We can build a net zero carbon world faster
We can accelerate the development and implementation of the technologies we need to address climate change.
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What is net zero and why accelerate it?
Announcing . . . the accelerate net zero podcast
Learn more about the work being done to mature, scale and drive adoption of the technologies we need to address climate change, and how that work can be accelerated.
We will be interviewing innovators, technology leaders, policy leaders, investors and others who are working to accelerate Net Zero, sharing ways that these programs can be accelerated openly and freely.
The podcast and show notes will capture examples and stories to demonstrate how we can accelerate net zero.
Sign up for the email list or follow the subscribe links to get notified about new episodes.
Latest Episode
How Safe Is It to Talk About Circularity? Conversations Around Sustainability Challenges
The concept of circularity is an exceptionally challenging topic for many businesses. Today, most companies push out products, and then it’s up to the consumer to figure out what happens to them at the end of their useful lives. Circularity closes the loop, to look at how waste products can become feedstocks for other processes that continue to generate value. It has the potential to completely change the role that a company plays in delivering customer value, the business model, and the product itself. How do you introduce such a difficult topic, and how do you even begin to generate the ideas you need to develop innovative products and services with circularity at their core?
Previous Episodes
Who Are the Stakeholders for Innovations That Change the World?
Deborah Stine is a bridge between scientists, engineers and the policymakers, community leaders and other stakeholders whose choices can either accelerate an innovation team’s work or place obstacles in their way. In this interview, she shares how to identify and engage with these stakeholders so that you can integrate their needs and concerns into your solutions from the beginning.
The Last Responsible Moment – Decisions for Climate Change Tech That Stick
The Last Responsible Moment is a powerful practice for improving decision-making in the fog of uncertainty. We are clearly past the Last Responsible Moment to address climate change. We needed these solutions yesterday. So how can we use this concept to accelerate these solutions?
Barrio Electrico: Community Powered Distributed Solar
This project brings distributed solar power to Puerto Rico through community-based networks. It’s based on a unique partnership between community organizations that bring consumers together, with trained local support teams and a for-profit partnership to provide…
Resources and news items
The Corporate Carbon Accounting Market
A lot of businesses and communities have set ambitious targets for reducing carbon emissions. But without good data, it will be hard to know if their actions make a difference. They'll need help determining what to measure, gathering data, analyzing the data and...
How to Separate Sincere Net Zero Pledges from “Greenwashing” – Oxford Net Zero
With colleagues, we have developed the minimum criteria – or “starting line” – for the UN-backed Race To Zero. Through this campaign, over 2,000 organisations have committed to “four Ps”: not only to pledge net zero, but to set a plan to deliver it, proceed with...
Study: Urban Greenery Plays a Surprising Role in Greenhouse Gas Emissions
If we want to achieve Net Zero, we need to continuously evolve the models we use to understand greenhouse gas sources and sinks. This study looks at the effects of trees, shrubs and lawns on CO2 emissions: Urban greenery adds CO2 to the atmosphere when vegetation dies...
“I believe that if I pour everything I know . . . “
Source: Katherine Radeka, Accelerate Net Zero on Twitter: “I believe that if I pour everything I know about how to accelerate innovation into the work to achieve Net Zero, we can not only meet our goals for 1.5°C but exceed them, and accelerate the restoration...
Ban on new petrol and diesel cars in UK from 2030 under PM’s green plan – BBC News
The UK Prime Minister has announced ambitious plans to accelerate the transition to electric vehicles: New cars and vans powered wholly by petrol and diesel will not be sold in the UK from 2030, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said. But some hybrids would still be...
Can Citizens Groups Develop Better Community-Based Solutions to Achieve Net Zero?
This week, Science Magazine reports on one approach to developing better community-based solutions to problems like renewable energy and transportation infrastructure. Letting ordinary people determine climate policy might seem risky, but “if climate scientists have...
Signify Achieves Carbon Neutrality in Five Years Without Throttling Growth
Five years since announcing its commitment to Cop21 delegates in Paris, Signify has become 100% carbon neutral. Signify has achieved this through renewable energy contracts, impact mitigation through reforestation and solar energy investments, and a comprehensive look at emissions from offices to the factory floor and beyond into supply & distribution chains.
An Open Letter to Joe Biden from a Climate Change Scientist
Yesterday, Joe Biden became the President-Elect of the United States. Today, Ben Sanger, a climate change scientist who was forced out at the Department of Energy earlier this year, wrote an open letter to Biden about the need to restore the primacy of science: Mr....
The U.S. Is Poised to Rejoin the Paris Agreement
The election of 2020 has already had one consequence for climate change: Biden has pledged that the United States will rejoin the rest of the world in the 2015 Paris Agreement. And on January 20, 2021, we will have an Administration that understands the seriousness of...
How Can We Eliminate the Biggest Obstacle to Renewable Energy?
Clean power costs have come down with the help of new financial instruments, but renewable energy access is still an issue for low- and middle-income households. As part of the solution, policy makers are beginning to zero in on strategies that lean on growing the...
In the race to net zero carbon, every year matters.
We cannot afford to waste time, energy or resources on solutions that fail in execution or cannot scale. We need to “fail fast” with some ideas to accelerate others, and set up development programs for success in the execution phases by helping them make good decisions in the early phases.
Many innovation and product development programs encounter unexpected problems, cost overruns, and delays when things don’t work out as expected. They disappoint investors, customers and community stakeholders.
When innovation teams eliminate the root causes of these obstacles at their source, they deliver the right product to market faster.
They get from idea to launch faster, they scale faster and they start making a difference faster.
They change the world faster.
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“We were expecting to get products out faster.
It actually did a lot more than that —
it helped us get the right products out faster.”
Katherine Radeka
Host, Accelerate Net Zero Podcast
I help innovators change the world — faster.
I’m the author of three books on innovation and the developer of the Rapid Learning Cycles framework for innovation. This framework is accelerating innovation on every continent except Antarctica.
I have a long track record of accelerating the development of products like printers, washing machines, coffee makers, forklifts and mowers. I’ve helped biotech, medical device, pharma and aerospace adapt the framework to fit their industries. Today, my methods are accelerating solar, wind and nuclear energy systems development.
But that’s not why I’m here.
The truth is that I don’t know if the methods I use to accelerate the development of new products could also help accelerate the systemic change we need. But if they do, new forms of renewable energy, transportation, food production and more could make a difference years sooner than current forecasts.
Here’s what I do know: failure is not an option.
We can’t afford to waste the time, energy and resources we are investing on solutions that look great in early development but fail in execution — especially those that fail for reasons that could have been prevented with a different approach to early development.
So if it is possible to accelerate them by eliminating the root causes of the problems that plague most technology development programs, then that’s what we need to do.
areas of focus for acceleration
These are areas where our past work has given us valuable experience to build upon.
Transportation
Solutions
The advances required to keep people, goods and services moving in a carbon-neutral society.
Renewable
Energy
The scalable solutions that will eliminate the need for fossil fuels to energize a world that is interconnected.
agriculture &
Food distribution
Technology for food production, storage and distribution to reduce emissions from farm to table to trash.
sustainable
materials
The raw materials we need to reduce emissions — perhaps eliminate them — in our everyday lives.
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Sponsoring Organization
The Rapid Learning Cycles Institute helps innovators get their ideas to market faster.
Many innovation teams get stuck in the late stages of development when they run into obstacles that they couldn’t see ahead of time. Many of those obstacles trace back to decisions made in early development, when the knowledge needed to make good decisions wasn’t available, or at least not visible to the team.
The Rapid Learning Cycles framework fixes this by helping teams make decisions at the right time, with the right people and the best available knowledge. When teams do this, they make decisions that don’t have to be revisited later.
RLCI offers books, training and other services in how to use the Rapid Learning Cycles framework to accelerate innovation. We offer significant discounts to universities and nonprofit organizations. Readers of this page can use the code accelerate-net-zero to receive 10% off any training or other purchase at RLCI.
Contact:
Katherine Radeka
Accelerate Net Zero
PO Box 859
Camas, WA 98607
(206) 274-6179