Carbon Journey, Where do I start?
A regular question that the team gets from organisations is, where do I start? How do we become carbon neutral? What can we do to reduce our footprint? These are all great questions and shows that the business is already thinking in the right manner. All three questions are answered by what we refer to as, a Baseline Assessment. This is a consultancy piece of work that normally takes anywhere from 3-10 days. The report at the end of it gives you all the information you need to know what your footprint. From the consultancy and report, we can then map out, what we call ‘High Risk’ areas i.e. highest emissions areas, or areas that will be looking to grow leading to higher emissions through to the Low Risk. The baseline assessment will initially look across your scope 1 & 2 emissions. This is because, these areas are in your direct control and are created by your business operating. To help create a full picture of the baseline we often ask for data to go back five years. It is important to get as much history on your organisation as possible so we can show your emission history and so both organisations can learn from it and start to make changes (if needed).
Once we have this baseline, we look at two areas, the consumption of the good i.e. electricity and the carbon footprint associated with it. This is where we differ from other businesses. Our reporting shows the consumption and footprint; therefore it makes the reporting real. You can then use this information to make educated changes to the way you work. This is important for you as if you want guidance on your carbon reduction strategy, you need to know where to focus your time and energy. There is no point asking everyone to buy an electric car and drive to the office if you have a hybrid working policy or if everyone is in walking distance from the office, albeit highly unlikely.
With the carbon baseline and clear map of your risks, we can then put in place a carbon reduction plan, carbon offsetting plans and check this against the annual consultancy and report, to see its how your business is progressing.