Green from the roots up, Sustainable from the top down
I talked with Carbonetworks’ President and CEO, Michael Meehan, the other day. We discussed Carbonetworks’ Carbon platform, and how their application helps companies participate in global carbon markets.
Carbonetworks software helps companies understand whether their carbon is going to be an asset or liability to them today and in the future as and works with companies to roll out their carbon strategies.
The television image in the video is from videocrab
Screenshot credit Carbonetworks
We in GreenMonk have written previously about carbon accounting software and the huge opportunities which are about to open up in this space.
Carbon footprint reporting is increasingly becoming part of the purchasing process with purchasers seeking carbon footprint data from their vendors. It will in time be mandatory and when that happens, every company will have a requirement for this kind of software. Companies establishing a name for themselves at this early stage will be well placed when that requirement comes to pass.
No surprise then to see the announcement on Cnet today that software company Carbonetworks received $5 in series A funding for its online carbon calculator from clean-tech venture firm NGEN Partners.
Climate Earth is another player in this space, to my knowledge hasn’t announced any funding yet and their website could stand some work but their Team is impressive.
These companies should be working with AMEE so that everyone can benefit from the data.
Watch this space, more companies and more offerings are likely to spring up and don’t be surprised if some of these early players become attractive acquisition targets for more established software houses.
I come from a Social Media background. I use blogs, Social Networks, Microblogs, Photo Sharing sites, Video Sharing sites, Livecasting apps, Social bookmarking sites etc. everyday. I generate a constant stream of updates about things happening in my life which can be followed via RSS or on my Friendfeed page (a feed aggregator) or on the individual sites.
Cool. Interesting enough I hear you say. So what? Well, lets just park that for a second.
Carbon accounting is rapidly coming down the line. Already we are seeing companies like BT and Verizon requiring lower carbon footprints from their suppliers. This is because carbon accounting will take supply chains into account.
Carbon accounting will be incredibly granular and will attempt to take everything into account in the life-cycle of goods and services. This will include electrical power usage, road mileage and air miles alongside expenses and financial returns.
To get buy-in from staff, reporting total power and energy usage will have to be made as simple as possible so that it doesn’t interfere with the natural flow of people’s work.
This is where lifestreaming applications come in. Encourage the people in your organisation to use applications like blogs, Twitter, Flickr, Dopplr, et al. Then you can capture that output and route it through the carbon accounting software and ta da! carbon usage information accounted for.
Obviously it won’t be as easy as that, but if your employees are using Twitter, say, set up your company’s carbon account software with a Twitter account. Then instruct staff on how to message the software with what you are doing at any point in time i.e. “@bt-carbon-accounts – putting on the kettle for a cup of coffee” or “@ibm-carbon-accounts – hot today, setting the aircon to 19C”. This would also be especially useful for capturing the carbon footprint of people working from home.
IBM’s master inventor Andy Stanford-Clark has already done some work in this area. His house has a Twitter account and regularly sends updates like:
the phone is ringing (mobile)
electricity meter reading: 32100 KWH
outside lights turned off
outside lights turned on
etc. to Twitter automatically!
Will carbon accounting software and its requirement for constant inputs from all levels of business bring lifestreaming applications into the Enterprise 2.0 fold?