Stijn Gysemans’ Post

Here is my #scope3 #weekend reading for you! I took the time to go trough Microsoft 's sustainability report which they released earlier this week. Some facts: 96.5 percent of their emissions are Scope 3. Despite their ambitions, Scope 3 emissions increased year-over-year by more than 30%. This increase is primarily due to their investments in new data centers, with explains why one-third of their Scope 3 emissions is coming from Capital Goods. "Achieving net zero is not something we can do alone,” according to Microsoft. I agree with that! 😊 Here are 5 lessons I take away from reading the Scope 3 section of their Sustainability report: 1️⃣ They are partnering with their suppliers to understand their emissions footprint. With selected suppliers, they are collecting more advanced and granular emissions data. 2️⃣ They are now demanding key suppliers commit to 100% renewable energy by 2030. 3️⃣ Microsoft is setting up strategic partnerships with suppliers who have the willingness but lack access to capital or infrastructure to act. 4️⃣ To address the embodied carbon of their building emissions, they rely on standards set by Building Transparency and the EC3 tool. This provides spend-based databases of building materials. 5️⃣ For specific hardware components (e.g. silicon chips) , they performed detailed LCAs, understanding a detailed breakdown of their components. Performing LCAs for specific products creates a better understanding of where impacts sit in the supply chain. These detailed data points can be used to better understand hotspot analyses. Happy weekend! ----- ♻️ repost to help a sustainability manager in your network.

So what do i all need to put in place to manage my Scope 3? 🤔 Sometimes IT, CIO and Architecture teams get involved when discussing #Scope3 and supplier engagement. It's then often very helpful to structure the discussions into a Capability Model. Likewise when you are creating an RFP for the market. It describes what set of functionalities you need to have covered in your organisation to start automating Scope 3 calculations and supplier engagement. Feel free to share this with your IT colleagues. DATA INTEGRATION 1️⃣ Data Collection - Comprehensive tools and methods to collect emissions data from suppliers, including Scope 3 transportation data. It's often underestimated. Reality kicks in when data collection starts. 2️⃣ Data Preparation - Not all companies have the maturity to keep track in their ERP a detailed inventory of the products they buy . Or the data may not be easily accessible. (I shared more on that last week 📕) So need for automatic mapping of product data to supplier data. SUPPLIER ENGAGEMENT 3️⃣ Supplier Engagement Program - Structured engagement program to involve suppliers in the emissions management process.  Also  a streamlined process for onboarding suppliers to the platform. 4️⃣ Public Data Analysis - Analyze publicly available data (e.g., SBTi commitments, sustainability reports) before reaching out to suppliers. You don't want to annoy them with data you could already gathered upfront 🤦♂️ 5️⃣ Compatibility Open Standards - Compatibility with open standards like the #PACT framework from WBCSD – World Business Council for Sustainable Development for sharing product carbon footprint CALCULATION: 6️⃣ GLEC Transportation - Automated emissions calculations based on the GLEC framework. What you don't want to do is manually calculate distances and transport modi, make sure this stuff gets automated. 7️⃣ Farm Level Data - For Food & beverage companies - look for a capability that combines satellite data, farm management, and ag-machine data to obtain primary data from farmers. 8️⃣ Scope 3 emission factors - Emission factor databases such as Ecoinvent, Agribalyse, EF3.2, 4.0. Ability to upload custom emission factors. TARGET MANAGEMENT 9️⃣ SBTI Flag - For Food & Beverages, model sector and commodity pathways (e.g., dairy, palm oil, wheat). Obtain insights into supplier performance against SBTi FLAG. Group commodities into geographical regions for specifics. 🔟 Industry & Energy Targets - Set and manage targets for energy consumption and industrial emissions, aligning with SBTi and other frameworks. 1️⃣1️⃣ Simulations & What-if - Perform "what if" scenarios to assess the impact of different variables on emissions and outcomes. REPORTING & ANALYTICS 1️⃣2️⃣ Advanced analytics to derive insights from the collected data. 1️⃣3️⃣ Audit & Traceability CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT 14 and 15 - Customers demand to simulate their footprints & impact.

So you decided you are going to address Scope 3 emission. Great! 👍 It may be your first time, but most probably you are taking over the famous 'Excel sheet' from the consultant that helped you to calculate your first baseline. Data Management quickly becomes a nightmare. These are 8 tips / reflections I see that are effective today. What are your biggest hurdles to scale and automate Scope 3 purchased goods and services?

Companies are working hard on reducing their #Scope3 emissions, by engaging also with their suppliers. Here is my #weekend update on what's been going on around this theme. Mars announced a new program - backed by 47m€ - to decarbonize its dairy supply chain - that's milk , yoghurt etc... 70% of its scope 3 emissions are from raw materials - not uncommon food producers which are now subject to Science Based Targets for FLAG - a specific set of SBTi targets focused on agricultural and land-use-related emissions . Majority is from dairy , sourced from 1000 farmers and "100.000 cows". Amongst the partnerships that are announced are with FrieslandCampina - a Dutch cooperative. They will pilot Zero-emission dairy farms, by improving the type of food the cows will eat. ⭐️H&M⭐️, the clothing giant, released their latest sustainability report two months ago. They provide an update on their Scope 3 efforts: - Suppliers must set sustainability targets, which are—interestingly enough—reviewed and validated by H&M themselves. - H&M plays an active role in developing new infrastructure for green electricity in countries where their suppliers are located—a great example of #insetting. - H&M collects supplier data monthly, detailing energy usage by source. I see the frequency of data collection often increasing, from annually to quarterly, so monthly progress monitoring is interesting and perhaps necessary. Scope 3 brings in a business opportunity too. You can help your customers to reduce their scope 3 emissions, using your own products or services. ⭐️⭐️Schneider Electric, a french electrical utility company, is helping the suppliers of their clients with moving faster to green electricity contracts. Earlier this week they announced to expand these plans towards the mining and mineral industry with their "Materialize" program. This is an important sector as it provides key materials for the transition itself - think cobalt. They are partnering with the Global Mining Guidelines group, and aim to drive collaboration across the value chain. We are all for that! Have a great weekend! 🤗

I speak to a lot of sustainability managers these days. There is so much stuff todo. How do you prioritize? Based on what's burning today. Scope 3 is put higher on the agenda in this priority list. Why is it essential to focus on Scope 3 and supplier engagement now? 📕 Regulatory Requirements: Starting in 2026, the CSRD requires that every relevant company report their value chain emissions, based on data from 2025. You need to be prepared by January 1, 2025, as your customers will request this from you. 🤔 So what do I need to share? You will need to share your product footprints. Relying solely on Scope 1 and 2 data for product footprints is insufficient and incomplete, and will not help your customer move the needle. ☘️ Only CSRD? No, SBTi is the biggest driver today! An increasing number of your customers are committing to the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). This commitment will likely require you to adopt SBTi standards as well. 👏 So how do i start? If you have already committed to SBTi, or if your customer has requested that you do so, you must engage with your suppliers that represent 68% of your carbon emissions. How do you look at this? What's for you the driving force to start today with supplier engagement or in depth scope 3 measurements ?

I was recently in a prospect conversation . They are managing a portfolio of 10 thousands of products they distribute , procuring this from hundreds of suppliers . How do you go about managing your scope 3 sustainability ? ✅ get your scope 3 baseline under control for all the relevant scope 3 categories . Use spend based emission factors to get a first view ✅ start engaging with key suppliers what sustainability information they have available today , and in what format they can share the info ℹ️ ✅ create a data strategy for capturing scope 3 data , at scale . ✅ identify open standards (like #pathfinder from WBCSD – World Business Council for Sustainable Development ) to obtain product carbon footprint information ✅ tap into open platforms ( like ClimateCamp ) to drive collaboration ✅ start enriching this data with your customer logistics information , and pro- actively share this data with your customers . It can be done - even with a small strategic investment . #collaborate

You worked on your scope 3 emissions baseline. You have submitted your SBTi case. You are now ready to start reducing your scope 3 emissions. When you realize.... the work is only getting started: There are a lot of stuff in between that needs to happen: SCALE problem: - you need to obtain the sustainability data of your suppliers, at scale, often spanning hundreds to thousands of suppliers. - suppliers need to start managing hundreds of requests from customers that come in. Data availabllity and Quality problem: - you want to obtain accurate data, which need to be better than the industry averages they have been working with before! - your suppliers may lack accurate data today, often missing carbon footprint data at product level. Data Standardisation problem: - Your suppliers need to "fill in yet another platform" to share this data, and get fed up in filling in yet another tool. Only then the real reductions can start. Suppliers can share sustainable ealternative products, including the data for their customers to simulate alternative strategies.

Was thinking already a long time to do this write-up. At ClimateCamp we started with a remote-first culture, combined with our quarterly workations. We felt however that Microsoft Teams (or Slack for that matter) wasn't able to bring back the in-office culture that's required to build a fast-growing startup. Async work does not always make the cut. I wrote a blog post how we are combining Gather, a funny looking virtual office, with intensive quarterly workations and a monthly 3-day Airbnb retreat with the team. So no physical office in Antwerp anymore. All budget is re-allocated to Airbnb 🤦♂️ What's the environment you are thriving in? What do you see working? with Ruben Pelckmans Laurent Moyersoen Vitalie SCHIOPU PS: we are hiring an ML Engineer and a Data Scientist. Read the blog post to see how its like!

I think how we look at our suppliers today is wrong. Suppliers are not only a risk. Suppliers should not only be rated. Suppliers are not only there to be assessed. Suppliers should not only fill in yet another (!) ESG form. No. Suppliers are innovating with lower carbon products. Suppliers are investing already today, and can't wait to show it to you. Suppliers can help you , to achieve your own sustainability targets. Hear it from themseleves in our webinar on the 14th of May! cc: Laurent Moyersoen

#hiring ML Engineer looking for impact? ping Vitalie or myself