Name: EP 253: Making Sustainability Profitable with AI Automation
Start: 2024-04-06T11:42:00Z
End: 2024-04-06T11:42:25.000Z
Location: BrightTALK

Investors and advisors can learn everything they need to know about sustainable finance as Paul Ellis interviews leaders in the field.

Sustainability has moved out of the asset management limelight over the last few years.  Faced with more political pressures and conservative policy agendas in some countries, firms in the investment industry are experiencing slower flows into sustainable funds, even in Europe earlier this year. Schroders has been a leader in sustainable investment for almost 30 years, featuring dedicated sustainability career experts across asset classes, markets and countries. And today we’re speaking to Andy Howard – who heads sustainable investment globally at Schroders -- for his take on where we are, where we are going next and what Schroders is doing to continue to expand its leadership role in sustainable investment opportunities through active management and engagement.

EP 307: Sustainability – Less Public Commitments, More Delivering on Objectives

Aniket Shah is Managing Director & Global Head of the Sustainability and Transition Strategy at Jefferies, a global financial services firm ranked #1 in the Institutional Investor Survey for Sustainability in the US, Europe, Japan and Australia in 2022-2024. Shah talks with us about using a face-to-face approach to advancing the energy transition: investors walking the streets, visiting the plants, talking to the people and learning the business culture. Shaw explains how in the current economic environment, climate adaptation and resilience-related investments are critical to continuing the global agenda on sustainability and human rights. Shah serves on the Board of Directors of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network and teaches as an Assistant Adjunct Professor at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs.

EP 300: Boots on the Ground: The Key to Investing in the Global Energy Transition

In 2016 the founding partners at Cibus Capital merged their first-hand experience of the impacts of the current food production industry on the planet and its people. By combining their skills in finance and agriculture they formed the Cibus Funds to invest in more sustainable food systems. Rob Appleby, Cibus Capital’s CIO and Founder, believes that by identifying companies that are category or local champions, with proven track records, a cost advantage and that pay specific attention to sustainability criteria, Cibus makes investments that will outperform over the next decade.

Episode 276: How to Invest in the Future of Food

Shivanth Pande is the founder of NIMB ACE Capital, the first investment bank in Nepal to offer systematic sustainable investment plans and other financial services for employees who work for the bank’s corporate clients as well for the large underbanked population. Using a strategy that includes a variety of sustainable mutual funds, the bank now has more than 600,000 clients. In addition, Pande is the co-founder and current chairman of M! Nepal, a social venture that facilitates banks and microfinance companies in extending outreach of financial products to the poor urban and rural populations in Nepal.

EP 301: How a Nepalese Bank Is Growing the Sustainable Investment Services Sector through a Global Marketplace

The “Valley of Death” has become a popular term to describe a challenging period for sustainability focused startups. Bridging this “valley of death” in commercialization of sustainable technologies is a key role today's guest believes her company can play for their clients. Cindy Jia is Head of the Sustainable Solutions Group at ING Capital. Her goals for the ING team include accelerating adoption of sustainable tech and facilitating an easy transition between the different capital pools that are available. Today we're going to discuss the challenges in achieving these goals and how ING has progressed.

EP 293: How to Avoid the “Valley of Death” in Sustainable Tech Startups

The US healthcare system is under siege, financial distress and rising frustration and dissatisfaction by the public to name a few challenges. My guest today is leading the way to a different approach. Rob Roy is SVP, Chief Investment Officer and Co-Head of Environmental Sustainability for AdventHealth, a non-profit healthcare system which employs 3,800 physicians and provides healthcare services to over 8 million patients through 52 hospital campuses in 9 states and 22 home health and hospice agencies. Rob, who has 36 years of institutional investment experience, oversees AdventHealth investments, which include operating capital and employee retirement portfolios totaling approximately $20 billion.

EP 285: Transforming the US Health Care System from the Ground Up

Climate Week 2025 in New York is approaching and all eyes are on the decarbonization and climate transition trend, with climate mitigation investing often taking center stage. But as the physical effects of climate change on people and the global economy continue to escalate, it’s increasingly obvious that  investments in climate adaptation and resilience are also critical. And insurance, particularly the insurability of assets across different regions is rapidly becoming one of the most exciting avenues for meeting this need. Three investment experts from Schroders join us on today’s program to discuss what’s happening, including climate and crop insurance industries, insurance linked securities, and private market opportunities. Irene Lauro, an Economist at Schroders, focuses on climate issues; Christophe Etienne, is a Senior Natural Catastrophe Specialist on the Insurance Linked Securities team at Schroders Capital; and Martin E. Diaz Plata is Head of Private Equity Investments at Blue Orchard, an Impact investment manager owned by Schroders that runs the only private equity strategy in the world solely dedicated to climate insurance.

EP 271: Schroders' Insurance Linked Securities & PE Investment Strategies Spur Climate Adaptation and Resilience

Today’s guest on the Sustainable Finance Podcast believes that we are in the early stages of a persistent, global investment mega trend driven by a massive, disruptive event - Climate Change! Dr. Julie Anderson is Program Director for the Masters of Science in Sustainability Mgmt. at American University’s Kogod School of Business. She previously held senior leadership roles at top investment firms, including serving as Director and Head of iShares US Sustainable ETFs at BlackRock, where she managed $58 billion in assets and led strategic initiatives across the business. She believes this global megatrend is an opportunity to change the way we think about and choose sustainable investments. Investors should engage with and support companies that produce products in a responsible way that also creates healthy environments. We should focus on creating companies that are more sustainable, more profitable and more competitive because they are managing their Climate risks and opportunities better.

EP 306: Climate Change is a Massive Disruptive Event Driving a Global Responsible Investment Mega Trend

According to Boston Consulting Group (BCG), sustainable food and plant-based innovations will grow in market share from $39B today to $290B by 2035! My guest today is a global player in helping transform the food system. Elysabeth Alfano, the CEO of VegTech, consults with public sector companies up and down the industry supply chain. Today, Alfano is talking about her role as advisor to EATV, an ETF which invests in the founders, disruptors and trend-makers with the vision and technology to create a food secure future.

EP 287: Investing in Disruptors and Trend-Makers to Create a Food Secure Future

My guest in today’s replay of SFP Episode 272 is Marie Clara Buellingen, Head of Sustainable Finance Americas for Societe Generale Corporate & Investment Banking, one of the largest foreign banking organizations in North America. She is charged with solving the challenges of making public and private capital work together to scale clean energy solutions in the required timelines. The Societe Generale sustainable finance team develops ESG strategies and programs that meet with key stakeholder expectations and best practices such as TCFD, SASB, GRI, UNPRI and the CDP. We talk about approaches to clean energy technology solutions that she has seen work across multiple sectors of the global economy.

EP 272: How Public & Private Capital Join Forces to Scale Clean Energy Solutions

How should energy transition investors and policymakers think about the role of technologies like green hydrogen and energy storage systems, and what policy frameworks are needed to de-risk investment in them that will accelerate the transition? This is especially true of supply chain risks when financing critical minerals projects and nature-based solutions like Voluntary Carbon Markets (VCM). Tokollo Matsabu and Patlong Advisory LLC, work with companies to globally deploy revolutionary electrolyser technology and make clean, green hydrogen economically viable in international markets. Today, SFP followers will also learn about Patlong’s Advisory role to the Lesotho Foreign Ministry on energy and sustainable finance policy initiatives.

EP 305: How to De-Risk & Accelerate Energy Transition Investment Flows in International Markets

Insurance carriers are the second largest money management group and one of the most impactful regulatory industries on earth. How is Premiums for the Planet, a membership-based collective action movement, motivating this industry to incorporate more sustainable investment strategies? Join Founder and CEO Brad Stevenson as we discuss how the collective’s companies are challenging the investment practices of their insurance carriers to support the climate adaptation efforts of the collective.

EP 267: How Climate Conscious Companies are Challenging the Insurance Industry

Investors today have to consider sustainability and climate resilience across all asset classes in a diversified portfolio. In this episode, we speak with two professionals from Schroders to hear how these factors are integrated in energy infrastructure and real estate. David Boyce is Head of Schroders Greencoat US, which focuses on renewable energy infrastructure. Craig Morey is the Climate Lead for the Schroders Real Estate team, which makes direct real estate investments across the UK, Europe and Asia. Both of these teams reside inside Schroders Capital, the nearly $100 billion dollar private markets unit of Schroders, which also includes Private Equity, Private Debt & Credit Alternatives. The key message for SFP followers in this episode is that climate resiliency and returns are not mutually exclusive concepts. The current shift to climate resiliency in renewable energy and infrastructure is opening up very attractive investment opportunities, and enhancing current investments.

EP 304:  Climate Resiliency and Returns Are Not Mutually Exclusive Concepts

For real estate investors and owners, figuring out how to reduce carbon emissions without raising the cost of building new or retrofitting is a major challenge. My guest today, Laura Rapaport, founder and CEO of North Bridge, is leading the way in providing financing that does just that. C-PACE is a long term, fixed-rate credit product secured by a special property assessment, and North Bridge has recently secured a $1 billion commitment from the Carlyle Group to originate C-PACE loans. Rapaport explains how this financing can ensure that resilient and sustainable real estate projects have the flexibility required for completion while reducing carbon emissions and energy consumption and benefiting local economies. All PACE projects to date are expected to reduce carbon emissions by 3 million tons.

EP 284: How Sustainable Infrastructure Can Be Financed at Lower Cost and Reduce Carbon Emissions

On today’s program we talk about how universities are key innovators in solving the climate crisis. At the same time, as we read daily in the news, they’re dealing with tremendous uncertainty. So how is Lisa Sachs, the Director of the Columbia University Center on Sustainable Investment and the recently launched Columbia Climate School MS in Climate Finance, coping with these uncertainties in U.S. climate policy and sustainable finance? And what about the volatility in career opportunities that graduates of these programs will face during the next four years? For Sachs, these are just two of the stress points she is managing in today’s university environment. Sachs is also an Associate Professor of Professional Practice at the Columbia Climate School, where climate science and climate change are engaged in the 21st Century’s existential challenge for supremacy.

EP 291: Why University Leadership Is Critical for Solving the Climate Crisis

Tee Ganbold is Co-Founder and CEO at Improvability AI, the Generative AI improvement engine for sustainability. She was Co-Founder and Chief Growth Officer of Clear AI, optimizing supply chains for sustainability utilizing knowledge graphs. Improvability AI enables companies to enhance their sustainability focus and increase profits through the power of AI automation - intuitive AI agents and applications that automate tasks and workflows to lower costs in the business model and supply chains. Clients use the Improvability AI RAG Platform to automate reporting, insights and research based on their private data and documents. They also work with Improvability AI to create their own platforms for clients or teams.

EP 253: Making Sustainability Profitable with AI Automation

Generative AI

Intuitive Agents

AI Automation

RAG Platform

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EP 253: Making Sustainability Profitable with AI Automation

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The Sustainable Finance Podcast (SFP)