New Uses for CO2? Elkington’s Latest Out-Front Thinking
It’s always fascinating to see what John Elkington is thinking.
In this profile in Ethical Corporation magazine—which calls him “CSR’s leading thinker”—Elkington restates his view that regenerative business models could create at least $12 trillion in opportunity and add up to 380 million jobs by 2030.
Elkington has some very cogent things to say about the shocking changes in geopolitics last year, from the Brexit vote to today’s change of US president.
But maybe the most intriguing thing is this little snippet:
…He is travelling to Germany to meet with Covestro, a spin-out from the German chemicals giant Bayer, which has just opened a plant using CO2 in place of polymers in mattresses and upholstered furniture.
If we can turn CO2 into a valuable asset instead of a climate-change accelerant/pollutant, that could be world-changing. And there’s no reason it can’t be possible. I’ve known for years about turning wastes into input. See for example this article about another visionary, John Todd, that I wrote all the way back in 2002.
So why not turn carbon dioxide into a salable product?
Insatiable curiosity about the world has always powered my writing and speaking. I wanted to know more about this. A few seconds of searching led me to Covestro’s page about this technological and environmental breakthrough. While the writing shows distinct signs of a non-nartive-speaking author, the information is quite cool.
