Latest news with #BezosEarthFund
Business Insider
19-07-2025
- Business
- Business Insider
Amazon Stock (NASDAQ:AMZN) Perks Up With Greater Sustainability Push
An operation like online retail giant Amazon (AMZN) is energy-intensive. There is simply no other way to put it. Between the legions of delivery vehicles bringing our ordered products to our doorsteps and the massive energy expenditures of data centers and the like, Amazon burns a lot of power. But Amazon is also working to reduce its power needs, and focus on sustainability, a process that is garnering it some respect. Sufficient respect, in fact, to push up Amazon stock fractionally in Friday afternoon's trading. Elevate Your Investing Strategy: Take advantage of TipRanks Premium at 50% off! Unlock powerful investing tools, advanced data, and expert analyst insights to help you invest with confidence. Make smarter investment decisions with TipRanks' Smart Investor Picks, delivered to your inbox every week. Amazon ships somewhere around a thousand packages a minute worldwide, reports note. And while there have been significant gains in its emissions patterns, Amazon has also been making headway with its Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) scales. Word from Amazon's Chief Sustainability Officer Kara Hurst notes that Amazon's pathway to being more sustainable will 'never be linear,' but progress is being made regardless. Amazon still has a goal to reach net-zero status by 2040, even as its total numbers are on the rise, up from 64.38 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent (MTCO2e) in 2023 to 68.25 million in 2024. But it did meet its goal of matching 100% of the electricity used with renewable energy, and has done so for the last two years. Amazon will never stop pulling power, but it can at least improve how much of that power comes from certain sources. New Leader for the Earth Fund In a bid to further improve things, Jeff Bezos recently tapped a new leader for the Bezos Earth Fund. A 'climate and biodiversity fund' valued at $10 billion, the fund will be run by the former head of the Alexa voice division, Tom Taylor. Taylor retired from Amazon after 23 years, back in 2022, and will now be president and CEO of the Bezos Earth Fund. Taylor noted that he was 'thrilled' to join the fund, planning to '…lead with the bold mandate to invent our way out of Earth's environmental challenges with a combination of long-term thinking, technical curiosity, and excellent execution.' Is Amazon a Good Long-Term Investment? Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Strong Buy consensus rating on AMZN stock based on 44 Buys and one Hold assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 22.25% rally in its share price over the past year, the average AMZN price target of $251.44 per share implies 11.28% upside potential.
Geek Wire
15-07-2025
- Business
- Geek Wire
Jeff Bezos picks retired Amazon exec as the new CEO of his $10B Bezos Earth Fund
Tom Taylor, president and CEO of the Bezos Earth Fund. (LinkedIn Photo) Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has pulled one of his former executives out of retirement to become the president and CEO of the Bezos Earth Fund, a philanthropic effort to help the planet. Tom Taylor worked for Amazon for more than two decades, retiring in October 2022 as senior vice president of Amazon Alexa and a member of the company's senior leadership team (S-team). 'I am thrilled to join the Bezos Earth Fund and lead with the bold mandate to invent our way out of Earth's environmental challenges with a combination of long-term thinking, technical curiosity, and excellent execution,' Taylor wrote today on LinkedIn. 'I am excited to work with Jeff and Lauren [Sanchez Bezos] to implement their vision and grateful to inherit an incredibly capable and mission driven team.' Bezos launched the fund in February 2020 and issued its first $791 million to 16 environmental groups later that year. The organization set a target of dispersing $10 billion by 2030, and has granted roughly $2.3 billion so far. Its diverse slate of programming includes focuses on land conservation, planet friendly foods, environmental justice, low-carbon energy and industries, climate tech innovation, monitoring and data, and financial markets. Taylor's appointment marks a notable change to the top spot, as the fund's top executives in the past had largely come from the environmental community. Andrew Steer, the former head of the World Resources Institute, was the fund's first CEO and president, resigning his position in February. 'Andrew has decades of experience in environmental and climate science as well as economic and social policy in the U.S., Europe, Asia, and Africa,' Bezos said at the time of Steer's hire in 2021. A couple of months later, the fund brought on Charlotte Pera, who was previously president and CEO of the ClimateWorks Foundation. She departed the Bezos initiative in January 2024, having served as vice president and deputy CEO. When he announced his departure earlier this year, Steer said the fund had 'assembled some of the leading international experts in our field and built a team of some of the most passionate, imaginative, caring, and joyful staff I have ever had the pleasure of working with.' Taylor started his Amazon career as senior vice president of seller services, Amazon Payments and Fulfillment by Amazon. Prior to that, he was director of operations at K2 sports and was an engineer at Delphi Automotive Systems. 'After I retired from Amazon, I followed the good advice to consider this as 'Quarter 3' of my life and looked for an opportunity that balanced my desire for both adventure and service,' he said on LinkedIn. 'Leading the Bezos Earth Fund is this perfect opportunity — a place where I can bring something to the table, learn from some amazing people, and help the planet now and for future generations.'
The Guardian
09-07-2025
- Science
- The Guardian
MethaneSat down: how New Zealand space ambitions fell off the radar
For scientist Sara Mikaloff-Fletcher, the news that a methane-tracking satellite was lost in space last week left her feeling like the air had been sucked from her lungs. It happened just days before New Zealand was due to take control of the spacecraft, known as MethaneSat, which was designed to 'name and shame' the worst methane polluters in the oil and gas industry. 'It was a pretty challenging moment in my career,' says Mikaloff-Fletcher, the Wellington-based lead of New Zealand's part of the mission. 'I was anticipating until a couple of days before this news that this would be a healthy mission that would last three to five years.' The satellite was New Zealand's first publicly funded space mission. Yet the project had been plagued with issues and delays, and last week officials confirmed that after only 15 months in orbit the satellite had lost contact with the ground and was likely unrecoverable. The loss of the satellite dealt a heavy blow to the country's fledgling government-funded space sector. New Zealand initially invested NZ$29m in MethaneSat, a project led by the US non-profit Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) with other finance coming from the Bezos Earth Fund, the Audacious Project and the Valhalla Foundation. The satellite's primary goal was to detect methane leaks from oil and gas production worldwide. But in New Zealand, Mikaloff-Fletcher leads a complementary project to explore if the satellite could also track the release of the potent greenhouse gas from agriculture. Methane from livestock accounts for almost half of New Zealand's greenhouse gas emissions. The project was years in the making and some experts have criticised New Zealand's involvement. In 2019, the government agreed to invest in the mission but the satellite's launch was delayed until March 2024. Almost NZ$12m of the funding was used to build a mission control centre at Rocket Lab, a private space company with a launchpad on the remote east coast of New Zealand and also operating from the US. The University of Auckland was to take over mission control last year but problems led to further delays. They included the satellite going into safe mode due to intense solar activity, and issues with operating its thrusters. The university never took control because the satellite stopped responding on 20 June. By this point New Zealand's total investment had risen to NZ$32m, according to the New Zealand Space Agency, because of additional funding allocated to maintain capability to take over operations. Judith Collins, minister for space in the New Zealand government, declined to comment on the loss of MethaneSat. The deputy head of the New Zealand Space Agency, Andrew Johnson, described it as 'clearly a disappointing development'. But Johnson says involvement in the mission has strengthened New Zealand's expertise and space capability, and the mission control centre at the University of Auckland's Te Pūnaha Ātea Space Institute will continue to be used as a training facility to position the country for future missions. However, Richard Easther, a University of Auckland physicist who is not involved in the project, says it was a mistake for New Zealand to invest in MethaneSat. He was initially excited about the mission, but says it's become 'clear they haven't been able to keep to schedule and deliver a functional spacecraft'. While the mission was deploying new methane-detecting sensors, the design of the spacecraft itself was not as well defined as it should have been when New Zealand invested in it and parts of it 'haven't been tested in space'. MethaneSat's mission lead and chief scientist for EDF Steve Hamburg says the mission was 'technologically ambitious' and the team that developed the satellite 'includes some of the world's most seasoned professionals in both public and private sector space flight'. Johnson says the providers of the satellite's structural and functional components, as well as the sensor, were selected before New Zealand joined the mission, but given the expertise of the professionals involved, 'we had no reason to doubt their judgement.' Jon Coifman, a spokesperson for MethaneSat, says it was unclear what caused the loss of contact, but an expert panel had been set up to investigate. The existing datasets would remain accessible 'for the foreseeable future' and more data would be released over the next few months. The team remains 'undeterred in our efforts to drive down methane pollution'. 'No other satellite could match the ability to detect changes in methane levels with such high resolution and high sensitivity over such wide areas,' Coifman says. Mikaloff-Fletcher says there have been other missions that have faced similar challenges. 'A great example is Nasa's Orbital Carbon Observatory mission, meant to deliver the most precise measurements of carbon dioxide ever made from space. It was launched in 2009 and fell into the ocean without making a single measurement,' Mikaloff-Fletcher says, though she notes further satellites were launched to achieve the mission. She says MethaneSat did record data that will be useful in tracking agricultural emissions, and her work in the field will continue despite the setback. Preliminary analysis shows the satellite's observations over agricultural targets in New Zealand line up well with modelling and measurements collected by aircraft-borne instruments, suggesting 'we will be able to quantify agricultural emissions in a wide range of different farming systems from existing data'. 'The satellite's life may be shorter than hoped, but the project will go on to shed new light on agricultural emissions from the data we have.'
Time of India
03-07-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Jeff Bezos' dream satellite fails mid-mission, halts global climate watch
Jeff Bezos ' ambitious climate-monitoring project, MethaneSAT, has suffered a major failure after losing all power in orbit, effectively ending its mission. Launched in early 2024 aboard a SpaceX rocket, the $88 million satellite was designed to track global methane emissions using advanced detection tools. Backed by the Bezos Earth Fund , Google, and the New Zealand government, the satellite aimed to bring unprecedented transparency to climate data. But now, with the system unresponsive and deemed unrecoverable, the mission has come to a sudden halt, raising serious concerns about the fragility of space-based climate monitoring infrastructure. Jeff Bezos' climate vision faces a major blow in orbit MethaneSAT was a flagship project of the Bezos Earth Fund, which had contributed over $10 million to its development as part of Jeff Bezos' larger goal to use space technology in the fight against climate change. The satellite was designed to detect small methane leaks across vast regions, providing publicly accessible data to help countries meet emission targets. Operated by the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), MethaneSAT was one of the few satellites entirely focused on methane tracking. Its failure now leaves a significant gap in global efforts to verify and report emissions under international climate pledges. Data legacy lives on, but future plans remain uncertain by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Giao dịch vàng CFDs với sàn môi giới tin cậy IC Markets Tìm hiểu thêm Undo Although MethaneSAT is now unresponsive, the EDF has stated that data collected prior to the power loss will continue to support climate research in the months ahead. Google had supported the mission with AI tools to manage the satellite's complex data output. However, no replacement satellite has been announced yet, casting uncertainty on the continuity of the mission. This loss also highlights the growing need for more durable and scalable orbital systems that can withstand the rigors of long-term space operations. The failure of MethaneSAT is a stark reminder of how vital and vulnerable space-based climate monitoring systems have become. Satellites like these are crucial tools in detecting emissions that are otherwise invisible from the ground, enabling real-time tracking of environmental changes on a global scale. As climate goals become more ambitious and urgent, the reliability of satellite-based observation will play a central role in holding nations and industries accountable for their emissions. Reinvesting in and reinforcing such space missions is essential for the future of climate transparency and action.
Engadget
02-07-2025
- Science
- Engadget
Bezos-funded satellite tracking methane emissions loses power in space
MethaneSAT, the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) methane-tracking satellite backed by the Bezos Earth Fund, is lost in space. Its ground team lost contact with the spacecraft on June 20 but tried to reestablish a connection until it learned in the morning of July 1 that MethaneSAT had lost power altogether. The team believes that the satellite is likely not recoverable. MethaneSAT collected data on methane emissions that have previously been untrackable in an effort to combat climate change. Methane is the second largest contributor to global warming after carbon dioxide, with agriculture, fossil fuels and waste decomposition being the largest sources. In its announcement, the MethaneSAT team said that the spacecraft's observations have given us critical insight about the distribution and volume of methane being released from oil and gas production regions. Thanks to the satellite, scientists have also developed the capability to "interpret the measurements from space and translate them into volumes of methane released." That knowledge can be used in future missions. EDF developed the mission, which launched in March 2024, to hold the countries who previously pledged to slash their methane emissions accountable. It created Google Cloud-powered algorithms to calculate and monitor methane emitted in certain regions with held from Harvard and Smithsonian scientists. While the satellite itself is gone, the MethaneSAT team vowed to work with other scientists to leverage the algorithms and software developed for the project. The team will also continue processing the data the satellite had sent back.
