Jeffrey Whitford, newly promoted Chief Sustainability, Social Responsibility and Inclusion Officer for Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, joins Russ Fordyce to explain how bio-based high-performance liquid chromatography lab solvents that work as one-to-one drop-in replacements won Sustainability Product of the Year at the 2026 BIG Sustainability Awards. He shares the 18-month promise that took six years, why he set out to decommoditize a commodity, and the professor who tried to break the product and could not. Along the way, he covers honest carbon accounting, supplier days, and the simple principle he would give any executive: start somewhere and quantify the impact.

• Guest: Jeffrey Whitford, Chief Sustainability, Social Responsibility and Inclusion Officer for Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/jeffrey-whitford-5419b812
• Website: sigmaaldrich.com

• [00:00] Welcome, and congratulations on the award and the promotion
• [01:12] A 358-year-old company in one minute
• [03:37] Solvents 101 and a 10 percent footprint
• [05:14] Novel substitution versus the drop-in replacement
• [10:52] The bio-based acetonitrile launch
• [13:06] When product managers take ownership
• [14:59] Making the hurdle lower
• [16:47] Why the goal is no green premium
• [20:35] What surprised customers
• [22:59] A seat at the table
• [28:43] One principle: start somewhere and quantify
• [30:07] Closing thoughts and congratulations

• Remove the adoption tax. Whitford's first bio-based solvent asked customers to change how they work, so his team rebuilt it as a one-to-one drop-in. In regulated labs, the greener option wins when nobody has to revalidate a method.
• Decommoditize the boring core product. Solvents are a commodity category, yet they made up about 10 percent of the company's footprint. Differentiating a product everyone must buy, even with a story as surprising as whiskey waste, turns sustainability into a commercial advantage.
• Trust and ownership are the real scoreboard. Whitford calls carbon accounting art and science, and says his job is predicated on trust. The sign it worked was product managers taking ownership, until it was not just a sustainability thing anymore but simply how the business runs.

• MilliporeSigma bio-based HPLC solvent launch announcement
• Trellis: Why MilliporeSigma's sustainability lead sits in on sales pitches
• My Green Lab: Carbon Impact of Biotech and Pharma reports
• Technology Networks: Highlights from My Green Lab's 2025 impact report
• GHG Protocol Corporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Standard

Congratulations to MilliporeSigma, the U.S. and Canada Life Science business of Merck KGaA, Darmstadt, Germany, winner of Sustainability Product of the Year at the 2026 BIG Sustainability Awards. Learn more about the program: Sustainability Awards

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Rob Barrosa, President and CEO of Electrify America, joins Russ Fordyce on the Winners' Circle Podcast after winning the Sustainability Leadership Award (Organization) at the 2026 Sustainability Awards. Rob explains why his team built 350 kW chargers before the cars could use them, how battery storage and utility partnerships keep the grid in balance, and how ride and drive events, incentives and workforce training bring first-time drivers into EVs. If you have wondered what really holds EV-curious drivers back, this conversation has answers.

• Guest: Rob Barrosa, President and CEO
• Company: Electrify America
• Award: 2026 Sustainability Awards, Sustainability Leadership Award (Organization)

• [00:00] Welcome and the 2026 Sustainability Award
• [00:53] Inside Electrify America: 5,600 chargers across 47 states
• [02:55] What has changed since 2018
• [03:34] Betting on 350 kW before the cars arrived
• [04:57] Charging for drivers without a home charger
• [07:07] Batteries, the grid and the AI data center comparison
• [08:12] Inside the community-led education program
• [10:09] Ride and drive events and getting people in the seats
• [11:07] Training the next workforce
• [12:38] What really holds EV-curious drivers back
• [14:47] Exchange programs and cleaner air
• [16:17] The hard parts: utilities, permitting and the handshake
• [19:56] Location strategy: amenities, highways, then cities
• [23:33] Measuring what community programs deliver
• [26:00] Families, kids and the moment the lights go on
• [28:36] Where charging goes next: speed, trucks and the grid
• [30:50] Planning with utilities and cities
• [32:49] Wrap-up and thanks

• Build for where the market is going. Electrify America deployed 350 kW charging when many people said it was unnecessary, because the team knew longer range, faster charging vehicles were on the way. Today cars are pushing 400 to 600 kW, and some models charge at a megawatt.
• The hard parts are not just hardware. Utilities, permitting agencies and the car-to-charger handshake took years of education and a Northern Virginia lab with hundreds of thousands of testing hours. The next challenge is the grid, which is why battery storage and energy management matter.
• Awareness and price move drivers. Ride and drive events get people in the seat, incentives like $2,000 to $3,000 off address the price gap, and workforce training builds the people who will support the network.

• Electrify America
• Rob Barrosa on LinkedIn
• Electrify America on LinkedIn
• Nomination video on YouTube

Know an organization doing sustainability work worth celebrating? Learn about the Sustainability Awards and nominate them.

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Zach LaValley, CTO and EVP of Product, Data and Engineering at RapidSOS, joins Russ Fordyce to talk about the 2026 Stratus Award win and how connected phones, cars and smartwatches are reaching 911. Zach explains why RapidSOS adds a fast lane next to existing systems instead of replacing them, and how humans and AI share the work. He closes with two practical tips: enable the emergency health profile on your phone, and ask your vendors whether your car is connected.

• Guest: Zach LaValley, CTO and EVP of Product, Data and Engineering
• Company: RapidSOS
• Award: 2026 Stratus Awards, Solution / Platform as a Service (Product)

• [00:00] Welcome to the Winners' Circle
• [00:50] What RapidSOS does
• [02:46] Software, hardware and the redundancy backup
• [04:22] Why 911 infrastructure is slow to change
• [06:05] What happens when a device is not on the network
• [08:21] Ending the game of telephone
• [09:59] Better responses and the Cass County crash
• [11:52] Layering on top instead of replacing
• [13:58] Synthetic data and privacy
• [15:14] Earning trust with a fast lane
• [20:27] Humans in, on and over the loop
• [23:28] Call metadata and intelligence
• [24:51] Better decision support for dispatchers
• [26:36] The next three to five years
• [28:13] Check your emergency health profile

• The 911 call is only one signal now. Cars, phones and smartwatches can all send location and context, and RapidSOS connects them into 911 and out to responders in the field.
• Add a lane, do not rip out the road. Zach's team layers on top of existing systems so agencies can shift traffic at their own pace and always be able to go back.
• Choose the right human and AI relationship for each use case. Humans can be in the loop, on the loop or over the loop, depending on the job and the comfort level of the agency.

• RapidSOS
• Zach LaValley on LinkedIn
• 2021 911 Profile Database Report
• NHTSA publication DOT HS 809 896
• AARP guide to smartphone emergency info and Medical ID
• Nomination video on YouTube

Congratulations to RapidSOS on winning a 2026 Stratus Award. Know a team that deserves the same recognition? Learn more and nominate at the Stratus Award for Cloud Computing.

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