The path to net-zero starts with understanding your carbon footprint
I’m thrilled to announce our recent investment in Emitwise, a leading player in the rapidly evolving automated carbon accounting sector.
The need to achieve corporate net-zero emissions is now universally understood, but there are still many significant challenges and obstacles to overcome. Enterprises face mounting pressure from customers, investors, and regulators to disclose accurate environmental data, driving the demand for more effective progress tracking on the path towards carbon neutrality.
Currently, most enterprises rely on specialized consulting firms or small in-house sustainability teams (with cross-department assistance) to collect data across various systems — and then estimate their total CO2 emissions via manual spreadsheets. Beyond the tedious and inaccurate nature of these reporting methods, they also do little to help strategize or identify the critical actions needed to reach the ultimate goal — eliminating the organization’s carbon footprint.
Automating the collection, analysis, and reporting of carbon emissions
Emitwise addresses these critical reporting problems by providing an automated, commercial-grade carbon accounting software platform for scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions. The solution connects enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems and ingests raw data files across all emission categories within its proprietary Emitwise Carbon Calculator.
At the heart of its solution is a proprietary emissions factor (EF) database that combines public and private emissions data with AI and machine learning. Emitwise conceived and developed the platform via its in-house team of experts spanning environmental fields, social and governance (ESG) reporting, data analytics, life cycle assessments (LCA), and carbon accounting. Combining an ERP with data ingestion algorithms, this software automatically selects the appropriate emissions factors, accurately calculates carbon footprints, and provides audit-level transparency at the input level. The company’s internal team of carbon accountants also provides overlay support to ensure all results maintain the highest levels of accuracy.
“I want to post my carbon footprint result, alongside other key corporate KPI’s, on my plant wall for all employees to see and monitor,” said one executive with a leading packaging solution vendor. “That’s how we will engage and motivate staff to make a difference.”
This unique software-driven approach enables companies from all industries to efficiently and accurately calculate their carbon footprint, supported by automated updates to track ongoing progress. Here at ArcTern Ventures, we believe Emitwise’s software platform is a game-changer that sets new standards in universal carbon footprint reporting.
Life beyond reporting: empowering employees to drive real change
Efficiently measuring a carbon footprint is only the first step in an organization’s journey towards net-zero emissions. Genuine CO2 mitigation, with all of its complexities, needs to move beyond simple boardroom rhetoric — and become a shared mindset that encompasses every employee at each level of an organization.
Emitwise has designed its solution with this very goal in mind, creating simple and elegant user dashboards that can be customized at a functional or employee level, and then configured to track the desired outcomes. Using the AI-powered software, companies can swiftly identify and tackle carbon hotspots, devise a broad range of roadmap priorities, set science-based CO2 targets, and then track their progress all in one place.
The platform raises new levels of awareness that are critical for both developing effective mitigation strategies and establishing climate-driven incentives. Ultimately, the path to net-zero requires empowering all employees to take action and realize they can make an impact — however big or small.
“We believe active management of carbon footprint will be a cornerstone of every company’s stated mission and culture…” said Mauro Cozzi, co-founder and CEO of Emitwise. “The world will see real change once we establish that level of visibility and engagement.”
At ArcTern Ventures, our stated investment mission is to finance innovative tech companies that are accelerating the transition to a low-carbon economy. Emitwise is incredibly well-positioned to drive this evolution, with a dynamic vision that perfectly aligns with our own.
We’re also not the first company to realize this extraordinary potential. ArcTern Ventures is proud to join the new and existing group of investors supporting its growth efforts, including True Ventures, Social Impact Capital, Lightbird Ventures, and others.
Emitwise is a company engaging the latest technologies to set new standards in carbon footprint tracking and reporting. And with our recent investment, we’re proud to be strengthening its efforts on the path to realizing a carbon-neutral world.
