University of Technology Sydney was celebrating on Tuesday as news finally leaked out that Alireza Fini, associate professor at the school of the Built Environment, had snared a research and development grant for the university and four industry partners of about $7.5 million.
The federal government grant is to research how to commercialise a dowell-based laminated timber idea that does away with glues, uses low grade timber, and can help make low to mid rise timber buildings affordable.
Fini told The Fifth Estate that to snare the winning solution he went to Switzerland with one of his industry partners to interview a company that made complex and precise timber design manufacturing processes with a team of just 18 people working in a small village outside of Berne.
Asked what drew him to the company, he said it was a small logo he happened to see on a video he saw on YouTube. He cut it out the image, enlarged it, and started the process of contacting the German speaking company, finally yielding a response from the chief executive after several failed attempts.
He was impressed by an extraordinary piece of complex machinery they were working on to create the most unusual, laminated timber he’d come across. But what impressed him the most, he said was their humility. “They were very humble”. He knew he was onto a winner.
Full story to come soon.
Pollination snares more heavyweights
If this rapidly evolving green advisory and investment banking juggernaut is not on your radar you’re not paying attention. Pollination, started by the Martijn Wilder, just keeps getting bigger and more important. Last count it was over 300 people.
Now it’s appointed Audrey Zibelman to spearhead its play into the US market with an eye on capturing a share of the $1.5 trillion Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).
Zibelman’s about as influential as they get in the energy space: she was former chief executive of the Australian Energy Market Operator. She’s also been an advisor to Pollination since 2022 and has been chair of New York State’s Public Service Commission.
And if you think the IRA might be in danger of being ditched if Trump snares power in the next US federal election, there are people who disagree. These include South32 chief executive Graham Kerr who thinks says the IRA will be hard to gut partly because a lot of the spending benefits Republican states. Zip Co and HBF Health chairman Diane Smith-Gander, told The AFR that the momentum in Europe will secure commitment in the US and Auctus managing director Campbell McComb reckons the capital opportunities of the IRA will be too hard to resist.
AusSuper chief executive Paul Schroder said in the article that leading fund managers are in the least concerned with a Trump victory.
“It’s not material to the decision of whether to co-invest or co-underwrite a technology company or a consumer durable,” he said.
Zibelman is just the latest appointment to Pollination. In her US work she will join John Morton a former climate counsellor to the US Treasury Secretary who is now the company’s head of Americas, who was appointed 12 months ago, is.
- Pollination managing director, Zoe Whitton, will headline The Fifth Estate’s masterclass on 20 February, The Shifting Sands of ESG. Tickets are available here.
Albanese government needs to show some muscle on climate – before the worm turns
If you think that prime minister Anthony Albanese sailed too close to the winds of political backlash with his broken promises on tax relief and his loss of the Voice referendum, then you might expect he’ll strap in for worse to come if the analysis by Polly Hemming a director at The Climate Institute starts to catch on.
Hemming, a former public servant in the environment and energy department of the federal government, drew some serious and convincing parallels between the robodebt fiasco of the former government and this government’s behaviour on climate change in an article that led the influential magazine, The Monthly in February.
The same systemic public service/government problems that gave us robodebt are still in play on climate, she says. Here are some choice snippets:
Robodebt was five years of lies mistakes and failures. Australia’s climate policy is entering decades of the same, under the watch of both major political parties and their enablers.
An aggressive and longstanding protection scheme for the fossil fuel industry run by successive governments has given Australia the dubious honour of being one of the world’s largest exporters of climate change. Our little nation state is a notorious long-term blocker of international climate ambition and has played a key role in slowing global action.
A damning body of evidence dating back to at least the early 1990s documents how Australian politicians – with the help of senior public servants – have ignored the science, undermined international climate negotiations, watered down United Nations climate reports, pandered to the resources industry, pursued long-term markets for Australia’s gas and coal, thrown billions of dollars at false solutions, commissioned dodgy modelling, sabotaged the ambition of other countries and twisted logic into unrecognisable forms in order to justify it all.
Labor is far from innocent, she says, adding that the Albanese government’s policy toolkit is almost indistinguishable from the Coalition’s: the safeguard mechanism, the nature repair market, Australia’s carbon offset scheme, gas industry expansion, stacking “independent” agencies with industry interests.
With more evidence laying out the sad state of support of coal with public funds – $9 billion in fossil fuel subsidies and$1.5 billion for a single gas project in the Northern Territory.
The Climate Change Authority, the Independent Review of Australian Carbon Credit Units, the Net Zero Economy Agency, the National Reconstruction Fund Corporation, the Nature Finance Council, and the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act consultation – not one of these initiatives embodies the accountability or transparency the government promised.
Smart homes on the rise as Europeans call for energy efficient homes
People in Europe are staying home, so they’ve started to put their energy consumption under a microscope and using smart home tech to help.
According to ABB Smart Buildings, using numbers from German tech analyst Statista, household penetration rate of smart home tech is projected to increase from 24.9 per cent in 2024 to 48.3 per cent in 2028.
Advancement in energy efficient smart home technology is also on the rise. This includes visualised energy intelligence and improved information on the circularity credentials of lighting and switch products.
Next month, industry from across the globe will meet in Frankfurt for the Light & Building exhibition.
Climate-KIC
Starting this year, environmental organisation Climate-KIC has officially joined the University of Technology Sydney as part of its Institute for Sustainable Futures. The institute says the move will bring new expertise in systems innovation to ISF and boost both organisations’ impact.
Jobs
Renew, a not-for-profit sustainability outfit has appointed Helen Oakey as its new chief executive officer. Oakey has a background in climate advocacy, sustainability, and community engagement, including successfully advocating for a gas-free ACT in 2022.
The Western Australian government has appointed Emma Williamson as its new government architect.
Williamson has nearly 30 years of experience and is the co-founder and a partner at TheFulcrum.Agency, a creative consultancy. She was named a fellow at the Australian Institute of Architects in 2022 and has worked on projects such as Murdoch University’s Boola Katitjin, WA Museum Boola Bardip and the Karratha Super Clinic.
Her appointment follows Rebecca Moore, who was the first female government architect.
Architecture firm Grimshaw has appointed David Ritter as its new sustainability lead for Australia and New Zealand.
Before his appointment, Ritter had been Atelier Ten’s Melbourne office lead from 2015 to 2023 and worked on several sustainable and regenerative design projects.
Ritter had also previously served as the R&D director at Shanghai Landsea Architecture Technology Co. His experience also includes teaching environmental design at the University of Melbourne and sustainability and environmental design at the Swinburne University of Technology.
The certification program, GECA (Good Environmental Choice Australia), has appointed Vikrant Gorasia as its new standards and technical officer.
Vikrant, originally from Kenya, has five years of experience in companies such as Arup, Omnii, Stantec, and Wood in the fire safety and technical safety industries. He also has many years of experience volunteering with Engineers Without Borders Australia before his professional career.
Landscape Architecture firm CONTEXT has recently been acquired by its co-director Hamish Dounan, who will become its sole director and owner.
It has also recently relocated its studio to Chippendale in Sydney.
Additionally, the company has appointed Scott Jackson as its associate director. Jackson had previously served Arcadia Landscape Architecture as a senior associate. Before that, he had worked at Turf Design Studios in several roles, totalling more than eight years.