Sustainable Travel International can help your company demonstrate its environmental leadership by measuring, reducing and offsetting your businesses’ carbon footprint. By definition, a carbon footprint is a measure of the impact human activities have on the environment in terms of the amount of greenhouse gases produced, usually measured in metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e).
In general, the carbon footprint associated with businesses encompass a wide range of emissions sources, from direct impacts like energy use and business travel to indirect impacts such as employee commutes or emissions from within your supply chain. The most common sources of office-related emissions include:
- Energy use in office facilities including electricity, natural gas, propane, and heating oil
- Employee travel i.e., non-commuting trips including flights, train trips, and hotel stays
- Miles driven for business, including company cars, vans, trucks, etc.
- Employee commutes, whether by car or public transport
- Estimated volume of waste generated
- Estimated volume of recycling generated
If your company is engaged in travel and tourism, you should also consider trip-related emissions including your average number of passengers and their points of origin. The most common sources of tourism-related emissions include:
- Energy use in accommodations based on square footage, including electricity, natural gas, propane, and heating oil
- Client and employee travel to and from the destination including flights, train trips, taxis, etc.
- Client and employee travel during the trip including flights, train trips, taxis, etc.
- Estimated volume of waste generated
- Estimated volume of recycling generated
Assessing carbon footprints that include all of these types of emissions can be complex. In addition, there is currently a lack of consistency in methods for calculation and reporting, so it’s difficult to compare one company’s footprint with another, which is why we don’t use a generic calculator for businesses. We use the most commonly accepted methodologies for calculating emissions, and we share them with you. The more precise your data, the more precise your carbon footprint assessment will be.
For more information, please call 800-276-7764 or email us.
