1. Community sustainability
Within hours of starting his second presidency, Donald Trump signed an executive order once again withdrawing the US from the 2015 Paris Agreement. Claiming he was “putting America first”, with the casual sweep of a pen he seemingly isolated the country from the global campaign to curb catastrophic climate change.
There are fears that this time around – with more domestic and overseas allies than during his first tenure – Trump’s jettisoning of the United States’ climate targets could have more deleterious consequences for the wider world.
However, despite the federal complacency toward the climate emergency, coalitions of American states, cities, businesses and local institutions are pledging their commitment to pick up the baton of US climate leadership and continue the shift to a clean energy economy, albeit it at a more local level.
The US Climate Alliance, for instance, is a coalition of 24 state governors committed to tackling climate change, representing major economies like California and New York. These states have formally notified the UN Climate Change Executive Secretary of their commitment to the Paris Agreement's goals.
The coalition represents a massive 57% of the American economy and 55% of the population, and it’s collectively on track to achieve a 26% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by the end of 2025, while working towards 50-52% reductions by 2030.
The alliance also plans to maintain its international presence, with representatives set to attend the UN Climate Change Conference (COP30) in Brazil, continuing their tradition of participation in global climate discussions despite Trump’s withdrawal.
America Is All In is another alliance of leaders representing thousands of US cities, states, tribal nations, businesses and schools, as well as institutions of faith, health and culture.
These coalitions and more community-level commitments highlight how, under the US Constitution, the American federal system allows for climate action and environmental progress to continue through more local and regional initiatives, even when national policy moves in the opposite direction.
The mood music emanating from the White House is decidedly sombre. But there’s also something to be said for looking for the positive when it comes to sharing stories about the climate emergency – and what’s particularly noteworthy about what’s going in the US at a more local level is the sheer scale of these commitments when viewed as a whole.
2. Organisational sustainability
Although 2025 was meant to usher in major corporate sustainability reporting requirements, the year has begun with a degree of uncertainty. The change in US administration, delays in European regulations, as well as questions about various reporting directives have left many business leaders frustrated with the stop-start nature of reform.
However, this period of limbo offers a valuable opportunity to get your sustainability house in order, argues Forbes’ ESG contributor, Mary Foley. She highlights how even organisations well-prepared for sustainability transparency in 2025 face internal challenges that need addressing. Her numerous exchanges with senior executives, for instance, have surfaced the fact that the primary hurdle isn't the regulations themselves, but the lack of internal coordination.
She believes the key to success lies in establishing robust internal systems. Organisations should focus on breaking down departmental silos and creating clear communication channels to ensure sustainability data can flow smoothly across the business when new mandates arrive.
We can capitalise on this hiatus to think about how we best align communications with sustainability strategy, something that’s crucial for organisations seeking to embed environmental and social responsibility into their core business. While companies often prioritise external communications about their sustainability efforts, success begins with internal alignment and engagement.
Creating a culture of sustainability requires consistent two-way communication between leadership and employees about goals and progress. When staff feel part of the mission, it often boosts recruitment and retention, as studies shows potential employees, particularly younger cohorts, favour environmentally conscious employers.
Establishing strong internal engagement first gives organisations the bedrock for focussing on their external communications – ensuring their sustainability narratives are woven throughout corporate communications with credibility and transparency, rather than existing in isolation.
3. Economic sustainability
A new report from the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries provides a stark warning that climate change could slash global GDP by 50% between 2070 and 2090 without more action to tackle the crisis now. Current economic predictions severely underestimate the risks by not factoring in critical factors such as tipping points, sea temperature rises and climate-driven migration.
At 3°C of warming by 2050, for instance, the world could face billions of deaths, state failures and significant extinction events. The report calls for a paradigm shift in how leaders approach climate risk.
This throws into sharp relief the urgent need for organisations to embed sustainability initiatives into their operations. However, as this Trellis article from a series about how companies can integrate sustainability into their core business strategies highlights, even the best-laid plans can still run into roadblocks during the implementation phase.
Organisations often encounter six key barriers when embedding sustainability into their operations. Knowledge gaps among employees can hinder action, whilst the absence of sustainability metrics in KPIs may lead staff to take a 'someone else's responsibility' stance. Some businesses struggle to make the consumer case, despite evidence showing sustainable products can command significant price premiums. Fear of failure in meeting public commitments can stymie progress, whilst the ongoing ESG backlash can make it challenging to quantify sustainability's value. Finally, bureaucratic inertia can leave sustainability champions feeling stuck in the system.
Internal communicators play a vital role in overcoming these barriers. We can promote and facilitate education programmes to address knowledge gaps, help align departmental KPIs with sustainability goals, and share success stories about sustainable products. We're also perfectly positioned to create transparent dialogue about realistic goal-setting, highlight the business case for sustainability initiatives and foster cross-departmental collaboration to help overcome organisational inaction.
By maintaining clear two-way communication channels between leadership and employees, we can help build the momentum needed to embed sustainability initiatives successfully across our organisations.
4. Environmental sustainability
The hottest year on record sent the planet past 1.5°C of heating for the first time in 2024. Last year’s average temperature was 1.6°C above preindustrial levels, data from the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) shows.
That is a jump of 0.1°C from 2023, which was also a record hot year and represents levels of heat never experienced by modern humans.
The C3S data also shows that a record 44% of the planet was affected by strong to extreme heat stress on 10 July 2024, and that the hottest day in recorded history struck on 22 July.
The climate crisis caused an additional six weeks of dangerously hot days in 2024 for the average person, supercharging the deadly impact of heatwaves around the world and leaving millions prone to deadly temperatures.
The effects of human-caused global heating were far worse for those in certain parts of the world, analysis by World Weather Attribution (WWA) and Climate Central has shown. Those in Caribbean and Pacific island states were the hardest hit. Many endured about 150 more days of dangerous heat than they would have done without global heating.
Nearly half the world’s countries endured at least two months of high-risk temperatures. Yet even in the least affected places – such as the UK, US and Australia – the carbon pollution from fossil fuel burning led to an extra three weeks of elevated temperatures on average.
So, perhaps there is a certain irony that recent scientific analysis indicates that, over the decades to come, many of the world’s biggest oil ports will be overwhelmed by rising sea levels caused by the global heating emanating from the burning of the fossil fuels that they send around the planet.
5. Personal sustainability
With AI usage not set to diminish any time soon, data centre emissions are about to rise even further. Emissions have tripled since 2018, and more complex AI models like OpenAI’s new Sora will only accelerate this trend.
Even new kid on the block DeepSeek’s claims that it is more energy-efficient than its rivals don’t stand up to scrutiny once its energy-intensive “chain of thought” reasoning is factored into the equation.
Against that backdrop, it’s easy to feel paralysed by things that seem beyond our control. However, we can all make changes on a personal level when it comes to reducing our environmental footprints. After all, organisations are made up of individuals, and so are our communities – and action is needed at all levels.
We can also leverage our role as internal communicators to encourage colleagues to take small, personal differences through several key actions. These could include:
- Know your impact: use a carbon footprint calculator to identify your highest impact areas – and remember that imperfect action is better than no action at all.
- Follow the waste hierarchy: prioritise reducing consumption first, then reuse items where possible and recycle as a last resort. Focus particularly on eliminating single-use items.
- Check your spending: review where your money goes, from avoiding fast fashion to examining your investments and banking choices for sustainability credentials.
- Mind your diet: reduce food waste and consider reducing meat consumption in a way that's sustainable for your lifestyle, rather than making drastic unsustainable changes.
- Be energy efficient: tackle 'vampire loads' by unplugging unused devices, combine errands to reduce car trips and reconsider travel habits where possible, particularly flying.
- Use your voice: perhaps most importantly, speak up about environmental concerns. Vote for environmentally conscious policies. Talk to family and friends – and, of course, advocate at work.
- Sharing some of the things we can all do at a more individual level will go some way towards mitigating the sense of overwhelm that many of those around us can be forgiven for feeling right now.
