If you don’t measure, you can’t manage: how small businesses can achieve net zero

Ahead of COP26 later this year, a new report has found that 94% of Scottish businesses say that environmental, social and governance strategy (ESG) is important to their business – but only two thirds have calculated their carbon emissions for the last year. Feedback from our own SME clients suggests that, in many cases, the reason is a lack of information on how to go about it – and the fear that it will be complex, time-consuming, and expensive. This is where SECR comes in and saves the day.

SECR provides a robust tool to not only calculate your company’s carbon emissions, but also to track how they change over time. Though it is mainly targeted at large corporations, the Boxfish team are now using SECR to help smaller businesses quantify their emissions and benchmark their impact on the environment.

Using SECR also allows us to support ambitious companies in mapping out their journey to a more sustainable, net-zero future by assessing the gap between their current environmental status and the Scottish and UK Government backstop of 2045/2050. We can then break down the carbon reduction needed into manageable milestones – typically 3 or 5 years in duration, each with an interim reduction target.

Above and beyond, we can help SMEs to identify and implement other suitable measures to reduce their environmental impact – such as switching to green energy procurement, increasing energy efficiency, and investing in low-carbon and/or renewable technology.