The audit of the greenhouse gas emissions at Natural Origins is an overall initiative for sustainable development and Corporate Social Responsibility. The objective of the project is to quantify all the impacts generated by the production and the consumption of our products in order to determine actions to be set up to reduce our carbon footprint and to fight against, on our level, global warming. This project is a real opportunity and a lever for innovation, but it is important to highlight that it is also a substantial human and financial investment.

Human and financial means implemented

As with all forms of audits, studies or benchmarks, carrying out a greenhouse gas emissions assessment provides a step back. This initiative raises questions and opens new development opportunities. This questioning is not effortless, it requires the implication of all the employees along with external qualified persons:

• A CSR policy task officer:

To carry out this audit, it is essential to be surrounded by qualified people with proposals to make; we therefore hired a full time CSR policy task an officer who pilots and coordinates every step and ensures the link between the different stakeholders. The entire Natural Origins team and our partners support the officer: the involvement of everyone is essential to properly carrying out the survey.

• An external provider:

Analysing the raw data and converting this into emissions is a job in itself which requires training and adapted software, which is why in order to guarantee precise results, we have called on an internationally recognised dedicated structure.

The 3 steps of the project

This project is carried out in 3 phases and initially concerns collecting information, the exploitation of this raw data and the implementation of an action plan to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

1. Collecting data

At this stage, the objective is to take over all activities and identify all sources of greenhouse gas emissions based on 3 levels (called scopes), corresponding to emissions parameters:

• Scope 1 corresponds to direct emissions resulting from the combustion of fossil energy, such as gas, petrol, coal, etc. Only emissions linked directly to our activity are measured, for example the consumption of refrigerant fluids or electricity…
  
  
• Scope 2 regroups indirect emissions of CO2 linked to the production of energy, in the form of electricity or heat.
  
  
• Scope 3 includes other indirect emissions, that being those which are not directly associated with manufacturing products. Henceforth, we need to analyse all the rest of the value chain, like the transport of merchandise, our clients’ end use, waste management and even professional travel…
  
  

2. Analyse the raw data and convert this into greenhouse gas emissions

All this quantified data is then translated into the form of emissions based on a coefficient which converts data in the ″equivalent in CO2″. This step is carried out by a qualified external provider based on a clearly defined methodology.

3. Recommendations and means of improvement to limit these greenhouse gas emissions and our carbon footprint.

Our audit is in the process of being finalised. Based on this summary, we have clearly identified greenhouse gas emissions sources, which we will present shortly. Our mission is henceforth to understand the reasons for these emissions and determine the actions to be set up to limit emissions while maintaining our activity, a sizable challenge indeed! But which gives our work real meaning…

Natural Origins proposes accompanying you in promoting your CSR commitments using its means and expertise. 

Please feel free to contact our experts.