Business Leaders Bridging The Climate Gap – Voices From The Earth Day Women’s Summit
Release Date: 06/10/2025
How To Talk About Climate In A Polarized Culture – Katharine Hayhoe, Climate Scientist, Professor at Texas Tech University & Chief Scientist at The Nature Conservancy
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
“We have to begin our conversations with what really matters to the person or people we're speaking with. And if we don't know what that is, we have to get to know them and build a relationship and then start the conversation where they're at…The second common misconception I see is that we have to load up our wheelbarrow with the biggest load of scary facts we can possibly find and just dump it on people because not enough people are worried about this.…But if we haven't connected the head to the heart, my life, the places I love, the people I love, the things I love my home, the price...
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Critical Minerals 101 – Abby Wulf, Critical Minerals Expert, Former Head of Critical Minerals at the Dept. Of Energy, & Center for Critical Minerals Strategy
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
“Critical minerals and materials…are essential for key economic and national security technologies that help to fuel great sectors in the United States and around the world…We're at a very interesting point in the United States for critical minerals and materials because the US Geological Survey… just released their draft version of their newly updated critical minerals list…(But) they're very difficult to come by. And for a lot of these materials, they are mined as byproducts and co-products. They're used in incredibly low volumes, and so it's very difficult for companies to sort of...
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Mobilizing Women’s Influence – Paula Noble Fellingham
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
"People care about the diversity because diversity makes teams stronger. And, and this is research based. And so they can say what they want, but those who know that there is strength in diversity, they'll continue on in spite of the, you know, the outcry on the other end….There's research that shows that when the lives of billions of women are improved, here's what happens. Number one, there's better female leadership. Number two, there's stronger education and more equality with women and girls. There's healthier national economies. There's research. …There's stronger families and my...
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A Creative Leverage For Good – Kate Williams, 1% For The Planet
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
“1% for the planet…the way it works is that we have businesses who are our members, and they're actually supporting environmental partners at the level of 1% of revenues….You invest in the things that matter and the planet matters.…(to) drive impact at scale. And so, in terms of that scale, last year we certified US$100million of support going from these companies to environmental partners….When a company joins, they pay a dues fee to us, but then the rest of their 1%, they will give directly to environmental partners….And then at the end of each year, we certify that giving.” ...
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How Design & Tech Are Transforming Cities – Nikki Greenberg, Real Estate of the Future, from Smart City Expo World Congress 2025
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
“(B)efore we're even thinking about AI, it's actually thinking about how are we using our technology effectively and is it part of our processes? Does it complicate things or does it simplify things? And the advice that I always give them is like, before you start bringing in new technology and new processes and having to train people and doing their job in a different way and adding complication first, look at what you're doing and…pair back the stuff that doesn't need to be there anymore. And then think about technology.” Nikki Greenberg on Electric Ladies Podcast Cities are in...
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What’s a ‘Tech Humanist’? – Kate O’Neill, CEO of KO Insights at Smart City Expo World Congress 2025
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
“One of the other important things about tech humanism to me is that the three-way relationship between business humans and tech is primarily about the relationship between business objectives and human outcomes and using technological capability to amplify that alignment, as opposed to using technology to amplify only the business objective side of that relationship. So really trying to think about how does a business meet the humans that it serves, and then how can technology be part of making that more effective and more successful so the business can succeed and the humans can have a...
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Unique Practical Urban Climate Actions – Joan’s Panel of International City Innovators from Smart City Expo World Congress 2025
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
The World Bank reports that, “today, more than half of the world’s population – over 4 billion people – lives in cities.” It also estimates that this shift is going to continue, in fact to DOUBLE to nearly 70% – or 7 out of every 10 people will live in cities by 2050. That’s only 25 years away. At the same time, extreme weather events are increasingly devastating cities – we have all witnesses how Hurricane Melissa decimated Jamaica last week, for example, destroying home and businesses, schools, houses of worship, government buildings, everything. So what can, should...
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Career Advice For Difficult Times From 5 Women Leaders
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
“Your job isn’t to know the answer. Your job is to ask all the right questions of where the business is going and…Don’t be afraid…(Align) with people who could see the possibility of (your) experience…Take that stretch job and just remember you’re in the room to ask different questions, and that’s perfectly fine. So, take the stretch and then lean into your experience that allows you to have a different lens and a different perspective.” , Chief Sustainability Officer at Workiva on Electric Ladies Podcast When the economy feels tough or you feel like things are...
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How Climate Modeling Affects Everything – Maria Caffrey, Principal Scientist, UK’s National Physical Laboratory
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
“(Climate modelling)…it's being used in things like insurance companies. It's being used by companies for their ESG assessments. So, when you get your insurance premium at the end of the year, there is some kind of climate model that has said something about the risk of your house to flood. It has said something about your risk to fire. And so that might be driving up your insurance premium…And so it's being involved in your lives in many different ways. The food you consume, those grocery bills, there's prices behind it that are being driven by people using climate models saying...
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Car Rentals Reinvented & Sustainable – with Page Motes, Chief Compliance & Sustainability Officer, Hertz
Electric Ladies Podcast - Women Leaders Discuss Careers, Trends, Technologies and Innovation in Energy, Climate, and Corporate Responsibility
“Regardless of what's happening with kind of the ESG backlash conversation here, especially in the US, our other jurisdictions are coming hard and fast on regulatory…It doesn't matter what's happening in the broader ESG backlash …The other piece is, our corporate customers that have their own set of goals and expectations have absolutely not led up on us on wanting to see us continue to progress and move forward and drive change and help them drive change, because that is their expectation of us as a large scale supplier.” Page Motes on Electric Ladies Podcast If you're thinking...
info_outline“Most things when it comes to corporate sustainability do not happen in a vacuum. I am part of an environmental sustainability team, but we would not be able to accomplish anything without our energy teams, our network teams, and more. The ability to take what can be a complex idea and translate that into a compelling business case often comes down to dollars and cents. While it takes time, that's how we've been able to drive change.”
Rosie Austin on Electric Ladies Podcast
In a poll at The Earth Day Women’s Summit in Dallas, Texas, 100% of respondents said that business is not doing enough to address the climate crisis. With climate change fuelling more frequent and ferocious weather events, and the current U.S. federal leadership defunding climate- and clean energy-related initiatives, businesses now have an opportunity, and a responsibility, to lead. Will they?
The good news is, many of them are taking steps to reduce their carbon footprint and increase their climate resilience. How? Listen to this live recording of a session at The Earth Day Women’s Summit at Earthx2025 with a panel moderated by Electric Ladies Podcast’s Joan Michelson.
You’ll hear how businesses are keeping the momentum going and stepping in where federal leadership has stepped back.
The panel includes:
- Danielle Azoulay, Founder, The CSO Shop and former head of CSR and Sustainability at L’Oreal and at Bed, Bath & Beyond, who shares insights into what consumers care about, and how this is shaping business decisions.
- Helle Bank Jørgensen, CEO and Founder of Competent Boards training programs, on the importance of boards in keeping businesses focused on the long term.
- Jana Gerber, President, Microgrid North America at Schneider Electric, on what companies are focusing on to meet their climate goals.
- Rosie Austin, Principal Program Manager - Global ESG Reporting at AT&T, on why resilience doesn't occur in a vacuum.
- Joan Michelson, Executive Producer of The Earth Day Women’s Summit and host of Electric Ladies Podcast.
“If you look five years out, 10 years out, what is it that you want to look back at and say, Yes, I was part of this, or, or I did this. There’s a ton of roles if you look at these 17 biggest pain points in the world (the 17 sustainable development goals). Where is it that I can make a difference? I want to educate myself in this, so I can go out and help organizations, perhaps even the organization that you are working in right now.”
Helle Bank Jørgensen on Electric Ladies podcast
You’ll also like:
- Marci Jenks, Eco Material Technologies, on green cement innovations.
- Helle Bank Jørgensen, CEO and Founder, Competent Boards on the importance of ESG and boards.
- Jessica Filante Farrington, AT&T, Director of Global Sustainability, on climate resilient infrastructure.
- Tensie Whelan, Founding Director of the NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business, on why sustainability is good for business.
- Joan Michelson’s Forbes article on What Business Can Do To Address Climate Crisis Despite The Backlash
Read more of Joan’s Forbes articles here.
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