Siemens' Alison Taylor: Corporate sustainability about stewardship, not compliance

What keeps a sustainability executive up at night?

According to Siemens vice president of sustainability Alison Taylor, it's not just the daily grind of compliance, policy and coordination that's always top of mind -- it's also the vision necessary to be an industry leader.

Taylor, who formerly served as chief counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works and counsel to the U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce, is primarily responsible for representing Siemens on environmental issues on Capitol Hill.

Taylor visited SmartPlanet's New York City headquarters last month, where I spoke with her about what kind of issues occupy the desk of the hottest executive post of the 21st century.

SmartPlanet: You have a background in environmental law. What makes a good CSO?

AT: Chief sustainability officers have all different kinds of backgrounds, such as marketing -- and sustainability initiatives come out of marketing, too.

The reason I have this job is because my policy background. Climate change and energy are absolutely inseparable as issues. You have to come to a company and ask, what is your policy? There's already a policy on climate change at Siemens.

SP: Siemens is a multinational company. Is it difficult to ensure consistent policy across international borders?

AT: Europeans are more energy conscious, and more sensitive to gas prices, smaller appliances... their employee and consumer base is a little further along the line.

With U.S. policy, there’s a great deal of frustration within the company about what’s going on. In the background, we're figuring out where we should be, not just in what we say to the public and on Capitol Hill, but where are we in terms of programs and planning for the future.

The policy has to line up with business initiatives. It’s not only talking about what Siemens does; it’s making sure what Siemens is doing what we’re talking about.

This really isn’t a compliance issue. We’re way beyond compliance. Sustainability is really about forgetting about what the law says you have to do and is [instead about] what you’re going to do about the future.

It’s absolutely embarrassing to not have a compliance plan. Being caught with a major dump in a river is reputationally damaging in a major way. There’s really been a shift in thinking.

This is really beyond compliance. This is stewardship.

It’s a lot easier to have a company-wide initiative [than localized policies]. If you design for the most stringent regulations, you're ahead of the game.

It's just sensible. It’s not just altruistic and wonderful.

SP: For some, hearing that sound environmental policy is in business' interest seems...counter-intuitive. Is it?

AT: We're not a bunch of scientists. What we do know is our market and our products and where we can innovate.

What we do need is some kind of certainty. Predicting the market is what we’re about, not predicting science. The market needs some kind of carbon incentive.

Siemens is not a big emitter. We’re not a big manufacturer. We're an infrastructure company, a technology provider. The big question for us is how are our customers going to be affected by these regulations.

There’s still some skepticism on Capitol Hill. A coming together of environmentalists and business can help. Regulation is not entirely the driver anymore [in the U.S.]. This is the sweet spot. This is the time to act.

We need regulatory incentives, a price for carbon, a renewable energy standard.

[At Siemens,] Sylvania is the furthest along [in sustainability initiatives]. The second furthest: building technologies.

Pressure is coming from the clients. They are responding to pressure and ensure that they’re offering something their competitors don’t have. With B2B, there's a little less pressure.

SP: Going "green" means many things to many people. How do you make an impact?

AT: People define sustainability differently. In a business, it depends on where your priorities are.

The way you have to start it is going up your supply chain and asking questions -- for example, we have over 100,000 products.

I know that there's no real methodology. Because there's not a legal requirement to do it….not everybody follows the same protocol, and there's room for interpretation.

SP: So how do you ensure you're doing a better job than, say, your corporate rival General Electric?

AT: It is very hard to compare these things. No two companies are that comparable. Our goals aren't that comparable to GE.

We're getting to a point where all this data thrown out there is frustrating people. We need something to level the playing field. Some kind of standard regulation. It is worrisome. The Dow Jones Sustainability Index is the best thus far, but it's a big mystery where you're going to come out and why.

With sustainability, we're showcasing a part of our portfolio that we're not used to showing before: high-speed rail; light rail; wind turbines; natural gas turbines; clean coal tech, where we scrub stuff out; water treatment tech, using a membrane; gasification tech, including carbon capture; solar; motors, such as those in an assembly plant; and building technologies, such as energy audits and automation.

SP: That's an impressive spread, but I noticed you didn't mention the smart grid.

AT: We're looking at smart grid. What is the smart grid? Everybody has a different definition there.

Right now, it's about getting the right incentives in place and getting operational requirements, which is tough in this economy.

Our Neptune project involves underwater power from New York to Long Island. But we're not into home metering. We're more about the transmission and distribution model, such as [power] charging.

The question is how far the consumer will want to go. There's a fear that utility will tell you how to use your power.

Photo: U.S. president Barack Obama visits a Siemens factory in Fort Madison, Iowa.

Read on for a discussion about corporate social responsibility with Siemens Foundation vice chairman Jim Whaley.

This post was originally published on Smartplanet.com