Often when we initially talk to clients about 'sustainability', we notice they tend to use the term 'decarbonisation' and 'sustainability' interchangeably.
'We've already got a sustainability plan, as we're decarbonising our operations'
'We've done our carbon footprint so are on the road to sustainability'
Whilst it's true that decarbonisation is critical to sustainability, it's important to remember that tackling carbon emissions is only one sustainability topic. It's by no means the full picture.
This is also true when it comes to carbon footprinting and subsequent carbon management. Yes, these are extremely useful tools for reducing corporate carbon impact, however they aren't sufficient tools to address holistic sustainability impact.
We've put together the below, to help you get to grips with what carbon measurement can and can't do for sustainability and your business.
What carbon measurement and management CAN do...
1. Provide a spring board for holistic sustainability measurement and management. Undertaking a carbon footprint requires in-depth analysis across the business, including supply chains. Often when conducting carbon analysis on supply chains you learn a lot more than just where carbon is!
You also learn a lot about your supply chain: like what your business activities are, where they occur and what practices they require - all highly useful information for understanding other sustainability topics like water consumption, land use change and pollution.
2. Help you finding cost savings and efficiencies: The carbon footprint supply chain analysis often identifies business activities where resources are being used inefficiently.
Do the lights always need to be on?
Could we change the way our freight is packed to reduce space wastage on a van/ship/plane?
Locating and addressing these consumption inefficiencies, often lead to cost savings. Could your carbon footprint help you find a 30% cost saving in your supply chain?
3. Get ahead on regulatory compliance. Carbon management helps businesses stay ahead of regulatory requirements, avoiding potential fines and penalties associated with non-compliance. As regulations become stricter, having a carbon management system in place ensures businesses are prepared for future changes. Carbon data is almost table stakes in a lot of sectors and new regulations build on it.
4. Maintain a positive reputation. Reducing one's corporate carbon footprint is now almost a minimum expectation. So if you're re not doing it, or not clearly communicating that you're doing it, this might have adverse reputational effects. In addition, transparent reporting on carbon emissions can build trust with stakeholders, including customers, employees, and partners.
5. Support effective risk management.The carbon footprint process often sheds light on potential business exposures and vulnerabilities that previously had no or minimal visibility. The identification of these gaps allows businesses to better manage potential carbon-related risks, including those within your supply chain.
6. Encourages innovation. The process of reducing carbon emissions often requires and supports innovation and new market solutions. This is particularly true for product based organisations where business model change is often necessary in order to decarbonise.
What carbon measurement and management CAN'T do...
While carbon management provides valuable insights and benefits to businesses, it has limitations and does not provide a complete picture of a company's overall environmental impact. Below are some key limitations of relying solely on carbon management:
1. It's not a comprehensive environmental impact - Carbon management does not account for impacts on biodiversity and ecosystems, such as habitat destruction or species loss. In addition, other forms of pollution, such as the release of harmful chemicals or pollutants into the air and water, are not covered by carbon footprinting analyses. Carbon management considers only one planetary boundary (contribution to climate change) - there are eight others as outlined in the image below!)
2. Social and Economic Impacts - Carbon management does not take into account the social and economic impacts of business activities on local communities, such as displacement or changes in local economies. It also does not tell you whether your teams feel their working conditions are appropriate and whether your business appears attractive to the talent you need. Issues with human rights and working conditions of the supply chain workers will not be identifies through carbon measurement.
3. Circular Economy - Whilst carbon management reports on the carbon impact of using products as well as where they are disposed of at the end-of-life, the assessment does not provide insights on the circularity of a business or its products, and how the business is progressing towards circular practices. For example, if we look at a single-use plastic bottle compared to reusable glass bottle, from a carbon point of view the emissions are likely to be higher with a glass bottle. However, when we consider the whole lifecycle of the products and their overall implication on circularity, the reusable bottle will come out on top.
4. Long-term Trends and Projections - Carbon footprinting provides a snapshot of current emissions. As data is updated and businesses practices change, carbon emissions will be altered. This heavily relies on regularly updated data inputs in order to have a more accurate view of the future emissions trends. Undertaking one singular carbon footprint with one data input will not provide enough information to track and predict emissions trends in the future. On the other hand, getting trapped in a cycle of data collection and measurement on annual basis, if no changes are actually being implemented, also offers little benefit.
5. Culture - Carbon management does not measure the impact of corporate culture, employee behaviour, or management practices - all of which are important considerations on how the business can adapt in the new volatile world.
While carbon footprinting is a powerful tool for understanding and managing a company's greenhouse gas emissions, it should be complemented with other environmental, social, and operational analyses to gain a holistic view of the business's impact and performance.
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