The Business Revolution Episode 10

This special episode of The Business Revolution offers a sneak peek into our upcoming Melbourne event, “Unlocking your business’ sustainable advantage.” Join us for mini-interviews with three inspiring speakers:

Evannah Jayne (Terran Industries): Evannah discusses the economic benefits of sustainability and how businesses can turn ESG risks into opportunities.
Ishara Fernando (Blue Rock): Ishara shares her journey in the social impact space and highlights the importance of collaboration and taking action.
Geoff Gourley (ESG&I): Geoff, a leading ESG consultant and AI innovator, emphasises the need for businesses to adapt to the changing regulatory landscape and leverage technology for positive impact.

Tune in to gain valuable insights and get inspired to attend the event on 28 November 2024.

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Evannah Jayne’s bio:

Evannah Jayne is the founder and CEO of Terran Industries, an ESG services firm focused on creating impact driven results by strategically implementing sustainability solutions within organisations. Terran Industries accelerates the green transition for businesses, by acting as their dedicated sustainability team. Evannah is a self taught academic in the sustainability and business sectors, collecting certificates from leading universities including The University of Cambridge and University of Copenhagen, as well as completing a course by the United Nations. Evannah is the host of The Green Economy on Import Export TV, a show dedicated to promoting and showcasing sustainable solutions to the International Trade & Logistics sectors.

Links:

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/evannahjayne

Evannah on TBR Episode 3: businessrevolution.earth/thebusinessrevolution3

About Terran Industries

Terran Industries stands as your committed sustainability partner, offering tailored, full-circle ESG solutions to meet the unique needs of your organisation. Our role extends beyond conventional strategy & reporting; we actively assist organisations in navigating the ever changing ESG landscape. Together, we orchestrate and implement strategies that align with your existing organisational goals and also contribute towards internationally recognized sustainability goals. At Terran Industries, we empower our clients to drive innovation in their sector and future proof their business by integrating sustainability & climate resilience into their core offering.

Link: terranindustries.com.au

Ishara Fernando’s bio:

Ishara Fernando is the Philanthropy and Impact Manager at BlueRock, a certified B Corp. Ishara leads their Be BlueRock Foundation and drives the firm’s community impact strategy. She has extensive experience in social enterprise and FinTech, and is passionate about using her skills to create positive change.

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/fernandoishara

Blue Rock: www.bluerock.com.au

Geoff Gourley’s bio

Geoff is a LinkedIn Top Voice, leading Global Social Innovator, Entrepreneur, Impact Investor, ESG Consultant and NED with a portfolio career, in 2017 acknowledged in the Top 100 Social Entrepreneurs & Innovators around the world.

Geoff is the Founder & CEO of ESG&I. and creator of ChatESG ™ leveraging technology & AI for good and also the Founder & Chairman of Impact Investment Fund and Founder of Social Impact Consultancy One10 Group, Director ESG & Program Delivery & Investor at CLARA Energy, Member at Swinburne University TIVCC, NED at Urban Polo Association.

He is passionate about enabling purpose-driven business on a local and global scale.

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/geoffgourley

ESG&I: esgandi.com.au

Episode 10 links

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🎧 𝐓𝐁𝐑 episode 10 for download: audio

🎧 𝐒𝐩𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐟𝐲: open.spotify.com/episode

🎧 𝐀𝐩𝐩𝐥𝐞 𝐏𝐨𝐝𝐜𝐚𝐬𝐭: podcasts.apple.com

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Transcript – episode 10

Cherry Ward (00:00)

Welcome, revolutionaries. My name is Cherry

Alan Taylor (00:03)

I’m Alan.

Mik Aidt (00:04)

And I’m Mik, and together we are the three business musketeers who are doing our best to try and guide you through the evolving landscape of business and sustainability.

Cherry Ward (00:15)

This podcast is made on the lands of the Boon Wurrung, Juggera and Turrbal, and Wadawurrung people to whom we pay our respect and acknowledgement.

Alan Taylor (00:24)

And this is a special episode of The Business Revolution, bringing you mini-interviews with three incredible speakers who will be featured on our upcoming Melbourne event on the 28th of November.

Cherry Ward (00:35)

Join us as we get a sneak peek into the insights and inspirations that we’ll be sharing at the event, which focuses on helping businesses navigate the exciting world of ESG and sustainability and upcoming changes.

Mik Aidt (00:50)

In this Business Revolution podcast, we are on a mission. We admit it. We intend to prove to the world that sustainability isn’t just good for the planet. It’s also good for our health, for our pockets, for businesses and for the economy of the businesses.

Cherry Ward (01:09)

So whether you’re a business owner, a climate advocate, or simply curious about the future of our planet, you won’t want to miss this episode of The Business Revolution.

Alan Taylor (01:20)

And so first up, have Evannah Jayne from Terran Industries. Evannah, welcome back to The Business Revolution. Obviously, for those of you who’ve been following us, Evannah has been in quite a wonderful talk once before.

Evannah is the founder and CEO of Terran Industries, an ESG services firm with 30 employees globally, focusing on creating impact driven results by strategically implementing sustainability solutions within organisations.

Evannah, tell us a little bit about what you’ll be speaking about at the Melbourne event.

Evannah Jayne (01:56)

Thank you. Good to be back. I will be talking about sustainability and climate risk and how it is essential for businesses and hoping to be able to inspire people in the room and explore what climate risk is for business, how it affects businesses throughout supply chains, emissions, and even the social and governance side of sustainability and how it affects the business as a whole.

Mik Aidt (02:24)

And in short, what is the risk?

Evannah Jayne (02:27)

Risks can be very tailored to the individual organisation. Most common one we see today is in supply chains. Plastic is a common example. It’s an everyday material, but it’s also made from fossil fuels, which is a finite resource.

Everyone looks at fossil fuels and how they’re producing emissions and disrupting the energy sector, but they’re also very common raw material and everyday products. And sooner or later, that raw material is going to run out.

So if you want to have a functioning supply chain in the future, you need to switch to a more resilient supply chain and material source.

Mik Aidt (03:04)

And is that even possible?

Evannah Jayne (03:06)

It is. There’s hundreds and hundreds of bio materials growing into the market today. Most common one, anything that’s made out of plastic can be made out of seaweed. It’s an incredible material. Grows really, really fast.

Kelp is the most common one. It is incredible to see what products you can make from seaweed. And it’s a great selling point for businesses too. You can sell a little product and go, hey, it’s made of seaweed. And that’s a really interesting point for consumers.

Alan Taylor (03:38)

So what are you looking forward to most about the event?

Evannah Jayne (03:43)

I’m looking forward to meeting all the excited people who are there and sharing the knowledge that I’ve built over the last five, 10 years in the sustainability sector. There’s so much, well, as one thing I like to say is knowledge is power and I want to be able to share that knowledge.

Alan Taylor (04:02)

That’s wonderful. I think that’s what we all value is when somebody else can provide that knowledge and experience to help us along and that will help businesses. Like you say, there’s alternatives. So finding those alternatives, which will be beneficial for their business and the planet and then business will go on for a long time.

Evannah Jayne (04:21)

Absolutely. And there’s thousands of solutions currently in existence across all areas of sustainability and climate.

We ourselves have documented over 5,000 existing solutions in our database. One of the things we do with our clients as well is helping them navigate the existing solutions out there. Most of the time you don’t know what you’re looking for unless you know what to search for.

You Google ‘sustainability’, there’s too many millions of results. How do you navigate it?

So we’re documenting the ecosystem. We’ve pre-vetted over 5,000 result solutions, which we’re happy to promote to our clients as well.

Cherry Ward (05:00)

Wow, that’s fantastic. And I know in our sort of pre podcast recording discussions, you’re mentioning, you know, product that you’re developing around risk, this might be relevant to, to some of the, you know, the audience that’s attending and also listening as well.

Do you want to share and give us a little bit of, I guess, a preview of what you’re working on?

Evannah Jayne (05:22)

Sure. So we’ve just updated our new climate risk measurement framework. It’s across seven pillars. It covers all areas of sustainability, climate risk, environment, supply chains across ESG and corporate and governance as well. So we’re excited to launch this new model and we’re hoping to hopefully beta test it with a few people at the event. So we’re very excited to launch that.

Cherry Ward (05:49)

That’s fantastic. I’m keen to learn more about it as well as, I’m sure, all of the attendees and listeners as well. What’s one key takeaway that you hope the audience will gain from our event in Melbourne?

Evannah Jayne (06:04)

The economic benefits of sustainability. A lot of people see sustainability, especially if they don’t come from the sector, as something that’s expensive and burdensome. But it’s actually extremely cost effective and by implementing sustainability solutions today, you’re future-proofing your business and reducing economic risk as well as sustainability risk.

So the economic advantages of sustainability is something that is hugely overlooked. So hopefully we’ll be able to raise more awareness around that area.

Alan Taylor (06:40)

I find that a fascinating topic to cover. You’re turning a lot of preconceptions on their head. This is going to cost me a fortune. I’m going to be in trouble if we try and do this. We don’t want to do that.

We need to drill down now and do whatever we’re still doing. And you’re sharing these long-term gains.

Do you think there’s any short-term gains that companies can get?

Evannah Jayne (07:01)

I would say hundreds, yes. It depends so much on what the actual company is doing at the time. Short-term gains can range from immediate wins in especially the energy sector, for example.

Yes, installing solar panels, you can be completely removed from the grid if you install battery technology as well. And the advancements in… battery technology are huge.

There’s no reason not to install an on-site battery. And that’s something that you completely remove for Alliance from the grid, your energy bills will drop drastically, all from one simple investment of installation.

So that’s a very quick win that people can do. And if you want to even profit from that, depending on where you’re located, and this will be a very geographical dependent thing, not only on physical geography, but geography around who your neighbours are.

There’s one thing that can actually be done is create a microgrid within your community or within your block. If you’re friendly enough with your neighbours, you own the battery, you can sell power to your neighbours and make money. It removes them from the grid as well.

Alan Taylor (08:13)

So exciting spaces, low hanging fruit. Sometimes you might need a little bit of a step ladder to find those fruit that you mentioned, if it’s a little bit complicated, but the winds can be huge. So that’s fantastic. Thank you.

Cherry Ward (08:25)

Next up we have Ishara Fernando from Blue Rock. Ishara, welcome to the business revolution.

Ishara is the philanthropy and impact manager at Blue Rock, a certified B Corp. She leads the B Blue Rock Foundation and drives the firm’s community impact strategy. Ishara has extensive experience in social enterprise and fintech and is passionate about using her skills to create positive change.

Welcome, Isharah.

Ishara Fernando (08:55)

Thank you, very glad to be here.

Alan Taylor (09:00)

So Ishara, what unique perspective will you bring to the Melbourne event?

Ishara Fernando (09:07)

I’d say probably newer than the other panel members to the sustainability space and learning about climate action and the nature world.

I’d say that my experience has been more so in social impact and charity giving in the philanthropy space.

And so for me, I’m probably closer to a lot of the audience in terms of learning all of the jargon, unlearning the jargon. So many acronyms in this sector to learn and unlearn.

And I suppose for me, it’s about putting this into practice in our business. It’s around engaging our stakeholders, trying to affect change, seeing what we can do as a medium sized business here in Australia.

And so very much around, I guess, learning and the journey of learning and putting theory into practice and giving it a go and getting started.

Alan Taylor (10:01)

That is wonderful because as you said, you’re closer to the audience. So you, but you’ve also gone through it or you’re going through it. And so you can bring that real world, the other side of the coin to the other people in the panel.

Mik Aidt (10:13)

Ishara, what motivated you in the first place, starting this sustainability journey?

Ishara Fernando (10:21)

So as a certified B Corp business, company really believes in doing things differently and using business as a force for good.

For me personally, having lived in Berlin, like I’ve seen the secular economy over there, I’ve seen a lot of, I guess, positive change happening out of Germany and in Europe.

And I’d say these are the ones that we… look to globally who are ahead of the change than here in Australia. And at least Australia is ahead of the US, but we’ve got a way to go here in Australia for sure.

So I’d say, yeah, I mean, what I see, I work with families and businesses who are funding different causes that really matter to them. And almost all are worried about the planet and worried about nature and worried about what legacy they’re leaving behind for their children and for the next generations.

And so we really do see a lot of despair and a lot of, I guess, restlessness around what people are experiencing and seeing on the news cycles in their backyards and around the world.

And so there’s a lot of motivation from a number of people, but often an overwhelm and anxiety around what to do. And so one of the great quotes that I always hear is around action being the antidote to despair.

So taking action can very much be that antidote to the despair that we see with climate change. So as a business, yeah, we would very much like to be part of the change and not the problem.

And we would very much like to share our learnings along the way. It’s very much around progress and not perfection. We’re nowhere near close to being done and together collectively, we can make change happen.

Cherry Ward (12:08)

That’s great. And I know Blue Rock has been involved and hosted a few events like this. I’m interested to learn from your perspective, why events like this are important for businesses, especially those that are small medium, they may not have a big sustainability team.

Ishara Fernando (12:24)

Yeah, most won’t have a sustainability person at all. And so it’s often, you are your operations manager or might sit within a risk or a finance function, or it might just be a few passionate eco warriors within the business wanting to affect change and use their business as a force for good.

And so we at Blue Rock really find it important to partner with the experts and to bring the experts to our business owners in our ecosystem to continue to learn.

We learn from one another, we learn from mistakes, and that’s how we can, I guess, accelerate the change that we want to make by learning from one another.

We hosted a similar event around environmental sustainability in March during B Corp month, and the interest from our network was really great to see, and very much with that curiosity of what do we do, how do we get started?

We need help, and we want to make a change. And so that’s why it’s really important to us to continue to help everyone look at how to create positive impact on the community, both on people and planet.

Alan Taylor (13:35)

One thing resonated in me there is there’s so much of the personal connection you shared in there and where that ties in and how that ties to business. adding to that is that the duality of you’ve got going and getting the experts in the room, getting the help, being able to call for that, but also mistakes get made along the way.

And I think that’s another thing that if we can accept that a little bit more, we can make a lot of progress too. So that’s wonderful, Cheers. Thank you.

Ishara Fernando (14:04)

Yeah, now we see that in the startup world, right? Fail fast and share your learnings.

So why not do that across different industries and across different things that we’re trying to do within our businesses?

I have a number of business owners that want to make change and life is busy and costs are restrained, but what can we do? What are the little things that each individual employee, each individual household, each individual business, what are the actions that we can all take?

So that together we can make a collective action.

Mik Aidt (14:36)

What are you hoping people will take with them home after the event in Melbourne?

Ishara Fernando (14:40)

I guess one thing that I’d love for the audience to take away is the feeling of hope that they can take action and that together we can all take an action and really make a difference.

I’d say that overwhelm is strong with a lot of information, acronyms, jargon, this is the right way, this is the wrong way, all of that that’s out there. And I really hope that everyone can walk away on the 28th November with a sense of, I know where to get started and I know I’m going to give it a go.

Cherry Ward (15:11)

That’s fantastic. Thank you, Isharah.

Mik Aidt (15:16)

Our third guest today in this special episode where we’re focusing on our event on the 28th of November in Melbourne, we have Geoff Gourley, who in my opinion is a true champion of purpose driven business and also a social innovator.

Someone who I remember, Geoff, 10 years ago, you were organising these green drinks events in Melbourne and you have since then become a founder and a CEO of something very interesting called ESG&I, which is… you’ll tell us, I hope, what it is, but I know that it’s a community of hundreds of people coming together around this interest in what is ESG and what can ESG do for my business, exploring ESG.

And then even combining that with AI, artificial intelligence, something that should be very useful for businesses. So we’re excited to have you on board in the Business Revolution podcast.

Geoff, welcome!

Geoff Gourley (16:12)

Fantastic. Thanks, Mik. That’s great! And I really appreciate connecting and reconnecting with you after many, many years in the sustainability movement.

I guess giving the listeners a bit of context is probably back in the early 2000s, I really started to get into sustainability, particularly in the built environment where I was working professionally.

And we started Sustainability Drinks Australia as a way to get people connected and networking with like-minded individuals. And that was really some early days, I think, in sustainability.

And then 2008, I did the Al Gore Climate Project Leadership and also the Center for Sustainability Leadership Program. So that really got me entrenched in sustainability and being passionate about it.

And I guess that’s where my whole purpose has come from on that journey over many years now and being able to create my own consulting business and helping others on that journey as well, whether they’re an ASX entity or a small medium enterprise, which is where my focus has been more recently.

I still can’t believe that we’re banging on about sustainability and climate change now, as I would have hoped we had a lot more traction and a lot more action in that space. But I think we have made good grounds and there is a lot more focus on that.

I sort of moved into the ESG space around four or five years ago and started researching what challenges business had. A very dynamic regulatory environment as well.

So we’ve got new laws coming in here in Australia, which is the mandatory disclosure bill, which was passed, which is now law. And that is the Australian Sustainability Reporting Standards, which kicks in for very large entities from the 1st of January.

What I’m seeing there is a real… trickle-down effect, which will become a waterfall in a year or two, is these large suppliers that now have a mandatory obligation around reporting. That’s filtering through their supply chain. Their supply chain tends to be medium-sized suppliers.

They don’t have the resources. They don’t have a sustainability team or a director of sustainability. So they find it really challenging to navigate the requirements.

And whilst it’s not mandatory for the suppliers at this stage, unless they take that criteria, the big customers we’re seeing just pushing that requirement down.

And that’s where we’re seeing an opportunity as well to support those organisations, to educate them, empower them, inspire them to take action, which at the end of the day, I think makes for a resilient and competitive business going forward. We have had some recent instances where these large suppliers, their contracts won’t be renewed unless they are meeting the requirements of the customer. And so that’s a real critical trigger that we’ve seen in the last, probably two months since the bill passed.

Mik Aidt (19:09)

So if you don’t want to get left behind, be there on the 28th November and hear Geoff talk about this. Geoff, give us a little bit, like, a warm-up to what are you going to be telling people? What are you inspired about? And what is ESG&I?

Geoff Gourley (19:24)

Yeah, fantastic, Mik, look, I’m really looking forward to the event. I think it’s great to get back face to face. Businesses is still done, you know, person to person and having that human connection interaction is really, really important.

You know, I’ve been in business development and sales and trying to help people for many years. And I find that that’s the quickest way is to just connect with people in a face to face environment, understand their needs and their challenges, and then have a look at how I might be able to support them on that journey.

Yeah, look, I think the ASRS has been a big trigger. ESG more broadly is a focus for investors, for customers, for your stakeholders. It’s really not a nice to have anymore.

It’s a competitive requirement, I think, in business these days. And you can start small and you can take steps and you can start on that journey and talk about what you are doing and what you’re going to do, as long as it’s in the right sort of way.

And I think, you know, being able to come to an event where you hear about the topics of the day strategies on how to navigate, how to make a quick start, how to get through any roadblocks.

We find trying to demonstrate the business case for ESG within an organisation can be a bit tricky and being able to get the C suite on board that may not be right behind this ESG stuff, being able to influence them and say, hey, listen, here’s the business case of why it’s really important to do the sustainable actions, to adopt ASG.

And these are the benefits that will come over time. So, yeah, I really would love to see people there and share with them some of the insights around that and saves a bit of pain for you as well.

Mik Aidt (21:07)

And just about your own company there or this project which is multifaceted in some way ESG&I. Just explain even the name ESG &I.

Geoff Gourley (21:17)

It’s very interesting. I’ve got a long history of naming businesses after what they do. So we do environmental social governance and I always think impact is an important part to have.

And I was surprised when I was able to get the trademark for ESG&I. And so we started as a consulting business back in early January this year, 2024.

I’ve spent the last three years researching and developing skills and expertise around AI. And what I quickly came across when I was working, using AI as a co-pilot on live client engagements is, it’s amazing. It can increase my productivity. can enable me to gather information really quickly for clients, be able to give them the information to make informed decisions, but in a really fast turnaround.

And I guess when I created ChatESG, the idea is all about democratising access to ESG expertise because you know, we can’t all afford big four consultants to come and solve all our problems.

I created these three models where people can access ChatESG and do it themselves. They very much like ChatGPT, you get a subscription, you have a very great library of ESG specific knowledge and expertise at your fingertips.

And that can help guide you in some education and some knowledge building. And it can help build your early strategies, roadmaps, action plans.

The other model is, know, do it with me where we work with clients leveraging AI to deliver solutions for their challenges or issues. And then the other model is do it for me where our customers say, listen, you know, great, you’re using AI, that’s fantastic.

Can you just go and do it all for us and take away our pain? And so we’ve got these three different models and I think really importantly for the SME market is being able to give them early access to this massive specific knowledge bank of ESG information and sustainability information I’ve been building over 20 years. Having access to that is something that a ChatGPT doesn’t give you.

It’s that private intellectual property that I’ve been developing, working with clients and having a knowledge level of that added on top of ChatGPT. So it’s called a rag. So it’s retrieval augmented generation.

And basically think of it as a very specific personalised library on ESG information that you’re able to search and ask queries of and it’ll pull out information. It’s really relevant, really proven, know, this is strategies, practices that have been put into play every single day for my clients. And so get access to that innovation and knowledge.

And AI has just been a game changer, I think. I love using it. Obviously, you’ve got to keep control of it and you’ve got to double check all these different elements, but I’ve tried to really refine it and spent the last nine months building ChatESG.

We use it internally, privately at the moment, but we’ve created a wait list for the public release, which we’re expecting that product to come out around March next year. So really exciting time to be in the… ESG and AI space.

Mik Aidt (24:36)

Fantastic. And if people want to ask you questions, they can simply show up in Melbourne at the meeting on the 28th November and we’ll put all the information about the details on that in the show notes.

Geoff Gourley (24:50)

Absolutely, love questions and don’t be scared. A very good friend of mine who unfortunately passed away earlier this year was Geoff Robinson, an absolute guru in the sustainability space.

And Geoff was well known for always asking the first question. And so I would take his, I guess, approach and encourage anyone to be the first to ask the first question.

Also at the event, we’re going to give you a QR code which will give you free access to the ESG&I Community of Practice.

This is the membership portal or community that you talking about before, Mik, where we’re encouraging people to come together in this community, share knowledge, they can access a whole bunch of free resources, tools, educational content, connect with both like-minded businesses in the SME market, or connect with consultants and service providers that can help them through their problems.

Yeah, it’s always gonna be a free type of environment, just really to support people. At the moment, we’ve got about 160, 170 over the last four to six weeks, and we are looking to expand next year into the US and the UK. So this is just the sort of first iteration, if you like, the beta version, but it’s going great and people are engaging on there.

And you’ve got a place where you can market or pitch and you can also connect with people as well. Yeah, it’s fantastic. So we’ll give everyone free access to that on the.

Alan Taylor (26:21)

Thank you for sharing that, Geoff. It’s awesome because it also demonstrates what we’re all about, what all of us are about.

It’s not about competition, it’s about sharing, getting that community to co-create, co-help each other and do that and that’s wonderful. Thank you.

Geoff Gourley (26:37)

Yeah, it is Alan. I think having that mindset is pretty typical of people operating in the sort of for-purpose area. I work a lot with social enterprises as well, Indigenous based businesses, disability enterprises.

So a lot of people in this space really get that mindset. It’s about collaborating, trying to help everyone in the sector where you’ve got some expertise. And yeah, it’s not about competing.

It’s about seeing an opportunity to collaborate. We’re also doing that in the AI space. We’re working with some freelance consultants in the philanthropic area to see how AI can be used in philanthropy.

And that also helps companies meet their corporate social responsibility goals, or it be about how they provide funding for social impact.

I’ve just written a piece recently about AI and shared value projects and you know, we’ve tested that on a large client in South Australia about analysing all the data that came out of a year long shared value project.

So it was fascinating to see and sometimes that’s really hard to do measure the and quantify the impact from these shared value projects. So I was really excited to get into that and yeah, it’s been fantastic.

Cherry Ward (27:55)

That’s great. One last question from me, Geoff. I know in our pre recording preamble, you mentioned you’re up for an award tonight. Can you tell the audience a little bit about, know, what you’re nominated for?

Geoff Gourley (28:07)

Yeah, thanks, Cherry. It was interesting. I think about 12 months ago when chat GPT really came to the fore, I got excited about that.

I’ve always been trying to think of a way to clone myself as a consultant. I think chat AI, ChatGPT and AI really gave me a bit of a tool there. So I started using it and I got pretty poor results. I was thinking, wow, this is not necessarily all it cracked up to be.

And then I realised I was a problem. So I had to go and get some education. went and did some certificate courses. I can highly recommend the AIM AI as my co-pilot course, delivered through Australian Institute of Management.

That’s what I went and did. Fantastic. Unlocked all these secrets and tools and resources of AI specifically. And then what I did was I started to practise, practice, practice every day using it, using online client engagements and I found a complete change. The output’s incredibly high.

I don’t get many hallucinations, if any, now, what they call the sort of errors coming from AI. And then when I basically created my AI agents, I’ve got a virtual consulting team that I’ve created.

And I also have this rag library of ESG materials. That’s been a real game changer. And I was really thankful to be recognised as a finalist in the Australian AI Awards, which is actually on tonight here in Sydney.

And I’m nominated as a finalist in the AI Consultant of the Year, particularly with a focus around SME. And so I’m pretty excited about that.

It’s very competitive and I think, you know, just humbled to be in the final. But of course, like most people, it would be great to get an award. It’s been a long time since the sports day. So a business award would be always handy to have on the shelf in the pool room.

Mik Aidt (29:57)

Fingers crossed from here, Geoff, certainly also, kudos to you and great acknowledgement for speeding up the process because we all know that we are behind at the moment, certainly in Australia, when it comes to dealing with the real danger of a climate breakdown.

And hopefully, if humans were better at working with AI, we could speed up the process somewhat. And you’re right into that.

Geoff Gourley (30:24)

Yeah, absolutely. I think what I’ve seen both in the consulting side of business, but also with one of our major projects, which is the Clara Energy Green Hydrogen project, you know, we’ve been able to use AI in some aspects of that as well.

And in fact, we’ve created an 800 acre biodiversity stewardship area. And we’ve been able to analyse so much of the flora and fauna data that came out of on-field surveys and mapping and massive databases from the government and get a really clear idea on the types of really valuable biodiversity that we have on that site, which overall is about two and a half thousand acres.

And we’ll be creating a protected habitat alongside agrivoltaic. So we’ll have a PV farm with sheep running around underneath, keeping the grass clear and low and it helps a better yield for the sheep as well.

So it’s about making a difference around climate change, but also acknowledging that yes, we do need to do developments, but they’ve got to be responsible, sustainable. We need to protect the habitat. At the same time, we’re creating renewable energy and zero emissions fuels.

We are particularly creating a great hydrogen as a diesel replacement. And when you look at Europe, you know, they have banned diesel trucks from 2035. And so that will flow into Australia and we need to have a solution. We can’t stop the trucks because we can’t survive.

We need to move around food and products and goods and services. And so we’ve got to really rapidly come up with these innovative solutions.

And I really think forward thinking, AI, unlocking that investment capital, impact investment, investment around natural capital, really important to progress some of these projects. And again, going back to 2008, I think

We were probably talking a lot and maybe not taking enough action. And now I really see that we are taking a lot of action, which has been great to see, but we’re still a long way off from turning back the clock, I guess, on climate change.

Alan Taylor (32:29)

One of the little things you said in there really resonates with me: the, and it’s almost like the collaboration, but a variation on that theme that we talked about earlier – is that win-win, you can put the solar panels above the ground. So it’s better for the sheep, better for the, you know, it’s a win-win. Get the solar, you get the better, actually apparently it’s better for the ground itself because it stops it getting scorched, especially in the summer.

So yeah, this idea that we can use anything for two different benefits or more is very much against our current model and it’s maybe a bit too scary for some people but it’s great when it’s demonstrated.

Geoff Gourley (33:03)

Yeah, absolutely. I think a really key aspect of what we did well was community engagement. So we’re in a regional area in New South Wales on the Hume Highway.

We approached the farmer, we approached the community. We said, look, we see a challenge here. We see an opportunity. We want to make sure that we’re doing it in a responsible way that creates economic prosperity for that region, creates jobs.

We’ve actually partnered with the TAFE and registered Aboriginal parties in the area. So we’re creating some employment pathways for the local Indigenous in the solar space. That’s providing them with long-term employment.

We also have an accommodation strategy where we need some temporary accommodation for workers. It’s a very remote area. And then that housing, once that’s been finished with for the project, that turns over to long-term accommodation for the region.

And so again, that supports tourism, job creation, better housing opportunities in the area, which is sort of between Wagga and Gundagai. So again, when you just open up your mind and have that shared value, shared outcomes, you get all these win-win-wins across the board, as you’re saying.

Cherry Ward (34:16)

And that’s a wrap for today’s episode of The Business Revolution. We hope you enjoy diving deep into the world of business and sustainability with us and our guests who will be joining us at the Melbourne event.

Mik Aidt (34:29)

And if you live in Victoria or near Melbourne, we hope to see you on the 28th of November.

So you can learn together with us from our three experts here on how to transform your business into being a more sustainable business.

Alan Taylor (34:43)

And of course, if you enjoyed this episode today, register for a Melbourne event on the website, businessrevolution.earth.

Please be aware, this is only a cheap event. It’s only $30. And we’re not trying to make profit, but any little bit of extra cash we make, 50 per cent of that will be going to 1% for the Planet. So we’re feeding back into the ecosystem.

Mik Aidt (35:07)

And also remember if you liked what you have been listening to today in The Business Revolution podcast, it helps us a lot if you not only subscribe to the podcast, but also you can rate it and review it and so on, because all that interactivity really helps us reach more listeners out there.

And in that way, collectively, we are amplifying our impact.

Cherry Ward (35:28)

And thank you for joining us on this journey of transformation. I believe that together we can revolutionise the way we do business and create a world that’s sustainable for generations to come.

Alan Taylor (35:40)

Until next time, keep innovating, keep inspiring, and keep pushing for that positive change for a brighter tomorrow. I’m Alan.

Cherry Ward (35:49)

I’m Cherry.

Mik Aidt (35:51)

And I’m Mik, signing off. The business revolution starts with you.