GHD: Leveraging technology innovation for sustainable transformation

Brett Roberts from GHD will participate in a panel discussion about how to leverage digital and technology innovation to achieve sustainability goals. Global Business Summit 2022 (23-24 August, Denver). He shares some insights before the event.

EA: Digital technology is a key component in the sustainability transition. The interplay between these two trends: What are your experiences with the most important ways digital technologies influence sustainability plans and net zero journeys of companies?

BR: Digital technology has the potential to significantly accelerate society’s journey towards a more sustainable future. The adoption of digital technologies is generally slower for the sustainability and environmental industry than manufacturing and finance.

Data is at the core of the sustainability transition. Software platforms and digital technologies enable the acceleration of sustainability programs or net-zero programs by automating data collection and management. Dataset integration and the application of digital technology are helping to improve decision-making and accelerate progress towards sustainable outcomes.

When operations data is combined with emissions, water use or waste generation data, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (ML), can be applied to optimize operations to reduce water use, water consumption, and waste generation. Different operating scenarios can all be analyzed using predictive advanced analytics models. This will allow for more informed and sustainable decision making.

EA: And the reverse: In what ways do sustainability and climate imperatives catalyze the adoption, development, or innovation of digital tech where it might otherwise not have happened?

BR: Many companies have established net-zero goals or carbon reduction targets. Now they must put strategies in place to achieve these goals and track their progress. These strategies decarbonization may include any of four approaches: (1) optimizing operations to reduce emissions and (2) CapEx projects to reduce them; (3) selling, disposing of, or decommissioning high-carbon footprint assets; and, (4) acquiring carbon offsets. These strategies, along the initial environmental baseline setting, progress monitoring and reporting, are all key to digital innovation and adoption.

We have developed and continue to develop digital technology together with our clients and partners to improve the evaluation and implementation of these four strategies. Our advanced analytics models allow oil and gas clients to optimize their upstream operations, reducing emissions and flaring. We have automated greenhouse gases (GHG), so that operations and emissions data are used to automatically calculate GHG reports. We created ZEVO, a digital tool which uses a combination service and fleet assessments to evaluate fleet decarbonization options. GHDs Gaia solution tracks the environmental footprint and carbon footprint of our clients for their remediation portfolios.

EA: In what contexts and industry sectors can digital technology have the greatest impact on achieving sustainability goals? What are the drivers?

BR. The largest industries, such as Oil and Gas, have the most to gain from digital technology adoption in the short-term. Digital technologies can be used to accelerate the achievement of sustainability goals in all industries. Oil and Gas are particularly motivated to adopt new technologies at an accelerated rate because of the urgent need to reduce carbon emissions. Digital technologies could be used to improve remote monitoring and detection of methane emissions from satellites and aircraft.

The key driver for digital technology adoption is the need to move quickly, more efficiently, and track progress. It is no longer sufficient to measure progress and adjust strategies for decarbonization that the old method of measuring and reporting GHG emissions annually using “manual” or spreadsheet methods.

EA: In reverse, where do you see the greatest obstacles to using digital technologies to support sustainability and climate goals?

BR: There’s three major interrelated challenges in deploying digital technologies.

(i). Data availability:Many companies don’t have the right data or are not centralized enough to enable efficient and effective implementation of technologies such as AI and ML. For example, data may be scattered across multiple spreadsheets or software systems when trying to optimize operations and reduce emissions. There is often no consistency between assets and facilities.

(ii). Funding availabilityBudgets don’t usually include the cost of these technologies for collecting, centralizing, and cleansing data. This data can then be used to create higher-value solutions. For all digital solutions, an upfront investment is required. It also provides strong ROI in short- to medium-term for increased efficiencies. Even though companies may understand the business case, ROI and cost-benefit ratios, their annual budget cycles may not be sufficient to allow for the necessary investment in centralizing data.

(iii). Transparency in data sharingIt is already difficult for companies to implement digital technologies when they are trying to solve sustainability problems within their financial constraints. Imagine instead that companies and municipalities were willing to share their data with transparency to help them optimize their operations to reduce the environmental impact. If we could share the lessons learned from data transparency, we could significantly reduce costs and accelerate the progress towards sustainability goals of entire industries and countries, as well as individual companies and municipalities.

EA: What impact does a digital transformation have on the cost (or savings) of a sustainability program? And how does this influence a company’s sustainability strategy and digital strategies in your experience?

BR: Typically there are significant efficiency gains as well as cost savings when you kickstart a digital transformation journey, and invest in and implement innovative solutions. Digital technologies are not only efficient, but also provide secondary benefits and empowered sustainable outcomes.

An ESG software platform can help you track and report efficiencies. It will also create new and better business practices and behaviors throughout your organization. This will result in additional savings and better outcomes for the company.

Take GHD NavigatorFor example, Our integrated software solution can manage, automate, and streamline key aspects of waste tracking activities, and can be used for tracking progress towards waste reduction goals. This platform can lead to more sustainable practices in reusing and recycling resources and reducing waste disposal. This will result in cost savings throughout your organization. Cost savings can be enormously increased by implementing similar digital solutions. Instead of seeing a direct cost-return on a digital solution in one area, you can see multiple secondary savings that will help you build a foundation for more.

EA: Which digital technology do you think will have the most disruptive effect on the sustainability and ESG sector in the next few years? What are the reasons for this answer?

BR: Digital technology is a beautiful thing. There are endless opportunities to apply new technologies in the sustainability and environmental industries. However, I would choose to apply AI and ML to large data sets that are interrelated. This could prove to be a major, positive disruptor over these next few years. If implemented, AI & ML will:

• Optimize operations for a lower environmental impact
• Predictive analysis of different scenarios is possible to improve sustainable decision making
• Give early warning of non-compliance with regulations or adverse environmental impacts.
• Future sustainable investments will require better planning and decision-making.

The benefits list is endless. These and other use cases are centered around the interconnected relationships between large, sometimes non-traditional datasets. These data sets can be generated by AI and ML using document mining and web-scraping.

GHD uses predictive analytics and applies AI/ML to many aspects in the environmental industry, such as the remediation sector. We were helping clients optimize their remediation programs to reduce their long-term liabilities. We also helped them close sites faster and at a lower cost. We have created a database that includes data from more than 15,000 sites using AI and ML. This includes both traditional and non-traditional data. We can use this data to predict the likelihood and severity of third-party legal actions, group and identify high-risk sites, determine the best strategy for closure, and help clients prioritize their spending across their portfolio in order to reduce their long-term liabilities.

Robotic Process Automation (RPA), and blockchain are two other technologies that merit an honourable mention. While AI and ML are being used in our industry, but only in a limited way, RPA is and blockchain are rarely being used. RPA can bring efficiency to many manual repetitive labour-intensive tasks. Blockchain offers the opportunity to improve transparency, traceability, and transparency of data, decisions and reporting. Imagine all GHG reporting via blockchain. This would allow emissions to be traced back at individual assets. Companies can then benchmark themselves against other companies to identify areas of improvement.

Continue the conversation at Global Business Summit for Environment Analysts(23-24 Aug, Denver), Brett will participate in a panel discussion on the role and future of digital and technology innovation for sustainable transformation.