Taking accountability of your supply chain with Ecofiniti as your Scope 3 Emissions Consultant

For many organisations, Scope 3 is a material part of the total footprint and is often the most complex to measure. Yet, historically, this aspect of corporate carbon accounting has been the least focused upon.

As ESG regulations and frameworks continue to evolve, such as the updated GHG Protocol, IFRS or the NHS Carbon Reduction Plan requirements, Scope 3 has been put in the spotlight. Investors, customers, and regulators are demanding a more comprehensive understanding of emissions across companies’ entire value chain. In turn, Scope 3 reporting has become a key aspect and minimum-disclosure level of any ESG report.

With this shift, companies across the world are focusing more on sustainable procurement measures, requiring that their entire value chain take steps towards monitoring and reducing their environmental impact.

We understand that asking this is not a simple task. Dealing with different vendors, industries, and communication styles across the world is a complex process, while working with them to decarbonise your Scope 3 can be even harder. With our global team and extensive range of languages, Ecofiniti is well equipped to engage as your implementation partner through it all.

Our experience allows us to understand the best approach for your company and implement bespoke action plans for improvement. Whether you're starting the process, or trying to implement changes to enhance your sustainable procurement strategy, taking that first step is essential. That’s why we’re here to help with everything from start to end.

Whether it’s developing scoring systems, harnessing AI, or creating custom codes of conduct for each of your suppliers, we make supply chain management simpler. With our guidance and management, we can conduct remote and in-person assessments, ensuring your tenders and procurement processes are aligned with your internal ESG standards.

Additionally, knowing your supply chain’s ESG performance is vital in identifying where the emission hotspots lie. With this information, we can design and implement collaborative reduction plans with your suppliers. We track their progress from year to year, and tailor our approach to build up your business resilience and decarbonise your supply chain.

Improving the management of your supply chain and ensuring sustainable procurement goes hand in hand with improving your company’s broader impact.

When calculating Scope 3 emissions from your supply chain, there are two main sources of data that can be used to calculate these emissions: spend data and supplier specific-data. Depending on which methodology you utilize, the calculation accuracy differs.

Currently, many companies conduct Scope 3 calculations using a spend-based methodology. This approach relies on industry-average emissions factors and spend data to establish a baseline. However, for a sustainability-conscious company it can misrepresent the value chain when efforts have been made to procure lower-carbon suppliers. Because industry averages do not reflect the performance of specific suppliers, spend-based results can obscure both emissions hotspots and genuine improvements.

Ecofiniti can provide you with the necessary hands-on support to transition from spend to supplier-specific data, reflecting your real Scope 3 emissions. Often the most difficult part of the process is the communication and participation of your suppliers. We are here to provide full supplier engagement support, working alongside you to design surveys, manage outreach, handle follow-ups, utilise AI, and build stakeholder understanding.

Not only do we guide your company, but we actively assist your suppliers and entire value chain to meet your reporting requirements.

Scope 3 reporting goes beyond just the supply chain. With a total of 15 categories, operational emissions such as business travel, leased assets or employee commuting as well as financed emissions and investments are also included within this Scope.

At Ecofiniti we understand each category has many different data sources and calculation methodologies. By working alongside your team, we identify which categories are material to you and collect the necessary data to go along with it.

No matter what part of the process you're at, we can assist you. Our job is to make your job easier. We are the ones who directly reach out to waste providers to ensure your company’s waste stream is tracked and reported. We are the ones who compare your most recent business travel trips, and decipher how to improve your internal policies to decrease their impact. We are ones who search for the most environmentally-aware couriers to deliver your goods or work with your investments to understand your financed emissions. At Ecofiniti, we go above and beyond to help your company improve and reduce its indirect impacts.

Moreover, the GHG Protocol’s standards and guidance continue to evolve, while expectations around investments and financed emissions are developing through frameworks such as PCAF. New metrics are introduced as reporting practice matures, and certain areas such as insurance-associated emissions are becoming more complex. Knowing how to approach the entire process takes expertise and knowledge.

With our understanding, we ensure your company is fully prepared for the changing standards, publishing transparent, and up-to-date compliant reports. Without high-quality and accurate reporting, comprehensive reduction strategies and net-zero targets are not feasible.

Scope 3 reporting is essential to every company in any industry. Each year, we work closely with one of our clients, Charles Taylor, to calculate their global carbon footprint.

Like many other companies, Charles Taylor’s Scope 3 is not only the largest part of its footprint, but relies on the widest variety of data sources. We understand that and utilize the most efficient methodology throughout the process. With Charles Taylor, Ecofiniti not only collected and calculated data, but we also explained the process and managed everything from beginning to end.

For each of the 15 sub-categories within Scope 3, we broke down the “why” behind it all, educating the key stakeholders on Scope 3 reporting standards. We actively worked across departments within the company, expanding far beyond Charles Taylor’s sustainability team. This work allowed for Scope 3 reporting and ESG to be fully integrated into the company’s overall business strategy alongside its sustainability and carbon reduction plan.

As companies also start to measure their Scope 3 impacts more robustly, their baseline needs to be re-calculated. For Charles Taylor, we worked side by side to rebaseline their Scope 3 target based on 2023 emissions to meet the evolving methods and reporting boundaries, increasing accuracy and ensuring consistency when comparing year on year reductions.

By providing context, highlighting common issues, and sharing insight on how to reduce emissions, the entire process of Scope 3 management became easier each year with the reported figures becoming more accurate and truly representative. With each new footprint, Charles Taylor gets closer to their science based net-zero target across the entire value chain by 2050.