Calculation of a Corporate Carbon Footprint (CCF)

Our client operates mobile phone masts in various African and Middle Eastern Countries. They understand that their business operations make a contribution to Climate Change and wanted to understand and reduce the impact.

The Challenge

The first step in understanding and reducing the client’s impact is to calculate their carbon footprint. After all, “what cannot be measured, cannot be reduced”.

The first step was to understand the boundary of the CCF and also whether they wanted to include Scope 3 emissions. Since this was the first time that the client had undertaken such an exercise, they decided to only look at their Scope 1 and 2 emissions.

It was also made clear that the client wanted the CCF verified by an Independent third party audit firm. As such, we had that in the forefront of our minds when undertaking the project.

Our Solution

It soon became apparent that a large contribution to the Scope 1 emissions came from the diesel used for the emergency generators. These were used when the grid electricity supply to the mobile phone masts failed, which is often the case in some African countries. Therefore, our work focussed a great deal on this emissions source.

In preparation for the third party assurance, we ensured that all of evidence required by the auditors was in place and organised in such a manner that it made for an efficient audit.

The Outcome

We calculated the Scope 1 and 2 emissions and presented the results on a per emissions source basis. This provided sufficient granularity for the client to understand where reductions could be made.
Quantitatively, it was very clear that the diesel use for the gensets was considerable both in terms of quantity but more importantly carbon emissions. Whilst this diesel use is unavoidable, it was possible for the client to speak with the third party maintenance company who supplies it to, where possible, use bio-diesel rather than regular diesel. Financially, this was more expensive for the client but reduced their CCF.