Drawdown Georgia Business Compact’s Sustainability Milestones on Its Third Anniversary
Business collective fosters collaboration to take action toward net-zero carbon emissions
Celebrating its third year, the Drawdown Georgia Business Compact (Compact),, continues to spur and sustain advances in science-based decarbonization strategies for Georgia and identify opportunities for collective action in the state. An initiative of the Ray C. Anderson Center for Sustainable Business at the Georgia Tech Scheller College of Business, the Compact has generated widespread interest among leaders in the business community – consistently growing year over year to include 68 members from companies across a variety of industry sectors. “This year, we’ve made great strides in building a strong community of practice and a set of actionable initiatives,” said David Eady, director of industry engagement for the Ray C. Anderson Center for Sustainable Business. “Compact members bring their best ideas to their peers, inspire action on climate change, and work together toward meaningful solutions that help their organizations meet their carbon reduction goals.”
Throughout the past year, the Compact held workshops, events, and webinars to educate and empower members and to provide the latest information and insights from subject matter experts in their industries. Leveraging key stakeholders from government, industry, academia, and nonprofit organizations, programming topics included carbon emissions in healthcare, sustainable aviation fuel, forest carbon initiatives, clean energy transitions for consumers and businesses, investments in renewable energy, development of voluntary carbon markets, and more. The Compact also released reports on decarbonization, spotlighted Georgia Tech’s carbon reduction challenge, and announced the development of a renewable natural gas interactive mapping tool – an exciting resource for members and the business community at large.
Member Collaboration
In 2024, the Compact announced a partnership with Metaimpact on a multi-stakeholder digital platform to connect members and partners where they can discover, align, collaborate, and track initiatives to reduce Georgia’s greenhouse gas emissions. The platform has already helped streamline communication, particularly in the planning, execution, and monitoring of Compact initiatives. The ecosystem fosters exploration, enabling members to discover new opportunities for connection, especially between in-person meetings. “In addition to learning through a community of practice, collaboration on concrete initiatives and solutions was a major theme driving the programming and the progress we made this year,” said Michael Oxman, managing director of the Ray C. Anderson Center for Sustainable Business.
The Compact has inspired solutions among members. Over the past three years, Goodr has connected with member companies to divert food waste from dining services. Cherry Street Energy (CSE) and Delta Air Lines are working together to install onsite solar at the airline’s headquarters, and CSE is also exploring opportunities with Norfolk Southern after the energy company’s CEO served on a panel with the CSO of the railroad company – a moderated panel organized for Georgia Tech’s SDG Week. Students from Georgia Tech have been actively engaged in practicum projects and other experiential opportunities that have helped Compact members mitigate emissions, extend sources and markets for anaerobic digestion, and support circular economy initiatives, to name only a few. From clean electricity to food and agriculture, the Compact’s working groups made notable advances this year on a range of collective impact initiatives that are poised to offer long-term benefits for members and Georgia’s economy alike.
Clean Electricity
The Clean Electricity Working Group focused on the potential of procuring renewable energy and accompanying economic benefits in the state and region. With collective impact objectives, the Compact offered members educational webinars on the energy transition and facilitated discussions with Georgia Power and other utilities that spotlighted on-site solar and clean electricity procurement opportunities. In addition, the Compact in tandem with participating members issued a request for information (RFI) for interested developers to address how they might meet members’ growing renewable energy demand through a collective procurement approach in the state and region.
Renewable Natural Gas
Working with Atlanta Gas Light, Gas South, and others, the Compact’s Renewable Natural Gas Working Group is exploring cost-effective ways to generate RNG to offset current natural gas use in industry, mobility, and electricity generation. One of the most promising opportunities is converting medium to heavy-duty trucks from diesel to compressed natural gas. At the final meeting of the year, the Renewable Natural Gas Georgia Market Mobilization Report will be released, along with a web-based interactive tool created via a partnership with the Georgia Tech Center for Spatial Planning Analytics and Visualization. This tool will be used for mapping methane sources in the state to support project development – like landfill methane capture and anaerobic digestion of dairy cow manure.
Forest Carbon Exchange
Partnering with the University of Georgia, Georgia Forestry Foundation, Georgia Forestry Commission, The Nature Conservancy, and others, the Compact’s Forest Carbon Working Group is exploring “Georgia-grown” forest carbon removal projects. Focused on high-quality, high-integrity carbon credits, these efforts prioritize afforestation, reforestation, and improved forest management, with a specific focus on engaging small-acreage forest landowners and underserved forest landowners in the state. The program adheres to Compact’s objectives to increase nature’s carbon sequestration capacity by strengthening Georgia’s forests while advancing equity, creating economic opportunity, and protecting biodiversity.
Food and Agriculture
The Food And Agriculture Working Group is working with companies with onsite food services to develop local food procurement policies to grow markets for locally grown, organic food, preferably from farms deploying regenerative practices. Nonprofit partners, small businesses and social enterprises are collaborating on meaningful impact solutions for the food supply chain. Another major focus of the working group is on reducing food waste, which is among the top 10 solutions identified by Drawdown Georgia research with a potential to reduce nearly two million metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions per year by the end of the decade.
Materials Circularity
The compact recently launched a Materials Circularity Working Group which is focusing initially on plastic waste, particularly in product packaging, through improved recycling and reverse logistics, including advanced recycling for hard-to-recycle plastics like LDPE and thin film. Member companies have communicated technological, market, and economic challenges associated with specific materials and expressed the need for innovation in alternatives to plastic, particularly in packaging. In response, the Compact has developed a database of hard-to-recycle materials and connected members with organizations like the Center for Hard to Recycle Materials (CHaRM), aiming to assist companies locate recyclers or markets for challenging materials.
Sustainable Aviation Fuel
Companies in the Compact within the aviation industry and those with large logistics operations have come forward to show their interest in sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) to decarbonize air transport. While Georgia currently has limited SAF production capacity, the abundance of feedstocks and robust transportation infrastructure (highways, rail lines, and pipelines) present great potential for the Southeast to emerge as a hub for SAF production. To chart a path forward, the recent workshop, Fueling the Future, brought together multiple stakeholder groups representing federal, state, and local government, industry, academia, and the aviation sector, to identify opportunities for establishing the Southeast as a national leader in sustainable aviation fuels.
Looking Ahead
In year four, the Compact plans not only to advance these initiatives but also to develop a working group focused on the built environment and the energy efficiency improvements that will drive decarbonization of this key sector. Since buildings represent such a ubiquitous energy center, finding solutions to reduce carbon impacts is imperative. Also in the works are efforts at ways to decarbonize member companies’ fleet vehicles – whether sedans or light-, medium-, or heavy-duty trucks. The Compact is exploring how to collaboratively support the mobility electrification transition that’s underway, with potential investments in charging infrastructure, battery production, and more.
If you are interested in science-based decarbonization strategies for Georgia, email David Eady, director of industry engagement for the Ray C. Anderson Center for Sustainable Business. Are you a business leader in the state committed to sustainable solutions? Join other leading companies leveraging the collective impact of the Georgia business community to achieve net zero carbon emissions in the state.