Minimising greenhouse gas emissions

You’ve all heard about climate change, and how much more difficult, unpleasant and expensive life is going to be if we don’t stabilise our greenhouse gas emissions. The world has warmed just one degree Celsius since mass industrialisation. We are already seeking more frequent, longer lasting and more intense heatwaves, harsher droughts, coastal flooding, longer, more dangerous bushfire seasons, and an increase in the intensity of cyclones. The scientific community has moved on from considering whether climate change is real onto how its mechanisms work and how we can make use of this knowledge.

If we want to limit the average global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius, bearing in mind that anything beyond this will be increasingly ugly for both the natural world and the humans that live and work on this planet. We need to reduce global emissions by at least 45% from 2010 levels by 2030. At present, we are not on track to achieve this.

The Carbon Disclosure Project is a not-for-profit organisation that tracks the environmental data of over 8,400 companies, representing over 50% of global market capitalisation. In 2019, it reported that 100 companies were responsible for 71% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. This means you may be forgiven for wondering “Why should I minimise my company’s emissions? Why don’t governments just shut down these super-emitters?”.

What is the problem?

The problem is that most of these are energy-supplying companies. The bulk of their emissions are “scope 1” – direct emissions from owned or controlled sources from their activities; namely supplying everyone else with energy. There is a heavy onus on them to switch away from fossil fuels and to be as efficient aspossible. However, if other businesses reduce their demand for energy, the buyers’ “scope 2” emissions – the indirect result of purchased electricity, steam, heating and cooling for own use – fall. If businesses join value chains that are also energy efficient and switching away from fossil fuels, they reduce their “scope 3” emissions. The result of activities from assets not owned or controlled by the reporting organization, but that the organization indirectly impacts in its value chain. Looking at this from the other side, this would drive a fall in the “scope 1” emissions of the energy companies.

Best of all, if your company isn’t using as much energy, you’re going to be saving money as well as helping to preserve our environment.

So how do you do this?

This is where Evalue8 Sustainability comes in. Our environmental reporting software helps you measure your emissions and determine if your efforts to reduce them over time and head towards net zero emissions are working. If you have been trying to do this for yourself, that means no more worrying about keeping up to date with evolving international standards – you can refocus on your core business.

We provide advice on ways you can save energy that are likely to be cost effective for you. We charge you an annual license fee and provide you with the reports and visual aids. You need these to track your carbon accounting progress over time, and to demonstrate your environmental performance to your shareholders, staff, buyers, suppliers and government. We provide you with an easy way of purchasing offsets for your emissions, should you wish to do so. Our value-add is that we make it easy for your company to become cleaner and greener. We provide evidence that you have done so to your stakeholders, making your goods and services more appealing to those that care about the environment.

Try our software today by booking a demo!