Insights from industry leaders, Volume 3: Nancy Hobhouse, Head of ESG at EVRi
Meet Nancy Hobhouse, an accomplished sustainability expert with expertise in Carbon, Sustainability, Governance, and Ethics across various industries. With a track record of leadership, including being named Transport & Logistics Businesswoman of the Year, Nancy currently leads EVRi’s ESG strategy and implementation.
What’s one thing you want people to know about sustainability at EVRi?
At EVRi, Sustainability is key to every single decision made, it’s not just an ESG-owned programme but rather, a companywide commitment. To be a company that is excelling, sustainability needs to be a primary focus and at EVRi, we work really hard to ensure it is. It’s important that sustainability is not a marketing ploy, EVRi is actively working towards being low carbon.
To achieve this, it’s important not to be overwhelmed by big targets, you must take each year as it comes. Make 3-year targets, but worry about this year – taking one step at a time adds up! The market changes constantly and businesses will be different, people will be different. The company’s net zero target for 2035 is one step towards our long-term sustainability goals. However, there is no magic bullet to achieve these goals, and it requires collaboration between the government and other industry players.
What are the biggest challenges for sustainability in the Logistics sector?
This is a hard question because I don’t think anything is insurmountable. But I think the biggest challenge is not completely understanding what the fuel of the future will be, especially for heavy good vehicles. It’s a very Blue-ray vs. DVD moment; hydrogen versus electric. I don’t believe it will be one or the other but I think hydrogen will work for larger vehicles and electric for smaller. Then there are biofuels!
None of it has been defined by the government so the sector doesn’t know which way to go. Vehicles usually have a seven-year lease, so how do you set up infrastructure when you don’t know what the future fuel will be. Everyone is waiting to look at the technology, it isn’t long until diesel is gone!
What is the biggest roadblock preventing you from reaching your sustainability goals?
There is a lack of conversation on biofuels, the middle ground, it’s like an abyss. Everyone is constantly looking at the future yet no one is talking about now. With a downturn in the economy there is always a risk of ESG being de-escalated in favour of spending money in other areas. Luckily, we have inbuilt sustainability into EVRi’s business model so this is a limited risk, but I know this will be a worry for a lot of ESG professionals.
What advice would you give to someone starting their career in sustainability?
The environmental and ethical space is huge and vast, there are so many different things you can do. Understand what you are good at and use this to choose what aspect you want to work in. For instance, I enjoy working with businesses, so I work within corporates. I have friends who enjoy activism, they work in charity. One of my friends loves nature, they’re a bat ecologist! There is so much out there. Look at your skills, detach these from sustainability, then ask yourself what you enjoy and apply the sustainability lens.
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MORE SUSTAINABILITY SPOTLIGHT INTERVIEWS
You can read last weeks interview with, Bertel Haugen, Head of Innovation and Sustainability at Rude Health here.
If you would like to be featured in one of our spotlights please contact Amy.Hayward, Amy.hayward@iac-recruit.com.