How to Calculate and Reduce Your Company’s Carbon Footprint?

The carbon footprint is the sum of all greenhouse gas emissions attributable to a company, entity, or individual. This includes both emissions directly caused by your activity, such as fuel consumption, plastic use, and indirect consumptions. For example, emissions from the production and transportation of the raw materials you use are part of your carbon footprint.

To allow you to measure your carbon footprint comprehensively, ADEME has defined a method known as the carbon footprint assessment.

The carbon footprint assessment is used in France to account for all greenhouse gas emissions from a company or individual. We will explore the specifics of the carbon footprint assessment and how you can implement it internally to calculate your carbon footprint.

The carbon footprint assessment is a method developed by ADEME, which it defines as “an evaluation of the quantity of greenhouse gases emitted (or captured) into the atmosphere in a year by the activities of an organization or a territory.”

The official name of the carbon footprint is the “Greenhouse gas overview”, for greenhouse gases. Indeed, although carbon is part of most greenhouse gases, this assessment allows you to evaluate all of your emissions, even for less represented GHGs.

This method establishes a unique way for all companies to assess their carbon footprint. This allows:

1. Objective comparison to the market
2. Comprehensive examination to find areas for improvement
3. Unique criterion for evaluating your compliance with legal standards

The government regularly provides key figures to be achieved for different industries based on production. The unique calculation base that is the carbon footprint assessment allows you to see where your company stands regarding greenhouse gas production. If you need to make improvements compared to your competitors, Dametis can assist you in these actions.

The carbon footprint assessment also ensures that no carbon production source is overlooked, which would give you the impression of producing little. On the contrary, you may discover that your choice of supplier or product storage could potentially be optimized.

Finally, it ensures fair treatment in the eyes of the law, especially to ensure a unique criterion for carbon tax and other laws related to greenhouse gases. This is why all companies with more than 500 employees are required to conduct an annual carbon footprint assessment.

The carbon footprint assessment for your company can be implemented internally. Indeed, you have all the necessary resources on the ADEME website. Their site contains resources tailored to whether you are a company, a community, or a public institution. This will of course require a lot of time, whether it’s reading the documentation or gathering the necessary elements from your colleagues and suppliers. This is where Dametis comes in. With our software, you will save time and gain precision in your carbon footprint assessment. Our technicians can also leverage their expertise to conduct your company’s greenhouse gas assessment and provide you with the certainty of an accurate carbon footprint.

Once your carbon footprint is calculated, how do you use it? The first thing is to assess which of your areas produce the most greenhouse gases and check if:

• It’s more than you anticipated
• The allocation of the carbon footprint seems logical to you
• You can make improvements in some of them

En effet, dans une usine de production, vous pourrez estimer que votre principale source de GES sera l’utilisation des machines de l’Usine. Dans certains cas, une solution de maintenance plus performante, ou, dans d’autres cas, la modernisation de votre installation vous permettra d’améliorer votre efficacité énergétique. L’efficacité énergétique peut être le maintien de votre production en diminuant votre consommation ou l’augmentation de votre production à consommation égale. L’État offre notamment des aides pour faciliter les travaux écologiques des entreprises.

If the production of a department surprises you, it will be necessary to understand the reason for its place in your greenhouse gas assessment and, if necessary, find alternatives.

For example, if the storage facility from which you fetch raw materials ten times a day is 15 km away from your company, the journeys will impact your carbon footprint. Perhaps it will be more profitable to invest in a facility near your production site for all or part of your raw materials.

Dametis experts assist you with both simple and more complex optimization cases.

Finally, there are carbon offsetting measures, which will remove carbon from nature or allow others to produce less. This carbon is subtracted during the calculation of your carbon footprint. These measures include reforestation, installing solar panels for external use by the company, or supporting other environmental projects.