S U STA I N A B I L I T Y The way to a smaller footprint The global mobility industrys main associations are working closer together to tackle priority areas for reducing carbon footprint and increasing environmental sustainability. Magali Horbert, FIDIs Sustainability and Strategic Communications Manager, gives an update W hat does a carbon footprint look like? It seems that the world is trying to find its feet, or rather its footprint its carbon footprint, that is. Look around you and you will see talk of this everywhere: on the ads for zero carbon cars, when you book a flight online, even on some food items in the supermarket. We have all heard about the carbon footprint, a concept that was interestingly made popular through a marketing campaign commissioned by BP (British Petroleum) in the early 2000s, to shift the publics attention from its own ecological impact to the responsibility of the individual consumer.1 But can you say that you actually know what it means? Putting things into perspective Lets first go back to basics: all human activity produces greenhouse gases (GHGs), of which carbon dioxide (CO2) is the most familiar and prevalent (other major GHGs are methane, linked mainly to the farming of livestock; l There are many free carbon footprint calculators available online a fun one to try with your family is www.footprintcalculator.org Dont take the numbers as exact science, rather as a rough scale of proportion. For easy and fun reading about the carbon footprint of everything, the book How bad are bananas? by Mike BernersLee will help you develop a sense of scale and might just make you think twice about eating strawberries in winter 62 and nitrous oxide (N2O), linked mainly to fertiliser in agriculture). Everything we do generates GHG emissions (measured in tCO2e, or tonnes of CO2 equivalent). And all the emissions linked to our individual human activities taken together what we eat, what we wear, how we live, how we travel represent our individual carbon footprint. Of course, it is important to put things into perspective we cant stop breathing or eating, obviously. But by first understanding our impact and then adjusting our lifestyle, we can drastically mitigate our environmental footprint. As a baseline, scientists recommend that we should aim for a carbon footprint of maximum five tonnes per year where, currently, the average Western European citizens total is between six and eight tonnes,2 and only one flight from Paris to New York and back in economy generates two tonnes.3 Understanding the impact of international assignments Just like individual people, companies also generate emissions through their activities. These emissions are separated into three categories, called scopes: l Scope 1 covers direct emissions from controlled or owned sources (e.g. the diesel in your trucks or the gas used by your facilitys gas boiler) l Scope 2 relates to indirect emissions from purchased electricity, used to generate steam, heat, and cooling lS cope 3 is the broadest and most complex category, as it covers all other indirect emissions linked to a companys activity including the emissions generated within its entire supply chain. Some examples of Scope 3 emissions are business travel and employee commuting; the production and disposal of packing material; and emissions linked to air and sea transportation of goods. Businesses across the world are under mounting pressure to measure and report on their emissions, and the moving and relocation industry is no exception. As national and international legislation is forcing companies to calculate their environmental impact across all three scopes, stakeholders across the relocation supply chain are scrambling to comply. However, throughout this very diverse and global industry, understanding who needs to calculate and report on what is complicated: one companys Scope 1 emissions will be another companys Scope 3 one day, and vice versa the next. This makes clear and simple carbon accounting a very difficult task. To make matters worse, there are currently no commonly accepted frameworks or guidelines to help make sense of it all. As global mobility stakeholders grapple with