On Tuesday 18 May, Solange Chamberlain, chief operating officer of commercial banking at NatWest, will join a panel of guests for a session titled ‘Navigating the journey to net zero: how growing businesses will play their part’. The panel will discuss which technologies and business models will help the scale-up ecosystem become carbon neutral.

Within her role, Chamberlain manages NatWest’s Change and Transformation programmes and is the executive sponsor for commercial banking’s response to climate change, helping to drive the transition of both the business and its customers to a low-carbon economy.

She says: “All businesses have an active part to play in reducing carbon emissions and limiting the impact of climate change, regardless of what stage of growth they’re at. For scale-ups, addressing and mitigating against your climate impact isn’t just the right thing to do – it makes good business sense and is a necessity for future success.

“Investors and consumers alike are increasingly putting their spending power behind businesses that can demonstrate strong environmental credentials, while growing businesses that understand their carbon emissions are also better placed to cut their energy usage and spot opportunities for greater efficiency.

“In this session I’ll be discussing how scale-ups can build sustainability into their growth strategies, and the ways in which NatWest as a bank is also contributing to the UK government’s goal to reach net zero by 2050.”

• Stephen Welton, executive chairman of SME investment company BGF. Prior to taking up the role of executive chairman in July 2020, Welton was the founder CEO of BGF (formerly the Business Growth Fund). Under his leadership BGF has grown from one to 16 offices across the UK and Ireland, with more than £2.2bn invested in ambitious SMEs.

• Baroness Brown of Cambridge DBE FREng FRS, UK Low Carbon Business Ambassador and Climate Change Committee board member. Baroness Brown is an engineer and a cross-bench member of the House of Lords, with extensive experience in industry and academia. She is currently chair of the Carbon Trust and led the King Review on decarbonising transport (2007) for the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

• Paul Hayes, CEO, Seasalt. The Cornish fashion retailer employs an ambitious sustainability strategy and became one of the first fashion brands to sign up to the British Retail Consortium (BRC) Climate Action Roadmap in November 2020, pledging to support the retail industry in working towards carbon net zero by 2040.

• Jo-Jo Hubbard, co-founder and CEO, Electron. Hubbard started her energy career in cleantech financing and investment, specialising in solar, wind and batteries. Electron is working with existing and emerging energy market participants to create the first digital energy marketplace, focused on helping to deliver net zero in a cost-efficient and resilient way.

• Dr Emily Shuckburgh OBE, director, Cambridge Zero, University of Cambridge. Dr Shuckburgh is a mathematician and climate scientist and a fellow of Darwin College, a fellow of the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership, and an associate fellow of the Centre for Science and Policy. In her previous role at the British Antarctic Survey she led a national research programme on polar climate change.

Scaleup Week: The Business Plan For more information and to register for this free event, click here.