On Sept. 21, Siemens will take the stage as part of The Nest Summit’s clean energy track with a panel on how to build back better with sustainable, resilient buildings.
The location, of course, couldn’t be better for such a conversation: Siemens is leading the largest rooftop solar installation in New York City at the Javits Center. The 4,000 solar panels Siemens is installing on the roof will offset more than 1.3 million pounds of carbon emissions each year.
Matt Helgeson, Head of Sustainability, Siemens USA, will be one of the experts discussing how to fuse traditional energy efficiency practices with smart technologies and distributed energy resources at the conference.
Below, he delves into how Siemens is responding to the climate crisis and what’s been missing from the conversation thus far.
Despite the positive impact that energy efficiency can make, it is largely missing from the climate change conversation. It’s more than turning off lights or washing clothes on a cooler setting. Energy efficiency has entered the digital age, and with that, we need to discuss and implement measures to integrate well-established energy efficiency approaches with the new capabilities of smart and connected technologies to create an equitable, adaptable and decarbonized energy system for the future.
In 2015, Siemens was the first industrial company to commit to becoming carbon neutral across all global operations and we reduced our carbon footprint by 54 percent in 2020. The acceleration of climate change’s effects has resulted in our organization responding in turn and accelerating our sustainability program to achieve net-zero emissions by 2030.
Sustainability is at the heart of our business practices. The urgency surrounding sustainability is most evident when it comes to the threat of climate change, which we know is only accelerating. Therefore, Siemens is focused on deploying and investing in technologies and services that intelligently connect energy systems to buildings and industry, with an eye toward energy efficiency, reliability and smaller carbon footprints.
We’re also advocating for sustainable and equitable policies that drive U.S. innovation and leadership, while also combating climate change.
Our North America hub for innovation, Siemens Technology, is based in Princeton, New Jersey. We recently retrofitted and re-engineered the campus to combine renewable energy solutions with both building management and energy management solutions. The result is an innovative, resilient and cost-effective solution that serves as a live test bed for Siemens’ customers and partners on our journeys together to reduce emissions, foster healthy communities, and ensure that we are all prepared for a changing tomorrow.
As a technology company, Siemens is driven by the aspiration to address the world´s most profound challenges by leveraging the convergence of digitalization and sustainability. We help to form the backbone of society, by providing technology with purpose to make manufacturing cleaner, infrastructure more energy efficient, clean energy more accessible, and transportation smarter and healthier for the planet. By doing so, we help customers, cities and countries to do more with less and meet their individual sustainability goals in order to create distinct benefits for employees, people and society at large.
We are taking our Environmental, Social and Governance commitment to the next level with a 360-degree approach for all stakeholders – our customers, our suppliers, our investors, our people, the societies we serve, and our planet. We believe that making our country more resilient is about much more than infrastructure. It is also about building a society that is more equitable and inclusive. Only then will we truly be prepared to seize the opportunities of tomorrow.
