It’s been said that the challenge with saving the planet is that we all believe that someone else will do it. When in reality, the only way we can make a positive impact on the environment is if we all work together towards our common goal.
Finding My Passion
My passion for sustainability and environmental stewardship began early – in a high school environmental science class. We learned about the impacts that humans have on the planet and went out to watersheds and native grasslands to see the impacts for ourselves. This sparked an interest in me, and I decided to pursue a career that involved sustainability. Fast forward about five years, I graduated college and joined AT&T through the company’s Business Sales Leadership Development Program. At the time, I thought I was taking a short detour from sustainability to a career in sales, but little did I know, I was joining a company that was equally passionate about the planet and utilizing its core competencies for good.
Passion into Action
Today, I support our largest manufacturing, transportation, and consumer packaged goods (CPG) customers in developing and deploying smart climate solutions utilizing AT&T’s technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Artificial Intelligence, and Cloud Computing. These solutions span from tracking shipping containers around the world to remotely monitoring tank fill levels. For our customers, these technologies offer a new way of doing business, focused on driving efficiency, enabling cost reduction, or creating new revenue streams.
Along this IoT journey, many customers realize that, although the main drivers for pursuing an IoT project are business or customer focused, these projects could also reduce carbon emissions or minimize waste in processes. Take, for example, the Verifi solution developed by GCP Applied Technologies. By utilizing IoT connectivity and connected sensors on concrete trucks, the solution helps ensure optimal concrete slump is delivered to jobsites nationwide. This solution provides efficiency and reduced cost for the concrete operator but, at the same time, reduces wasted product and fuel consumption due to multiple trips and idling– all cutting carbon emissions in the concrete industry.
To put added focus and emphasis on the idea that smart climate solutions can enable emissions reduction at scale, AT&T set a goal to help our business customers eliminate 1 billion metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions using 5G and other broadband technologies by 2035. To meet this goal, we created the Connected Climate Initiative, our effort to collaborate with select tech partners, customers, and academics to identify best practices, develop innovative new products and use cases, and scale the innovations of startup partners building tomorrow’s 5G- and other broadband-enabled smart climate solutions.
For Generations to Come
Today, we have the opportunity as individuals and businesses to come together arm-in-arm to tackle the planet’s most pressing challenges. I encourage you, today and every day, to find ways to be the “someone” who will sustain our planet for generations to come.
Be the “someone” with AT&T
