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Sustainable businesses are enterprises that have a positive effect on environmental, social, and governance (ESG). They are leaders in the green economy. Often they are involved in human rights policies, especially in sourcing and labor, and also focus on carbon neutrality.
The present is the best time to become a sustainable business if it isn't at the core of your company's ethics already. It's never too late to begin the transition into sustainability, a circular economy, regeneration, and getting on a path to net zero. While it's true that it's not the main priority of all businesses to manufacture and distribute earth-improving products like at the heart of other companies, it is still possible and necessary that companies from all industries can do what they can to reduce climate change and contribute to the development and progress of healthy societies and ecological projects, while still focusing on their main functions and objectives and earning profit.
The three pillars of corporate sustainability are:
Investors seek these pillars for competitiveness and striving for the common good. When sustainability is a factor in a company, it is true that they have a bigger pool of investors that are ready to back them. Some investors no longer consider backing companies that don't have a roadmap to participating in ESG.
Moreover, to stay competitive, Gen Zs and MIllennials have begun focusing their conscious consumption on carbon-neutral companies. Their loyalty to brands now goes beyond having a useful product to who the company is and what they stand for. They have more questions now than ever about how workers are treated and where the materials are coming from. Even about how they can dispose of it at the end of the product life cycle.
According to this report by Maryville University:
What's good for the environment, humanity, and business in general, is that actions are taken now to not only add sustainable aspects but to make it one of the company's core values. This won't interrupt business; it will progress it because being sustainable means to future-proof your business. Being carbon neutral will improve operations, significantly reduce costs, engage stakeholders, and attract and retain important talent.
Even small business sustainability is achievable; it's not just for bigger firms with more financial resources. Instead of maintaining the global problems that are going on today, getting involved in carbon offsets and projects to better the environment and climate change are what is necessary to thrive. Net0 offers over 140 certified carbon offset projects and 40 can be done in one click without any approvals. Moreover, the record-keeping and offsets are all done in one easy-to-use dashboard for analytics, data exporting, and investor-grade reporting. Colleagues and vendors alike can use their own personalized dashboards to submit their data in minutes. Net0 also has a simulation tool so organizations can set targets against a benchmark year and lower their carbon emissions every year. Simply add data and make carbon reductions based on the analysis.
Related content
To learn more about sustainable business and going carbon neutral, please refer to our free academy of resources:
• Article: Why Communicating Your Efforts to Be Carbon Neutral Is Important
• Article: Carbon Emissions in the Atmosphere and the Methods of Abating Emissions
• Article: 10 Responsible Companies With Net Zero Targets and Pledges
With several sustainability issues such as climate change, office energy and product waste, manufacturing and packaging issues, logistics gas and pollution, and more, depending on the industry, you may have to dig deep into the things you didn't realize were harming the environment. Others will be more obvious. Some things will be easier to cut back on and other things you will need to search for alternatives and will take time to strategize further. Creating a blueprint all around will have a huge impact on the environment and doing your part makes a difference as a company. It's never one thing, in particular, that is doing the damage and with some investigation, you will be able to measure more accurately what environmental damage is coming from where. Having this knowledge is the first step to being able to reduce, replace with alternatives, or offset the damage not only for carbon but in many different ways.
Some examples may include:
Although GHG emissions aren't the only problems in business, this is an important part of having a sustainable business.
After pinpointing the problems in your organization, it's necessary to combat them by tracking, calculating, and performing carbon offsets for emissions that can't be reduced at the moment. Net0 easily integrates emissions data from other sources and calculates emissions precisely, with an offsetting option on the dashboard to make it convenient for vendors as well as employees to utilize. More than just a carbon calculator, its intuitive AI core is predictive and gives actionable insights with its simulator tools and analysis instead of only functioning as a carbon accounting platform.
It can be intimidating for companies that already have so much to do to start a roadmap to net zero but it is possible with minimal distractions. First, carbon emissions need to be cut by 2050 in most nations and more are coming around to pledging carbon neutrality as time goes by. Secondly, starting now will give companies the time to go step-by-step. Transitioning into a carbon-free company isn't feasible overnight. Planning out your net zero journey in stages is going to transform the way you approach the issues and will enable procedures that are realistic one-by-one and are simpler to execute, becoming a part of the regular company routine and not as an added burden or a complete change in company protocol that would be shocking.
To give an example, Nestle is working to halve their carbon emissions in this decade and eliminate them by 2050 according to their roadmap. This is viable in companies large and small, not just corporations with more financial resources. Nestle's various works will include all renewable energy sources by 2025, increasing their number of carbon-neutral brands, supporting farmers and suppliers in achieving regenerative agriculture, and more. They have offered more details online to be as transparent to consumers and suppliers as possible. The point of the roadmap is to achieve what companies can across the supply chain one step at a time so that all procedures can be carried out smoothly, while still benefiting the environment, employees, and turning a successful profit.
Once you have found what problems need to be solved, reduced, and replaced, then you can start building a roadmap towards your defined objectives. At first, it may be more difficult to reduce all the problems at once. Or, it may be more difficult to eliminate some of them without resources for alternatives but these will come later.
An example would be the goal to install solar panels at the company by the end of the year if it has the realistic means to do so. Some companies don't own their building or rent a suite in a high rise and this just isn't possible without further consent, landowners, lawyers, etc. It's important to take control of the things that you can at first instead of focusing on the things you can't control at the moment. Both large and small business sustainability will benefit from taking a look at the realistic options available to them. You can make these comparisons with Net0's simulator tool to see what your carbon footprint is now and compare that with what would happen when you switch to an alternative. Making benchmarks and achieving set targets can be analyzed over time to view your progress.
Reducing waste and pollution is another great goal. If you can find a way to reduce waste this year by 50%, it's 50% better than what you were doing in that area last year. Over time, the goals will become easier to scale and achieve, better for setting higher objectives in the next coming year. Consider buying products for your company that can be reused and aren't packaged in single-use plastic for instance.
The circular economy is changing the way waste is being handled and the transparency of that is being taken into account by conscious consumers. Linear supply chains were not responsible for what happens to a product or the waste of production once the product was shipped to the distributor or end-consumer. The responsibility was then handed off to the person or entity in possession of the product so they could take control of what happens next. In theory, all parties can contribute to the green cycle, and where some details lie there is confusion. Who is responsible for the waste of packaging and breaking down of extra materials? Pallets, for instance, are reused when you ship products in between warehouses of smaller businesses so they don't have to buy new ones. But who does what with pallets when they arrive at a clothing store where no pallets are used later on to ship out goods in bulk? Breaking up the wood and tossing it isn't sustainable and is wasting a lot of pallets that could be used elsewhere, but retail fashion industries aren't in the business of pallet resale or reuse like at a manufacturing company. These are the less obvious things that teams in different departments can bring to light with decision-makers to improve greener procedures and form circular supply chains.
The circular economy is not a burden. Rather than just heaping responsibilities onto others, it is a way to create jobs and tasks in new places and is better for the environment. This is even thought about as products are being created. Where it seems to help in a small way and sometimes a big way in different businesses, as a whole it will completely transform how waste is being handled making it a more sustainable option for society as a whole. Not only will it contribute to waste reduction but to GHG reduction in different industries regarding chemicals and pollution.
The shoe company Thousand Fell has made the first recyclable sneakers for a circular economy. They are meant to last 4.2 million steps and are made from recyclable plastics and other materials like yoga mats. When customers are done with them they return the old shoes to the factory to recycle them and make new shoes. They even offer a $20 shoe credit to people who participate.
Some companies were based on sustainability from the get-go and others that are incorporating it now as it was never their key function, so the transition won't look the same of course in every company as different businesses have very different infrastructures and overhead expenses.
Sustainable performance targets should be made publicly known. On top of communicating this important information to the public, being held accountable for a sustainability strategy will push companies to actually do it. Transparency in the global supply chain is being demanded by various local and international regulations and consumers alike, so adding roadmaps and making community efforts that are expressed externally is widely recognized and appreciated. Since it's so important for customers to know if they are buying carbon-neutral products, Net0 enables businesses to display a public dashboard of their carbon journey if they choose to. Along with hosted certificates and badges to place on premises, social media, and products, stakeholders will know they can trust the business is doing their part and can celebrate milestones with them.
Transparency should be part of the center of your company's ethics. It helps to have employees that share the same central beliefs about sustainability as the organization so they can be trusted to proactively make the right decisions in product development, sourcing, logistics, and more. Team members in different departments should have a clear view of decisions being made so they can assist others in processes and procedures to keep operations and products sustainable from the beginning of the supply chain. Not only should transparency be external but when they are internal from the start, it will flow more smoothly. When employees independently share the same values as the whole, the synergy is more productive.
When employee roles and parameters are clearly set, responsibilities can be fulfilled in the best ways possible without guessing who is responsible for what and what is acceptable within that role. Being honest about procedures that do and do not work is important to smooth out the bumps in the future so companies can be more proactive versus reactive about materials, sources, or logistics that have caused hindrances to sustainability. It's more about being a transparent, sustainable company instead of a company that takes measures when necessary and putting a green name on it.
Finances must also be shared as much as possible not only for checks and balances across departments but for scaling projects within that make it clear to employees and teams, not just leaders and decision-makers, what actions they should take for procurement and logistics to be able to keep quality, price, and green targets into account. Businesses can still keep private matters private regarding salaries and bonuses for the respect of others although certain organizations prefer to share that with the company and externally as well to ensure fair working practices.
Zero Carbon Coffee is a carbon-neutral company in New York that reveals their sourcing practices, materials and packaging, and even dairy farms where they get the milk, on their website. Since coffee brewing and dairy farms cause so many GHG emissions, Zero Carbon Coffee has done its utmost to run a sustainable, transparent, and net positive business by reducing and offsetting more carbon than is emitted. They buy carbon offsets such as soil projects that can contribute to regenerative agriculture and reforestation projects that keep carbon sequestered, and they even make sure that each bag of coffee covers 2 trees and 90 miles driven to cover the logistics and more of the carbon emissions. Zero Carbon Coffee covers the entire lifecycle of the product and supply chain on their site to ensure that the heart of their business lies just as much if not more in the environment than on coffee.
Regenerative businesses give the earth back more than what the business took from it. Companies in every industry can investigate contributing to the environment in addition to being sustainable. External projects that don't cost much can be a great idea in investing in your community, or abroad, and furthering environmental progress.
Many intriguing projects are cost-efficient and even some companies give their employees one day off per month to volunteer with organizations that are either set up with the company, or of the employees' choice, to assist with green collaborations.
Not all of the regenerative businesses have to do with a direct pollute-or-not approach but benefit the earth in different and positive ways. You can choose to have a niche like stopping global warming but you can also focus on different aspects depending on your industries or beliefs to be able to improve the ecosystem around you.
Danone North America supports regenerative agriculture which uses science-based techniques like crop rotation to enrich soil, improve animal welfare, and encourage the health of biodiversity. By "building healthy and resilient" soils and taking other measures, they can get to net zero emissions by 2050 and provide better quality food in the long run.
"Healthy soil is a carbon sink, storing a vast amount of carbon withdrawn from the atmosphere by plants via photosynthesis. That is why we promote agricultural practices which enhance soil organic matter content and help sequester more carbon, such as limiting chemical inputs, rotating crops, reducing soil tillage, and using crop residues as compost." - Danone NA
Regenerative agriculture is a proactive rather than reactive choice for the future, is going to transform society in regards to health and corporate food practices, and reduce carbon emissions as a whole.
Becoming a sustainable business isn't an impossible task or burdensome if you haven't started off as a sustainable business from the very beginning. Having all employees contribute ideas and pinpoint various, less obvious factors will result in building a roadmap to environmental success within your organization and for the environment altogether.
Book a call today with an expert to see how Net0 works. Net0 is an emissions management platform that allows businesses to precisely measure their carbon emissions and execute plans to reduce those emissions and achieve carbon-neutral status. Knowing what your carbon footprint is is a starting point on your journey to a more sustainable company.
