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On December 4, 2020, Brian Gutknecht, strategic marketing leader at GE Vernova, coined a memorable phrase to describe the era-defining topic of climate change. “It’s the ‘everything, everywhere’ problem,” he explained on the first episode of Cutting Carbon, the GE Vernova podcast that launched that year.

The world needs a breakthrough to lower emissions from heavy industry, and a solution may be brewing in Japan. IHI Corporation, one of the country’s oldest manufacturers, and GE Vernova have teamed up in recent years to work to unlock the secrets of ammonia. Under their latest joint development agreement, signed on Christmas Day 2023, the companies will work for the next two years developing technology to combust ammonia in turbines that normally run on natural gas.

Getting renewable electricity to big population centers is a growing challenge in the United States, but in the high desert of central New Mexico a plan is coming together. There, near the tiny town of Corona, GE Vernova will deploy 674 of its new “workhorse” 3.6-154 wind turbines* for the SunZia project and its developer, Pattern Energy. When completed in 2026, this colossus of a project will weigh in at a total 3,500 MW, making it the largest wind farm — and in fact the largest renewables project — in the Western Hemisphere, providing enough power for some 3 million people.

According to the Paris Agreement, the world must cut emissions by roughly 45% by 2030 and reach net zero by 2050 in order to stay below 1.5 degrees Celsius of global warming. This is a tall order in a very short amount of time — and countries around the world are setting ambitious targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) and bring them as close to zero as possible.

At the COP28 climate conference, now taking place in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), GE Vernova reached out to eight artists from countries across the Middle East, Africa, Europe, and South America through a collaboration with the creative services organization Neol, asking them to use an unexpected canvas to create a “Wonders of Wind” exhibit as part of the Blue Zone, located in Expo City Dubai.

Nearly 20 years ago, an oil-and-gas financier named Matt Simmons warned that Saudi Arabia was running out of oil. His book Twilight in the Desert was a sensation in 2005, when the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was producing 9.5 million barrels a day of crude oil. He was wrong: Last year the kingdom was producing 10.6 million barrels a day. So Saudi Arabia’s plan to diversify is not driven by scarcity.

It was in the southwestern German city of Stuttgart in the 1880s that Karl Benz devised what is considered the first automobile, the Benz Patent-Motorwagen No. 1. ­­­­­Today Stuttgart serves as the headquarters of automakers like Mercedes-Benz and Porsche, making the city synonymous with speed. So it’s fitting that Stuttgart is now one of the sites where the country is racing ahead of the pack in one of the 21st century’s biggest industrial challenges.

“GE’s a 130-year-old company founded by Thomas Edison. And it’s changed a lot over 130 years. But we’ve always had one thing in common: using innovation and technology to lift up the quality of life for people everywhere. That’s never been more important than it is today.” 

Deep expertise. Diversity of perspective. Experience guiding people and organizations to success. These qualities are in abundance among the leaders who will come to the table — two tables, more precisely — in 2024 as members of the boards of directors for GE Vernova and GE Aerospace.