Episode 6: Show Notes.

The built environment industry has had a bad reputation for many years because of the detrimental impact it has on the planet. Although the pace has been slow for a number of reasons, the industry is now starting to change, and today’s guest is one of the people leading the charge. Michael McElligott began his career as a construction worker, which is where he began to develop his inherent passion for social development and environmental sustainability. Through a 3 month, 18-hour-a-day deep dive into these areas of interest, Michael came up with the idea for the Smart Green Group, a property development firm of which he is the CEO. Smart Green Group is on a mission to help the built environment industry transition towards regenerative, socially equitable, circular systems. In today’s episode, Michael explains the transitions that are happening (and that still need to happen) within the built environment sector in order to ensure that we are able to survive and thrive on planet Earth for many years to come.

Key Points From This Episode:

• Michael shares where his passion for sustainability and circularity originated.
• Some of Michael’s biggest milestones during his time in the construction industry.
• How Michael became involved in the creation of a digital bank.
• The transformative 3 month period of Michael’s life, from which Smart Green Group was born.
• Why Michael chose the name Smart Green Group for his company.
• Reasons that the construction industry is so slow to change.
• One of the biggest enablers of green building.
• Benefits of a framework which was triggered by results found by the Royal Commission.
• Major changes that are taking place across the world with regard to the build environment industry's focus on impact.
• Version one versus version two of the circular economy.
• Why Australia’s sustainability sector is unique, and where it fell short.
• The beauty of the circular economy, and what more we need to be doing to save our planet and ourselves.
• Five built environment principles which should shape the future of the built environment industry.
• Some of the other exciting projects that Michael is spending his time on.
• Challenges of starting a circular economy, and a strategy for overcoming them.
• The importance of global collaboration in bringing about change.

Quotable Quotes

“My real passion is market changing and society shaping.” — Michael McElligott [0:06:48]

“We won’t call it green building in 10 years, it’ll just be building.” — Michael McElligott [0:10:12]

“The world is absolutely cranking right now when it comes to sustainability, future focused development, the reshaping of the way societies view our living conditions.” — Michael McElligott [0:14:15]

“We need to create a regenerative economy which is totally taken off GDP and going from a whole new metric of how we built out this world, and we really need to take our places as custodians for the planet.” — Michael McElligott [0:18:35]

“Until people’s dollars represent their values and they're willing to talk with their pocket, things aren’t going to change.” — Michael McElligott [0:22:00]

Links mentioned in this episode:

Michael McElligott on LinkedIn
Smart Green Group
Sustainable Digitalisation Project
Circulist

Host Nick Gonios
Producer Jim Lounsbury