Renewability is cleaner and can create jobs

Sustainability and renewability were buzzwords developed by cohorts normally associated with trendy lefty politics and tree-hugging.

It has now moved mainstream and that has implications about how all of us should think and act.

The Rockefeller Foundation, which manages enormous amounts of money generated by the hard-nosed capitalist JD Rockefeller from oil, has made a big decision.

Much of its resources are to be channelled into products and systems that offer leverage to sustainable and renewable capabilities. That seismic switch is driven by a recognition that fossil fuels have a finite life and consumers want more energy efficient and environmentally sensitive products.

Making fortunes from these themes is now in vogue. The car manufacturer Tesla has invented a machine that performs like a sports car yet does not require a scintilla of diesel or petrol. Its share price has rocketed and will travel further as it rolls out increasingly mainstream family cars with enhanced battery power and lower pricing.

I recently listened to a talk from an IT leader who says the narrative among technology inventors is 10x, meaning new systems should aim to enhance productivity tenfold. Another angle is to think of what I would label a “10x10%” approach.

This shoots for inventions that multiply functionality ten fold while reducing energy requirements by 90%. Finding ways to do that can advance society while sharply lowering its need to draw from our living environment.

With the capabilities of computing growing exponentially, the quantum of data accessible by inventors is multiplying before our eyes. This should give confidence that we can aim for transformational change in everything around us, from medicine to transport and on to infrastructure and food.

Imagine developing ground, sea, and air transport that replicates the Tesla effect. Imagine, too, buildings that have zero negative effects on their local environments and actually contribute to recycling.

All of these areas should be focussed on by young and ambitious entrepreneurs as gateways to success.

We have construction companies such as Kingspan at the pointy end of insulation systems that radically change the way buildings engage with energy use and functionality.

Putting Ireland at the centre of renewability and sustainability could be a shrewd move if done wearing a clear commercial hat.

Here are a few notions in this context; (1) target Ireland to become a massive centre for data storage and analysis in support of &renewability and sustainability, using data centres that generate zero emissions; (2) create a government- backed, but philanthropy financed, set of annual global prizes for inventions in &renewability and sustainability and make them a big yearly event in Ireland; (3) set out a grand plan to have Ireland evolve as the first country to be independent of fossil fuel dependency by 2040, and; (4) task our third level institutions with developing enhanced &renewability and sustainability undergraduate and postgraduate degrees hand-in-hand with Irish and global corporations.

Of course, these are wildly ambitious ideas but did you hear the one about the oil baron who sold everything and backed the environment instead?

His foundation is doing so, not out of a love for mankind, but a keen nose for creating wealth.

Achieving that, while undertaking tasks that transform in a positive way the manner in which we connect with our surroundings, would be a most satisfactory outcome over coming years.

Joe Gill is director of corporate broking with Goodbody Stockbrokers. His views are personal