With early roots in baseball, Bethany Brantley's 15-year sustainability career has followed a unique path across research, finance, and digital infrastructure—building ESG and impact programs for corporates and investors. Today, as Global Head of Sustainability at STACK Infrastructure, she leads the global function and team to embed climate-forward strategy into siting, development, operations, and tenant partnerships—advancing energy and resource efficiency, water stewardship, and the company’s net zero roadmap.
What set you on the path to your sustainability leadership role at STACK?
My journey started in undergrad. I chose TCU to chase a dream of playing D1 soccer, but as my academic priorities shifted, I hung up my cleats after one season and pivoted to an internship with the Texas Rangers. Through their ownership circle, I gained two mentors who sponsored me to pursue an unconventional study abroad in the Dominican Republic around microfinance and baseball education standards.
Working along the Haitian border where climate change had decimated water access, I was tasked with developing a holistic ‘microfinance + education’ model to pilot water projects built to serve rural communities with permanent clean water solutions. In parallel, supporting Nolan Ryan’s stewardship work showed me a related systems challenge—different domain, same underlying gap: extraordinary talent can enter MLB from Caribbean academies, yet many athletes lack education and life skills to fall back on.
Seeing the throughline taught me that success without scaffolding is fragile. A water project can operate and still fail a community without financing, training, and local ownership. A player can reach the big leagues and still be vulnerable without education and financial literacy to navigate a new economy and culture. That’s when I learned that sustainability isn’t a point-in-time solution—it’s a systems change paradigm.
That experience changed how I saw the world and my role in it.
I went on to pursue my master’s in environmental management at Harvard, which shaped my early career bridging climate with finance across research and VC/private equity roles. I joined IPI Partners in 2022, STACK’s owner at the time, where I built their global ESG practice and the early foundations of STACK’s sustainability program. Today, I lead that work from within, focused on making responsible growth repeatable by embedding sustainability into the core of delivery.
What are the key determinants of success for building out a robust sustainability program and net zero strategy?
Ultimately, sustainability scales when it’s treated as a business imperative: clear top-down mandate and sponsorship, paired with a deeply cross-functional operating model. Equally important, the success of any sustainability program comes down to the people you bring together to build it—and ensuring they’re empowered, connected, and set up to execute across the organization.
On net zero, strategies tend to succeed when they’re engineered into delivery. We don’t treat sustainability, energy strategy, construction, and operations as separate workstreams—they move in lockstep from dirt to delivery. STACK’s footprint spans 24 markets across North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific, so global alignment is also paramount, and execution requires regional expertise.
"We don't treat sustainability, energy strategy, construction, and operations as separate workstreams—they move in lockstep from dirt to delivery."
Bethany Brantley, Global Head of Sustainability at STACK Infrastructure
At the center of our net zero roadmap is an annual GHG inventory built on decision-grade data that allows for linking actions to emissions reduction. This strong data foundation enabled STACK to commit to achieving net zero emissions by 2050 through the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi).
Operationally, we’re focused on driving down Power Usage Effectiveness (PUE), sourcing renewable energy, adopting low-Global Warming Potential (GWP) refrigerants, and transitioning backup generators to Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil (HVO) renewable diesel where feasible. Across supply chain activities, we perform lifecycle assessments for new builds, require environmental product declarations for high-impact materials, and set carbon intensity thresholds in design specifications. Finally, we’re tackling embodied carbon by scaling our use of next-generation materials. We recently piloted the use of net-zero carbon steel, and became the first company to use electrochemical low-carbon cement in data center construction.
How does STACKS’s Sustainable Finance Framework fit into the company’s broader capital markets strategy?
STACK has embedded sustainable design principles into delivery from day one, which set us up for success when aligning our Framework to the Green Loan Principles. We’ve completed 33 green financings, representing $39.6 B+ and 4.1 GW+. Our Framework includes nine eligible categories for use of proceeds spanning energy and water efficiency, renewable power, pollution prevention, circular economy adapted products, and socioeconomic advancement. In practice, this means financings may qualify based on PUE, WUE, renewable energy use, lowered embodied carbon, and STEM education programs.
Because of the breadth of eligibility included in our Framework, we’re able to demonstrate how STACK’s capital markets strategy aligns holistically to the Green Loan Principles, building confidence with investors and opening access to green financing at scale.
Why do partnerships like the iMasons Climate Accord (iCA) matter?
Partnerships matter because of the pace and scale of growth happening in our industry. Growing responsibly requires collective action—developing shared solutions, building market confidence, and defining what sustainability leadership looks like. That’s why STACK has leaned into being a convener across the industry, not just a participant.
"Growing responsibly requires collective action—developing shared solutions, building market confidence, and defining what sustainability leadership looks like."
Bethany Brantley, Global Head of Sustainability at STACK Infrastructure
STACK is a founding signatory of the iMasons Climate Accord, and we’re actively engaged in working groups focused on materials, equipment, and water. We also served as the primary architect behind a new initiative between iMasons and GRESB to develop the first sustainability benchmark tailored for data centers. Traditional real estate ESG frameworks often don’t reflect the operational realities of always-on infrastructure, especially operational control boundaries which vary greatly across data center business models. This initiative brings operators, tenants, and investors together to define what can be measured reliably and communicated with confidence.
How does STACK approach community engagement?
Earning community license is where STACK’s responsible development principles come to life on the ground. Anchored by four pillars—responsible siting, local partnership, sustainability leadership, and community stewardship—our approach starts by engaging early: we show up, listen first, and then collaborate with local stakeholders to inform site selection in a way that aligns with community needs and minimizes disruption.
We aim to be transparent and specific about project impacts and mitigations, including power and water needs, noise controls, and watershed protections. From there, we work to shape local benefit packages that are community-specific, not templated—whether that includes supporting schools and shared public assets, creating local jobs, or partnering on sustainability-forward infrastructure solutions such as water efficiency, water recycling, wastewater improvements, or waste heat reuse where feasible.
When these principles are embedded from the start, we feel we’re better positioned to earn trust and build long-term relationships. At the end of the day, being a good neighbor comes down to early engagement, clear communication, and showing up beyond the fence line.
What key lessons have you learned that you would offer to others leading sustainability at scale?
Lead with aggressive transparency. Trust is earned through proof, and proof requires evidence. That means investing in data quality and assurance that ties actions to measured outcomes. If you want to communicate on sustainability leadership, your narrative must be grounded in credible data and verifiable results. Also, progress isn’t always measured by scale metrics alone, dollars deployed, or marquee breakthroughs. Often, the most meaningful impact comes from steady, practical innovations that remove barriers and enable broader market adoption.
"Lead with aggressive transparency. Trust is earned through proof, and proof requires evidence."
Bethany Brantley, Global Head of Sustainability at STACK Infrastructure
Finally, build in coalitions. The world is changing quickly, and sustainability challenges can feel compounding. By working alongside industry collaborators and peers to demonstrate tangible progress, maintain transparency, and help evolve best practices through shared learning, you preserve trust, protect asset value, and maintain the license to grow.
