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
The Group’s total Scope 1 & 2 emissions in 2021 was 7,745 tCO2e, of which 95% were from four sources: electricity, natural gas, company cars, and refrigerants. Our net zero plan focuses on addressing these four emission sources by reducing and replacing as much as possible, and removing the residual emissions by investing in carbon removal projects.
Our near-term goal is to reduce total Scope 1 & 2 emissions by 65% by the end of 2025 and achieve Scope 1 & 2 net zero by 2030. 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.
Find out more about our latest progress in Our Performance and how we manage the climate-related risks and opportunities in our TCFD Report.
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 FY2024, we completed our second Group-wide exercise to capture data on all 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 Greenhouse Gas Protocol as possible.
The exercise identified the Group's total Scope 3 emissions to be 196,879 tCO2e for the calendar year of 2023. This represents 98% of the Group's total emissions. The largest category of Scope 3 emissions was from purchased goods and services (Category 1), representing c75% of our Scope 3 emissions. The second largest sources was freight (Categories 4 and 9), which was c22% of our Scope 3 emissions. Find out more about each of the categories within our Scope 3 here.
We will develop an SBTi-aligned Scope 3 reduction plan by the end of 2024.
You can find out the methodology used to calculate our Scope 3 emissions on page 62 of our 2024 Annual Report.