By 2030, we want to cut our emissions by over half. By 2038, we aim to achieve Net Zero entirely. Our near-term targets are also ambitious, seeking to reduce our absolute scope 1 & 2 emissions by 80% and our absolute scope 3 emissions by 50% by 2030. Like every business the environmental impact we cause can be felt, and we’re taking responsibility for that. We’ve a clear market-leading target founded on a science-based approach to deliver on our promise.
Clyde & Co worked with Carbon Intelligence (now an Accenture company) to determine our baseline carbon footprint. The calendar year 2019 was taken as our baseline year, representing the last full year of normal operations before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Our total footprint for 2019
Office energy use
Business travel and purchased goods and services, i.e. our supply chain
We’re taking a holistic view on how we can reduce our impact on the world. Our strategy uses evidence and research from the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) which is a collaboration of international climate change groups that individually assess and approve companies’ ambitions.
We’re committed to operating our business in a responsible and sustainable manner and acting as an exemplar to the industry, demonstrating high ambition, high transparency and contributing to thought leadership.
Our Zero as one strategy is a global effort led by our Environmental Sustainability & Biodiversity team to help the firm reach our Net Zero target by 2038. The campaign aims to raise sustainability awareness at the firm and encourage everyone to get involved. So far, we’ve worked on providing tips for using our offices more efficiently, ideas for reducing carbon impact when travelling, seasonal campaigns and initiatives and climate change awareness training. We believe sustainability should be part of everything we do, and we all have a part to play.
We’re looking into our suppliers and the supply chains they use to address and support in areas that make an impact, while at the same time making our own internal travel policies more sustainable. We’re also transitioning our office portfolio towards fully renewable energy dependability.
We’re establishing a global network of passionate sustainability champions who will make incredible inroads into waste and recycling, nature and local communities, biodiversity, and nature loss. We’ve also developed climate awareness training to enable all our employees to help us deliver on our targets.
The firm also regularly engages with transformative strategies and ideas to stay up to date with an ever-changing and progressing sector. For example, we’ve converted all our corporate credit facilities into Sustainability Linked Credit Facilities and are implementing initiatives in our regional offices, such as a No Dig allotment in Bristol in the UK.
Our commitment to sustainability has been recognised on several occasions, showcasing our dedication to becoming a leading firm in the industry. We won the Law Firm/Operational award at the inaugural Legal ESG/UK Awards and ranked 4th out of 180 UK & US law firms in the RSGI GREENPRINT report, to name a few examples.
We’re developing a carbon offsetting strategy that will help us achieve Net Zero by 2038. We’ve already planted the Clyde & Co Community Forest in the north-east of England, and we’re currently partnering with Save the Children to fund agroforestry and reforestation in and around the tea-growing areas of the Nandi region in Kenya where child poverty, malnutrition and food insecurity are high. This partnership, which includes other major law firms, aims to fund further nature-based carbon removal projects in the future to work towards achieving Net Zero targets and improve community resilience in deprived regions suffering the effects of climate change. Our team are continuing to work on more exciting projects to deliver social, economic and environmental benefits to our communities.
Since establishing our baseline footprint and creating a roadmap to reduce our emissions, we’ve made good progress through a number of initiatives.
The Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) is a collaboration between CDP (formerly known as the Carbon Disclosure Project), the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC), World Resources Institute (WRI), and the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF). The SBTi defines and promotes best practice in science-based target setting and independently assesses and approves companies’ targets. A greenhouse gas emissions target can be considered ‘science based’ if the emissions reductions it requires are in line with keeping the global temperature increase at or below 1.5°C compared to pre-industrial temperatures by mid-century (2050).
The SBTi have validated and approved both our near-term and Net Zero reduction targets.
To better utilise the knowledge and expertise at the firm and increase engagement with sustainable initiatives, we've established a global volunteer group dedicated to improving sustainability across our firm. They act as representatives within our offices globally to:
We’ve a trainee founded Climate Change Group (CCG) that brings together trainees, paralegals and apprentices across our offices to provide support to our firm’s fee-earners and pro-bono clients on topics related to climate change.
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We sat down with our Climate Change Group (CCG) leadership team, Lisa Weigand, Noah Friend, and Favour Olatunde, to ask them some questions.
Read More - Interview with our Climate Change Group (CCG)
