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Towards sustainable perovskite light-emitting diodes
Perovskite light-emitting diodes (PeLEDs) are advancing to become the frontrunner candidates for the next generation of lighting and display technologies. However, despite rapid technical development, a thorough understanding of PeLEDs’ environmental and economic impacts—essential information for future commercialization—is currently lacking. Here we assess the environmental and economic performance of 18 representative PeLEDs, aiming to identify effective industrial techniques to develop sustainable PeLEDs from a life-cycle perspective. We find that, like mature organic LEDs, PeLEDs show excellent environmental performance. In addition, we demonstrate that lead is not a major source of toxicity from PeLEDs. We estimate that, to commercialize PeLEDs and improve their sustainability, their lifetime should reach the order of 10,000 hours to compensate for the relative environmental impacts. The techno-economic assessment indicates that the cost of future PeLEDs will probably be in the vicinity of US$100 m–2, comparable to that of commercial organic LED panels. Overall, this study shows the potential of PeLEDs as next-generation lighting technology from environmental, economic and technical perspectives, providing insights relevant to their future development.
Exploring corporate social responsibility practices in the telecommunications, broadcasting and courier sectors: a comparative industry analysis
This study aims to dissect and understand the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) endeavours of organisations within Malaysia’s telecommunications, broadcasting, postal and courier services sectors, particularly those holding licenses from the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC). These sectors were chosen for this study due to their crucial role in Malaysia’s economy and society, their notable environmental influence, the regulatory and public attention they receive as well as the distinct challenges and opportunities they face in implementing CSR. Employing a qualitative methodology, the study utilises a semi-structured interview protocol to gather rich, detailed insights from top management across eight listed and non-listed companies. This approach ensures a comprehensive exploration of CSR types, practices and their implementation within the target sectors. Purposive sampling was adopted to select informants with specific expertise, ensuring that the data collected was relevant and insightful. The findings of this study underscore that while telecommunications firms actively participate in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives, their efforts predominantly benefit the broader society, with less emphasis placed on shareholders. Additionally, it was observed that environmental issues receive relatively minimal attention from these organisations. This diversity highlights the necessity for a more equitable CSR approach that caters equally to the needs of all stakeholders, including the environment. Such a strategy is crucial for cultivating a sustainable and ethically sound business environment. The implications of this research are manifold. For companies, it emphasises the critical nature of adopting an all-encompassing CSR strategy that fosters competitive advantage while promoting sustainable development. The study advocates for a paradigm shift towards CSR practices that are not only philanthropic but also prioritise environmental stewardship and value creation.
A reform of value-added taxes on foods can have health, environmental and economic benefits in Europe
Fiscal policies can provide important incentives for encouraging the dietary changes needed to achieve global policy targets. Across Europe, the foods relevant to health and the environment often incur reduced but non-zero value-added tax (VAT) rates at about half the maximum rates, which allows for providing both incentives and disincentives. Integrating economic, health and environmental modelling, we show that reforming VAT rates on foods, including increasing rates on meat and dairy, and reducing VAT rates on fruits and vegetables can improve diets and result in health, environmental and economic benefits in most European countries. The health improvements were primarily driven by reductions in VAT rates on fruits and vegetables, whereas most of the environmental and revenue benefits were driven by increased rates on meat and dairy. Our findings suggest that differentiating VAT rates based on health and environmental considerations can support changes towards healthier and more sustainable diets in Europe.
Biodiversity offsets, their effectiveness and their role in a nature positive future
Biodiversity offsetting is a mechanism for addressing the impacts of development projects on biodiversity, but the practice remains controversial and its effectiveness generally poor. In the context of the Global Biodiversity Framework and the emergence of new approaches for mitigating damage, we need to learn from the past. In this Review, we explore biodiversity offsetting, its effectiveness and its future prospects, especially in relation to ‘nature positive’ goals. Offsets often fall short of their stated goal: to achieve at least no net loss of affected biodiversity. However, such failures are prominent because offsets have more explicit quantitative objectives than most other conservation approaches, whose effectiveness is also variable. These clear objectives provide the potential for the transparency that alternative approaches to addressing negative human impacts on biodiversity lack. Unfortunately, promising alternatives are scarce, so offsetting and offset-like mechanisms remain a necessary component of strategies to halt and reverse nature loss. However, improving their performance is essential. No quick and easy solution exists; instead, upholding best practice principles and rigorous implementation — including in the face of challenges from opposing narratives and interest groups — remains key.
Bank lending and environmental quality in Gulf Cooperation Council countries
To achieve economies with net-zero carbon emissions, it is essential to develop a robust green financial intermediary channel. This study seeks empirical evidence on how domestic bank lending to sovereign and private sectors in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries impacts carbon dioxide and greenhouse gas emissions. We employ PMG-ARDL model to panel data comprising six countries in GCC over twenty years for carbon dioxide emissions and nineteen years for greenhouse gas emissions. Our findings reveal a long-term positive impact of both bank lending variables on carbon dioxide and greenhouse gas emissions. In addition, lending to the government shows a negative short-term effect on greenhouse gas emissions. The cross-country results demonstrate the presence of a long-run effect of explanatory variables on both types of emissions, except for greenhouse gas in Saudi Arabia. The sort-term impact of the explanatory variables on carbon dioxide and greenhouse gas emissions is quite diverse. Not only do these effects differ across countries, but some variables have opposing effects on the two types of emissions within a single country. The findings of this study present a new perspective for GCC economies: neglecting total greenhouse gas emissions and concentrating solely on carbon dioxide emissions means missing critical information for devising effective strategies to combat threats of environmental degradation and achieve net-zero goals.
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