Equal Experts UK Ltd is committed to achieving Net Zero Carbon emissions by 2030. This plan currently covers the UK only, and not any of our subsiduaries in other countries.

Greenhouse Gas Emissions reporting

We calculate and report on our greenhouse gas emissions based on our financial year (FY), which starts in April, not by calendar year.

	Reporting period
Emissions	FY 2019/20 Baseline	FY 2020/21	FY 2021/22	FY 2022/23 Current
Scope 1	0	0	0	0
Scope 2	847.4	3.1	1.3	5.5
Scope 3	n/a	162.6	177.8	847.7
Total	847.4	166.0	180.0	853.2

 

Table 1: Summary of our emissions for the last four years (all figures in tCO2e)

Notes on our reporting

• We are using standard tons of CO2e emissions (tCO2e) and financial year 2019/20 as our Baseline for reporting purposes.
• We do not generate Scope 1 emissions as we do not own any vehicles or systems that directly burn fossil fuels.
• Our Scope 2 emissions cover offices that are either leased or serviced only
• We generate and report Scope 3 emissions from the following sub-categories:
  – 2. Capital goods (refresh cycle of IT equipment) (from FY 22/23 only)
  – 6. Business travel
  – 7. Staff commuting (including work from home, known as ‘teleworking’). This includes estimates for our permanent staff and our supply chain sub-contractors
• We do not generate Scope 3 emissions in the following sub-categories:
  – 4. Upstream transportation and distribution activities
  – 5. Waste generated in operations
  – 9. Downstream transportation and distribution

Financial Year 2019/20 (Baseline)

• These are our emissions produced in the past and are the reference point against which future emissions are measured.
• This was our first reporting period, and we did not measure or estimate any Scope 3 emissions.

Financial Year 2020/21

We re-calculated these in September 2022, to revisit our assumptions, particularly for Scope 3 emissions.

• Scope 2 emissions dropped as we spent less time in offices.
• Our Scope 3 emissions were as follows:
  – 6. Business travel – 0.7 tCO2e. This is low due to the Covid pandemic
  – 7. Staff commuting and working from home – 161.9 tCO2e

Financial Year 2021/22

We reviewed our assumptions and recalculated our Scope 3 usage for the previous year to include better estimates for Scope 3 subcategory 6 and better quality data from our travel records for subcategory 7.

• This led to a slight decrease in Scope 2 in terms of electricity use.
• Our Scope 3 emissions were as follows:
  – 6. Business travel – 28 tCO2e from travel which increased due to increased travel after the Covid pandemic
  – 7. Staff commuting and working from home -149.8 tCO2e

Financial Year 2022/23 (last reporting period)

We made no changes to our assumptions for this year but have recalculated office equipment and heating from working from home, and have added Scope 3 subcategory 2 information.

• The increase in Scope 2 emissions was driven by an increase in rented office space.
• Our Scope 3 emissions were as follows:
  – 2. Hardware refresh – 59 tCO2e.
  – 6. Business travel – 188.7 tCO2e from a significant increase in travel, particularly for conferences and events.
  – 7. Staff commuting and working from home – 600 tCO2e from equipment and utilities, increase due to an increase in employees and more commuting./li>

Emissions forecast

We have forecast our emissions over the next 5 years, based on current emissions.

Figure 1: Actual vs forecast annual emissions

We project that our carbon emissions will decrease slowly over the next five years to under 400 tCO2e by the 2028/29 period. As we reported last year, our emissions have increased as work patterns change, particularly with increased travel. The opportunities to reduce them will be limited and so we taking other steps to meet our Net Zero target.

Meeting our Net Zero Reduction Targets

Current Net Zero Activities

We have established an internal working group to design and implement a carbon offset programme to invest in carbon reduction projects during this reporting period.

We are aiming to have a portfolio of carbon offset projects in place by Q2 2024 that will offset our emissions for the previous year, and that will establish a model for the future in the UK as well as then incorporating our global subsidiaries.

Scope 2

• We have reviewed our office occupancy and have no plans to change our office provider who already has a BREEAM rating of Good.

Scope 3

Our Scope 3 activities have been reduced in scope this reporting period while we establish a carbon offset programme. We have

• Supported our staff to improve their home working spaces for energy saving through insulation and power efficiency including encouraging renewable energy sources.
• Collaborated with cloud technology providers Amazon, Google and Microsoft, to help our large-scale customers optimise cloud usage to reduce energy consumption.

Board Approval

This Carbon Reduction Plan has been completed in accordance with PPN 06/21 and associated guidance and reporting standards for Carbon Reduction Plans.

Emissions have been recorded and reported in accordance with the published reporting standard for Carbon Reduction Plans and the GHG Reporting Protocol using the appropriate Government emission conversion factors for greenhouse gas company reporting.

Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions have been reported following SECR requirements, and the required subset of Scope 3 emissions have been reported following the published reporting standard for Carbon Reduction Plans and the Corporate Value Chain Standard.

This Carbon Reduction Plan has been reviewed and signed off by the board of directors.

Sam McGregor – Chief Operating Officer – 12th December 2023