Tackling greenhouse gas emissions has become an urgent challenge. At discoverIE, we contribute to the transition to a low carbon economy both through our products helping others to reduce their emissions and through our operations by reducing our own.
In alignment with the UN Paris Agreement goal of limiting the rise in global temperature to 1.50C, we announced in November 2022 our commitment to become a net-zero emissions business. We have set a science-based target to achieve net zero emissions for Scope 1 & 2 by 2030 and for Scope 3 by 2040, and have published our transition plan to achieve the first phase of this goal – net zero emissions for Scope 1 & 2 by 2030.
Net zero for Scope 1 & 2
Our net-zero plan for Scope 1 & 2 focuses primarily on addressing four of the Group's largest emissions sources: electricity, natural gas, company cars and refrigerants, and aims to achieve an absolute reduction of 65% by 2025 against the 2021 baseline. In calendar year 2024 we reduced Scope 1 & 2 emissions for continuing operations in absolute terms by 59%, primarily driven by more sites switching to renewable energy sources and reducing electricity consumption.
We report our greenhouse gas emissions using the operational control method to establish our organisational boundary. As all our subsidiaries are 100% owned by the Group there is no difference between this and the financial control or equity share methodologies.
Our near-term goal is to reduce absolute Scope 1 & 2 emissions by 90% by the end of 2030 from a 2021 base year. The remaining emissions that cannot be removed will be neutralised through investing in carbon removal projects. This will ensure we remain focused on reducing emissions as much as possible before resorting to carbon offsets. We also commit to increasing active annual sourcing of renewable electricity from 58% in 2021 to 100% by 2030.
Acquisitions
Given our acquisitive nature, we take a proactive approach by incorporating emission-related questions into the due diligence process so emission sources can be identified early and plans can be drawn up in advance. This helps to shorten the time required to achieve net zero emissions for acquired businesses, which form a significant part of our growth strategy.
Net zero for Scope 3
In FY2025 we completed our second comprehensive Group-wide exercise to capture data on our Scope 3 emissions. The exercise sought to cover the entire Group (including new acquisitions), and included as many of the Scope 3 sub-categories defined by the GHG Protocol as possible.
Compliance with SBTi target validation requires us to calculate emissions for the downstream Scope 3 categories processing of sold products (3:10), use of sold products (3:11) and end-of-life treatment of sold products (3:12) for our base year of CY2023. We have completed the calculation of these figures based on a cross-section of our key products and continue to work with our businesses to further develop an acceptable, practical and repeatable methodology. Influencing the emissions from the use of sold products category, in particular, is largely out of our control.
There were three key elements to the exercise in our second year:
- To enhance data availability and accuracy for the categories and sub-categories that are most relevant and material to the Group
- To calculate a high-level emissions number for the remaining downstream Scope 3 (categories 10-12) emissions in our value chain
- To identify the challenges faced in the accurate and comprehensive collection of downstream Scope 3 data at local business level and prepare the Group to complete this more efficiently and systematically in future.
A summary of key findings is as follows:
- Our CY2024 Scope 3 emissions for categories 1-9 were 27% higher than those identified last year. We believe this increase represents the improvement in availability and accuracy of the source data used to calculate our Scope 3 emissions and not an absolute increase in emissions
- The largest upstream category of Scope 3 emissions was from purchased goods and services (Category 1), with that category alone representing c77% of total upstream Scope 3 emissions.
- The second largest source of upstream Scope 3 emissions was Freight (Category 4), which comprised 20% of upstream Scope 3 emissions.
- The upstream emissions of our value chain are dwarfed by the downstream categories, particularly Category 11, use of sold products. Almost 90% of our total Scope 3 emissions are generated by this category. We pride ourselves on our products' potential to aid the global transition to a low-carbon economy. However, a small sub-section of our portfolio generates emissions in use due to their operation in countries where the electricity grids still rely on high-emitting fuels to generate power. As national electricity grids become greener and rely more heavily on renewable energy sources, we expect these emissions to decrease.
Find out more about our latest progress in Our Performance and how we manage the climate-related risks and opportunities in our TCFD Report.