Why get support with your corporate carbon footprint?

“By engaging the expertise of a sustainability consultant, your emissions calculation becomes a tool to drive meaningful change.”

Calculating your organisation’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is key to complying with regulations such as the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) or sustainability management frameworks such as EcoVadis and CDP.

However, this process should be much more than a box-ticking exercise. Calculating your emissions can drive meaningful change in your organisation, helping target sustainability efforts and improve relationships with customers, suppliers and other stakeholders.

But with many factors to consider, and a shortage of green talent affecting a range of industries, effectively calculating your company’s GHG emissions can be complex.

So, how can you streamline and optimise this process? Read on to discover how working with a sustainability consultant can support your organisation to engage with stakeholders and select the climate risk assessment tools and methodologies that suit your context.

Choosing the right climate risk assessment tool: GHG inventory or LCA?

One of the first decisions you need to make when starting your emissions calculation journey is which climate risk assessment tool to use: a GHG emissions inventory or a life cycle assessment (LCA). Each provides unique insights into your company’s environmental impacts, but choosing the right one to use depends on your specific goals and the structure of your business.

Understanding the GHG inventory

A GHG emissions inventory is an essential first step for most organisations. It provides a broad overview of the emissions generated by a company’s operations, allowing it to identify where the most significant sources of emissions are located. This inventory is divided into three Scopes:

1. Scope 1 covers direct emissions from owned or controlled sources.
2. Scope 2 covers indirect emissions from purchased electricity, steam, heating, and cooling.
3. Scope 3 covers all other indirect emissions, including sources up and down the value chain such as suppliers and customers.

What’s the purpose of an LCA?

While a GHG inventory looks at the total emissions of a company’s operations, an LCA focuses on the environmental impacts of specific products or services throughout their life cycle – from raw material extraction, manufacturing, and transportation to use and disposal.

An LCA also includes impacts beyond the carbon footprint, such as water consumption, ecotoxicity, human toxicity, eutrophication and ozone depletion.

An LCA can be particularly useful in sectors where product-specific emissions are a key focus, such as the automotive industry. By analysing a product’s life cycle, companies can identify the areas that contribute the most to emissions and develop strategies to address them. This could include switching to lower-emission materials, improving manufacturing processes or choosing suppliers that use more sustainable transport.

GHG inventory or LCA: Which should come first?

For most organisations, starting with a GHG inventory is the logical choice because it provides a solid basis for understanding the major sources of their GHG emissions.

For example, companies operating in industries such as manufacturing or retail may assume that their electricity consumption (Scope 2) is the largest source of emissions, only to find that their supply chain (Scope 3) emissions far exceed this.

In some cases, LCAs and GHG inventories feed into each other. If one process reveals a high-impact area, the other may provide additional insight or verification.

For example, if your GHG inventory shows that the transportation of raw materials for a particular product line is a significant source of emissions, an LCA of the products themselves could help you identify specific changes that could reduce these emissions.

While both tools are essential, a sustainability consultant can help ensure you start with the most useful one – which will often be the GHG inventory. This is because it identifies the largest sources of emissions, whether they’re from energy use, logistics or supply chain activities. Once you understand where emissions are concentrated, an LCA can provide deeper insights into how to reduce emissions at the product level.

Stakeholder engagement: An essential step in your decarbonisation strategy

Since a significant proportion of a company’s emissions often come from its supply chain (Scope 3), building strong relationships with suppliers is essential to calculating your organisation’s carbon footprint. Effective supplier engagement enables companies to:

• Access accurate data: Suppliers are a key source of the data needed to understand Scope 3 emissions. Without their cooperation, a company’s GHG inventory will be incomplete or inaccurate.
• Collaborate on emissions reductions: Suppliers often have valuable insights into how emissions reductions can be achieved at various points in the supply chain, such as through material substitutions, process improvements or more efficient logistics.
• Drive systemic change: Companies that prioritise sustainability and work with their suppliers to reduce emissions can become catalysts for industry-wide change – creating a virtuous cycle where frontrunners encourage partners to play their part in a holistic emissions reduction strategy.

How can a consultant facilitate effective stakeholder engagement?

Effective stakeholder engagement is critical, but it’s not always easy. Suppliers may not be experienced in tracking their emissions, or may lack the resources to provide accurate data.

This is where a sustainability consultant can add immense value. They can help you develop a strategy for communicating your emissions reduction goals and expectations to suppliers and other partners. For example, they can:

1. Assess supplier sustainability maturity
   The first step in any supplier engagement programme is to assess the sustainability maturity of your suppliers. Some suppliers may already be calculating their emissions and setting reduction targets, while others may not even be tracking their emissions. Understanding where each supplier is on the ‘sustainability maturity curve’ helps you tailor your approach.

2. Educate and build capacity
   Many suppliers, especially those who are less advanced on their sustainability maturity journey, may lack the resources or knowledge to measure their own emissions. A sustainability consultant can provide training, share best practices on how to calculate emissions and explain how emissions reductions can benefit the supplier’s business.

3. Monitor and collaborate
   Supplier engagement doesn’t stop after the first round of data collection. It’s important to continue collaborating with your suppliers and monitoring their progress over time. A sustainability consultant can facilitate more regular engagement, helping you prepare for the next round of reporting and drive continuous improvement throughout the year.

From compliance to purpose

There’s no doubt that compliance with regulations such as the CSRD will become increasingly important for more and more companies in Europe and beyond. However, the process of calculating emissions can also be a powerful tool for driving commercial success. With the right guidance, emissions tracking and reporting can lead to:

1. Stronger customer and supplier relationships
   Companies today are under increasing pressure to demonstrate their sustainability credentials. By proactively managing your emissions and working closely with your supply chain, you show customers and suppliers that you are serious about sustainability. This can boost trust, improve customer loyalty and attract like-minded business partners.

2. Simplified sustainability strategy development
   Your emissions data provides insight into where your company’s biggest environmental impacts lie. With this information, a sustainability consultant can help you target specific areas for improvement. Whether it’s optimising energy use, reducing waste or sourcing greener materials, you’ll be able to implement more effective sustainability initiatives that align with your long-term goals.

3. Improved operational efficiency
   Identifying emissions hotspots can also highlight opportunities to streamline your operations. This could include switching to suppliers that use renewable energy or working with logistics partners that prioritise fuel efficiency. A sustainability consultant can help you integrate these improvements into your strategy, potentially leading to both cost savings and emissions reductions.

4. Leadership in sustainability
   Companies that take a proactive approach to carbon footprinting can distinguish themselves as leaders in sustainability. With a thorough understanding of your environmental impact, you’ll be better positioned to respond to new regulations, consumer demands and market trends. A sustainability consultant can help you make progress with your sustainability strategy and demonstrate leadership in your industry.

By leveraging the expertise of a sustainability consultant, you can turn your emissions calculation and reporting process into a tool to drive meaningful change – both from a commercial and environmental perspective. In this way, you can go beyond compliance to improve relationships and operational efficiency, and position your business as a sustainability leader.

Carbon footprinting: A strategic tool to drive lasting change

Calculating and reporting your emissions can be a powerful lever for transforming your business, but using this process to embed sustainability into your strategy requires a targeted approach. With the expertise of a sustainability consultant, you can easily navigate the complexities of carbon footprinting – selecting the right measurement tools, engaging stakeholders and applying insights to drive long-term value. Whether your focus is on compliance, improving relationships or positioning your business as a sustainability leader, getting support with your emissions calculations can be the first step to success.

Want to find out how a sustainability consultant can streamline your carbon footprinting process? Visit our Climate risk and CDP reporting page for more information.