New Innovations Making an Impact on a Sustainable Future

To achieve a sustainable future, we need to find a way to meet our current demands while protecting the environment and our resources for the future. Through impact investment strategies, companies and individuals, as well as sovereign funds and family offices, are spurring changes with sustainable initiatives and innovations.

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by all United Nations Member States in 2015, is a plan to preserve and ensure peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and in the future. At its core are the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs):

“…which are an urgent call for action by all countries- developed and developing – in a global partnership. They recognize that ending poverty and other deprivations must go hand-in-hand with strategies that improve health and education, reduce inequality, and spur economic growth – all while tackling climate change and working to preserve our oceans and forests”.

New Sustainable Innovations

Technological progress and new innovations are important drivers for a sustainable future. Here are some of the newest sustainable innovations and technologies:

1. Edible packaging

Addressing the problem of plastic pollution is essential when it comes to protecting our environment and oceans. Most plastics are non biodegradable and cannot be broken down by bacteria or other living organisms. Plastic in wildlife habitats poses a threat to plants and animals. A New York based company is turning alginate from seaweed and agar from red algae into flavored straws. Unlike paper straws that get soggy quickly, the material behaves like plastic for 24 hours, but degrades in the environment within two months. An Indonesian company sells edible seaweed-based packaging as burger wrappers as well as coffee pouches. 

2. New residential water recycling system 

The new hydraloop system cleans and disinfects bath and washing machine greywater that can be reused to flush toilets, fill pools or be used again in washing machines. Hydraloop says it can help reduce in-home water consumption by 45 percent. Hydraloop recycles and filters the water through a six-step process that includes sedimentation, dissolved air flotation and UV light disinfection. The system is also highly customizable with users able to prioritize when and for what purpose the water is used via an app.

3. 3D-printing for waste reduction

3-D printing poses a solution for optimal waste management. In traditional production, a product starts with a blank, and material is removed from the blank until the desired shape/ product is achieved. The remnants end up being disposed of in a landfill. In additive manufacturing, commercial-scale production using 3D printing, a product is “printed” layer by layer leaving nearly zero waste. The thermoplastics used in 3D printing are also more sustainable. 

Investing in new technologies and innovations is important in ensuring a sustainable future. In the past, the process of sustainable investing often fell short of its goals. We have the experience and the know-how to re-design the process for better impact, greater system efficiency and higher returns on strategic investments and initiatives.

At Transformation we invest only in extraordinary profit situations where there’s at least a market return on equity. We combine strategic advisory services and project development to help family offices, sovereign funds, and private companies capture extraordinary opportunities at the inefficient frontiers of agriculture, energy, and water, integrating the latest technologies to achieve lasting profit while maximizing efficiency and impact and transforming the world.