an industry—rail—that has enormous potential to make a difference. The transportation sector today accounts for around a quarter of global CO₂ emissions*, yet the majority of these emissions come from road transport, followed by aviation. 只有大约1%的交通排放来自铁路. This is despite the fact that rail accounts for around 7% of passenger travel and 6% of freight transport.

Persuading businesses and people to choose rail over road, 然后, represents the single biggest opportunity to radically reduce emissions from transportation. We can achieve this modal shift by making trains more comfortable, reliable and efficient. And we can further shift the dial by accelerating the development of technology that helps drastically cut emissions.

在脱碳上付出额外的努力

在全球最大网赌正规平台, we’ve long been engaged in strategic investments in cutting-edge digital and locomotive technologies, 和简化, 生态高效的客运铁路设备解决方案. We aim to lead the way on decarbonization and sustainability, providing the technology our customers will need to achieve their own climate objectives, from biofuel- and hydrogen- powered locomotives to digital solutions that optimize fuel usage and efficiency or friction brakes that reduces small particles emissions.

However, developing technology is not the only challenge. Our internal measurements show that by far the greatest emissions from our products are from our customers’ use (Scope 3 in sustainability speak). That makes finding ways to actively increase our customers’ adoption of new sustainable technologies a priority. Our new climate commitments to be published shortly in our Climate Report reflect this.

我们注重合作——无论是与客户的合作, industry partners or each other—is at the heart of everything we do, 也反映了我的一个深刻信念. Technology only gets you part of the way: meaningful, sustainable change is powered by people.

人的力量和可持续性滚雪球效应

We see this in action every day at 全球最大网赌正规平台 with our own people. 例如, 我们蒙特利尔的团队, Canada site set themselves the challenge of rethinking everything they do in terms of sustainability. 结果是, they have managed to cut their impact across the board through ideas ranging from running shuttle services between plants to fostering biodiversity on site and installing waterless urinals.

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I’ve also seen the snowball effect that comes from inspiring each other. 三年前, our team at our Piossasco site in Italy decided they would collect data and publish their own sustainability report, 展示他们实施的所有举措. 第二年, 另外两个团队也受到了启发，开始做同样的事情, sometimes replicating or bringing new ideas to the table. Today, eight of our sites around the world produce their own report. They have generated many more initiatives than we could have launched centrally—a great example of the snowball effect we are seeing as sustainability actions gain momentum across the business.

这是鼓舞人心的，也是谦卑的. 除了我和其他几个人, no one else at 全球最大网赌正规平台 has this in their job description. Everyone else is contributing to the sustainability cause on top of their existing role. The projects they develop and put into action create bonds between colleagues and it generates a healthy sense of pride and competition. 创造的集体能量是非凡的.

It is for this reason that we decided to launch a new initiative this Earth Day: the 全球最大网赌正规平台可持续发展奖. We are inviting people across our company to submit projects that support one of our three sustainability principles: Innovating with Purpose, 推动负责任的营运, 增强人民和社区的权能. Our aim is to recognize the people working tirelessly across 全球最大网赌正规平台 to improve our impact—and to enable the snowball to grow larger and larger.

为世界的积极变化而行动, we are making 全球最大网赌正规平台 more attractive for individuals who want to work for a company that is making a difference. 那是我的希望，激情, talented individuals who are moved by a cause that is bigger than their individual aspirations will bring their skills and energy to the industry for as many years as I have.

*来源:国际能源机构