For those of you who know me well, you’ll know that I am a passionate pond hockey player. At the weekends I can be found on the outdoor hockey rinks in my local community with my skates on practicing shots. One of the things I value most about this time isn’t just playing hockey and keeping fit, it’s also a chance to get back to nature and be outside together with my family.
However, there’s an increasing problem. The seasons on natural ice are getting shorter. The ponds are melting faster. I believe this is because of climate change.
For the last few years I’ve been volunteering with the non-profit association Save Pond Hockey. The concept of Save Pond Hockey is extremely simple: global warming will end the game of pond hockey, as we know it. To combat this, we are uniting the global hockey communities against climate change and raising money to donate towards climate action. By doing so, we intend to save hockey for future generations and help provide a space for the future Wayne Gretzky.
So far we’ve organized 20 tournaments and managed to raise 50k EUR for environmental causes and to purchase emissions allowances from the EU Emissions Trading Scheme. Unfortunately this year’s tournaments had to be cancelled due to COVID-19, but in 2022 we will come back bigger and stronger. So if anyone would like to get involved and organize a tournament, let me know!
Viljo Mettala, Global Key Account Manager Motion 
We all know that climate change is a global issue – the biggest we currently face but sometimes we only really register its true impact when we see the direct implications in our day to day lives. But we have to take action before the implications become irreversible.
One of the greatest impacts we can make on reducing emissions is through our leading technologies. I take great pride in working at ABB, where we are pushing the boundaries of motor efficiency every day and tackling one of the biggest challenges – industrial energy efficiency.
Industrial energy efficiency has the huge capacity to combat the climate emergency and we have the technology to address the challenges right now. When I work with a customer to install a more energy efficient motor, I know that this is one small action that if multiplied, will add up to make a massive difference.
It has been estimated that, if all of the more than 300 million industrial electric motor-driven systems currently in operation were replaced with optimized, high-efficiency equipment, global electricity consumption could be reduced by up to 10 percent.
This could be the difference as to whether our kids are playing pond hockey in 2050 or not, and that motivates me to join the energy efficiency movement.
Viljo Mettala
