EMBRACING OUR RESPONSIBILITIES
ACS has been fully embracing its responsibilities towards the planet and society for many years as an active participant of the UN’s Sustainable Developments Goals (SDGs). It has been a member of the UN Global Compact Group since 2011, and signed the event industry Net Zero Carbon pledge.
ACS believes that corporate sustainability starts with a company’s value system and a principles-based approach to doing business. This means ACS operates in ways that meet fundamental obligations in respect to human rights, labour, the environment and anti-corruption.
MEASURING OUR CO2 EMISSIONS
ACS has been measuring its CO2 emissions since 2019, appointed a Sustainability Manager in 2022 and in the same year started working with the Climate Neutral Group (CNG), an independent organisation dedicated to helping companies reach a Net Zero carbon footprint by 2050.
The CNG climate experts use innovative tools to make credible and transparent carbon emission measurements. Due to the covid lockdown years, it was not possible to make comparable measurements in 2020 and 2021. In 2022 however, CNG made a complete and thorough analysis and report of ACS’s carbon footprint, which allowed ACS to fully offset its carbon emissions for the first time in 2023.
OFFSETTING OUR CARBON EMISSIONS
This was achieved by carefully selecting, sustainable impact projects that reduce CO2 on location in developing countries. With the advice and guidance from CNG, ACS made a Gold Standard offsetting investment into cookstoves across Africa. These cookstoves not only reduce CO2 on location, but also contribute significantly to improve people’s health, their domestic lives and the environment.
ACS is very aware that reducing its CO2 emissions is the most important element in achieving a Net Zero target, but some emissions are externally controlled, and cannot be reduced further. So for the short term; the only way to currently achieve a zero-carbon target is through investment offsetting.