When it comes to climate change, businesses need to aim high

Environmental sustainability has captured a commanding position on the national and global stage, and quite rightly so. Today, at the Cisco Live Service Provider Summit, I joined a panel to discuss how Optus places sustainability at the forefront of everything we do – we are changing what customers expect of telcos and redefining what a modern telco is.

According to The Australian Institute’s Climate of a Nation Report 2022, increasingly, Australians are concerned about climate change (75%) and the majority of Australians (67%) agree Australia should be a world leader in finding solutions to climate change.

Australian businesses need to rise to the challenge of truly serving as enablers of sustainability. We all can play an integral role to minimise our collective footprint and communicate our respective approaches, so consumers can make informed decisions on where they spend their dollars.

Optus has built our sustainability commitments into our business plans and product roadmaps. Optus has a robust sustainability strategy, focusing on six key social and environmental pillars: climate action, circular economy, digital enablement, sustainable innovation, future of work and equity and inclusion. Each pillar comes with a set of ambitious sustainability targets that we're committed to reaching by 2025.

Taking meaningful action

We believe that working collaboratively at a sector level to drive sustainability is our greatest opportunity. “Scope 3 emissions”, which occur indirectly through a business’ operations, make up the majority of our emissions, as our mobile network consumes energy.

As we have developed roadmaps to help guide our decarbonisation strategy, Scope 3 emissions have been a focus. This year, we completed our first assessment of our full Scope 3 emissions inventory, the first step in identifying how we can reduce our Scope 3 emissions from our supply chain, with the goal of reducing our Scope 3 emissions by 30% from our 2015 baseline by 2030. We have accelerated the necessary shift by backing our electricity demand by renewable energy sources. To

do this, in March 2022, Optus made a commitment to having 100% of its electricity requirements backed by renewable energy sources by the end of 2025.

Our deployment of Australia’s latest energy efficient radio access network (RAN) at our Moorebank site in Sydney takes us a step closer to our goal. The new RAN, deployed in partnership with Ericsson, leverages lightweight, new generation radios and basebands which reduce the consumption of energy. This new RAN is critical not only to the sustainable growth of our 4G and 5G network, but also in helping us meet our sustainability commitments to reduce our emissions and move to a 100% renewable energy model.

Partnering for better Australian outcomes

In Australia, worsening bushfire seasons are not only a scourge on our communities, but also a concern for most Australian infrastructure players.

Optus has released research alongside CSIRO as part of a joint nationwide project to improve bushfire resilience of critical telecommunications, benefitting all industry players. We assessed the potential impacts of embers, radiation and flame on and around Optus’ sites to identify the most at-risk sites and prioritise site design changes. We are implementing the recommended mitigations to make impactful upgrades two sites in Victoria as part of a larger, long-term resiliency program.

We have also partnered with Eltek to create the Yes! CPX (Critical Power eXtender), a unique-battery solution which can ensure transmission hubs provide dependent downstream mobile sites an extra 10 to 20 hours’ continuity of service when the transmission hub’s main grid power fails. The 10 to 20 hours can give power authorities the time to restore services or allow Optus to access a site safely with a portable generator, especially if the area is impacted by extreme weather or natural disaster. The extended power allows those people impacted by the events more time to keep connected when it truly does matter the most.

The Yes! CPX unit isn’t exclusive to Optus, and we hope that companies with critical infrastructure around the world can improve the resiliency of their operations with this innovation.

Our customers’ contribution

We have also empowered our customers with the necessary knowledge and tools to make their own positive impact. Our newest Living Network feature, Optus Eco, allows customers to help offset the impact of their mobile phone use by choosing one of the Australian carbon reduction projects (Bonora Downs in NSW or Tallering Station in WA) available in the app. Optus Eco also enables customers to reduce their environmental impact through simple and easy measures like recycling old phones, repurposing pre-loved mobiles, opting for eSIMs over plastic ones and choosing paperless bills. Even small changes add up! 

Our partnership with Mobile Muster, a national e-waste recycling program, provides Australians a way to recycle their old electronic devices at various drop off points including Optus retail stores across Australia. In July this year, we expanded the e-waste products we can collect, with the Mobile Muster bins now accepting mobiles and accessories, modems and routers, smart speakers, tracking devices, gaming consoles and tablets. During FY22, we increased our e-waste collection by 62% under the program when compared to FY21.

The responsibility to reduce carbon emissions doesn’t just lie with government and businesses. From how we vote to how we spend our money, our individual actions have an impact. We know that this matters to our customers, and we will continue in our efforts to raise our standards and be the telco they expect us to be.