Many companies today rely on Excel spreadsheets to calculate their carbon footprint. However, as companies grow and data volumes increase, it becomes evident that this system is insufficient. With the intensification of regulations and rising sustainability expectations, these manual and complex processes pose significant challenges for companies. The limitations of Excel-based systems create serious issues in accurately collecting, analyzing, and reporting data.

Therefore, there is a need for more robust, sustainable digital tools that can involve all stakeholders. These tools enable the automatic collection and analysis of data, helping companies manage their carbon footprint more efficiently and effectively. Digital tools also increase transparency, allowing results to be easily monitored by all stakeholders. This way, companies can comply with legal requirements and achieve their sustainability goals more quickly.

Why Should You Manage Your Emissions?

Sustainability Goals

Companies are obliged to minimize their environmental impacts. Calculating and managing emissions demonstrates their commitment to sustainable practices, which is crucial given today's environmental challenges. This responsibility not only protects the environment but also meets the expectations of all stakeholders affected by the company's activities and decisions.

Stakeholders

Companies must meet the new expectations of their stakeholders due to increasing environmental awareness and sustainability demands. Investors, customers, suppliers, and regulatory bodies expect the reduction of environmental impacts and transparent reporting. Carbon accounting is a critical tool to show these stakeholders that your company takes environmental responsibilities seriously and takes proactive steps to achieve sustainability goals. This approach also enhances the company's reputation, provides a competitive advantage, and contributes to long-term success.

Regulations

Carbon Markets and Trading Systems

Some countries and regions have established carbon markets or trading systems to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. In these systems, companies can buy and sell emission quotas to meet specific emission targets. In Turkey, events like the Istanbul Carbon Summit are organized to promote carbon trading and reduce carbon footprints.

National Emission Standards and Targets

Many countries have set specific emission standards for industrial plants, energy producers, and other emission sources, with reduction targets. To comply with these targets, companies may need to reduce their emissions. Turkey aims to comply with the Paris Agreement by committing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 21% by 2030.

Reporting and Transparency Requirements

Some countries require companies of a certain size to regularly report their greenhouse gas emissions and share these reports with the public. This encourages companies to monitor, manage, and develop strategies to reduce their emissions. In Turkey, the Regulation on Monitoring of Greenhouse Gas Emissions, published in 2014, mandates businesses to report annual emissions through independent verification organizations to ensure transparency.

Environmental Permits and Licenses

In some sectors, facilities must obtain environmental permits or licenses before starting operations. These permits often include emission control requirements and may be subject to regular inspections. In Turkey, the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Regulation, which came into force in 2010, plays a significant role in evaluating the environmental impacts of large-scale projects and obtaining necessary permits.

International Agreements and Protocols

Various agreements and protocols between countries set targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions globally, encouraging member countries to comply with these targets. Turkey signed the Paris Agreement in 2016, committing to reducing greenhouse gas emissions to keep global warming below 2°C.

Compliance with regulations for emission management is crucial for meeting legal requirements and achieving sustainability goals. Therefore, it is essential for companies to carefully review their country's and sector's regulations and develop appropriate strategies.

Decarbonization Capacity

Accurately measuring emissions is the first step to effectively reducing them. This process allows companies to identify critical high-emission areas, set realistic reduction targets, and develop strategies to achieve these targets. This vital step for serious sustainability commitments can also provide cost savings, efficiency increases, and innovation.

These factors emphasize the need for companies to calculate and actively reduce their corporate carbon footprints. Now, let's delve deeper into the "how" and explore solutions that can enable sustainability teams to manage emissions effectively.

Excel spreadsheets are not flexible enough to handle large volumes of data and data in different formats. For international companies, consolidating and keeping up-to-date data from different countries and systems in a single file can be challenging. Additionally, manual data entry and calculation processes can be time-consuming and increase the risk of errors. Accessing accurate emission factors can also be difficult, as emission factors vary by country, affecting the accuracy and consistency of calculations.

Platforms, on the other hand, are ideal for overcoming these challenges. These software tools provide automatic data integration and calculation, making it easy to continuously monitor and report emissions. They also offer the capability to simulate different scenarios and analyze emission reduction strategies.

In conclusion, carbon accounting software is a powerful tool that supports companies in achieving their sustainability goals. These software tools enable businesses to effectively manage their emissions and continuously improve their sustainability performance, providing both environmental and economic benefits.

What is a Carbon Footprint Calculation Platform?

How the Carbon Gate Platform Simplifies Your Processes

A carbon footprint calculation platform is a digital tool used by individuals, companies, and organizations to measure, monitor, and manage carbon emissions from their activities. These platforms help users calculate and report carbon emissions from energy consumption, transportation, waste management, and other activities.

The Carbon Gate platform collects data from energy consumption, transportation, waste management, and other activities. You can manually enter consumption data for energy sources like electricity, natural gas, and fuel, or automatically receive them through integrated systems. It calculates emissions from transportation and logistics activities, including vehicle fuel consumption, air travel, and other logistics activities. In waste management, it considers the amount of waste produced and disposal methods for emission calculations. It also evaluates emissions from production processes, raw material use, and other activities.

Using emission factors, Carbon Gate performs accurate and reliable emission calculations, working with internationally accepted methodologies. The real-time monitoring feature allows for observing emission changes instantly by monitoring data in real-time. It prepares long-term strategic plans by tracking emission updates and developments over time. Detailed reports can be created sectorally, regionally, and operationally, and customized according to user needs. By providing reports compliant with local and international sustainability standards and regulations, it facilitates meeting legal requirements. It visualizes data with graphs and tables, making it easier to interpret and understand.

To reduce emissions, it recommends strategies such as energy efficiency, waste management, and the use of renewable energy, helping users achieve their sustainability goals. It creates actionable plans based on the determined strategies and systematizes emission reduction processes. It works integrated with existing ERP, CRM, and other business management systems, ensuring data flow and automating data entry, reducing manual errors. By supporting certification processes compliant with international standards like ISO 14064-1 and GHG Protocol, it makes it easier for companies to document their environmental performance.

Its user-friendly interface allows the platform to be used comfortably without requiring technical knowledge. This improves the user experience and shortens the training period. With our expert support team, we are always there when you need us. Ensuring data security and privacy by storing data securely and making it accessible only to authorized persons, Carbon Gate applies the highest standards in data security and confidentiality. In addition to reducing your environmental impact, it optimizes business processes, saving time and costs. Start using the Carbon Gate platform today to manage and reduce your carbon emissions!

How to Measure Your Organization’s Carbon Footprint with Carbon Gate

Steps to Measure Carbon Emissions on the Carbon Gate Platform

Step 1: Data Entry Start by collecting accurate and clean data. Complete the first step by entering the necessary data into the system to calculate your carbon footprint.

Step 2: Measurement Measure your Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions with the data you entered. Conduct a detailed analysis by measuring carbon emissions from all your activities, from energy consumption to transportation.

Step 3: Reporting Create reports compliant with global standards. Produce a transparent and reliable carbon footprint report with reports compliant with international standards such as ISO 14064-1 and GHG Protocol.

Step 4: Reduction Strategy Development Develop your reduction strategies with our expert team and achieve your sustainability goals.

Step 5: Reduction Track the results of the goals you have implemented. Regularly monitor the impact of the strategies you have implemented.

Step 6: Continuous Monitoring and Updating Regular Updates: Regularly update your data to monitor your emissions and measure the impact of your improvement efforts. Periodic Reports: Carbon Gate creates reports at specific periods (monthly, quarterly, annually) and presents them to you. Review these reports to evaluate your performance.

Step 7: Certification and Compliance Compliance Reports: Create the necessary reports to comply with local and international sustainability standards. Certification Applications: Use the reports provided by Carbon Gate to apply for environmental certifications and document your sustainability efforts.

How Carbon Gate Simplifies Your Life

As a carbon emission measurement platform, Carbon Gate can simplify your life and business processes in many ways. Here are some key advantages offered by Carbon Gate:

• Save time and money by automatically monitoring emissions instead of manually collecting and calculating them.
• Store and update data from previous years in a single database, making this process easier.
• Gain detailed information by getting to the source of emissions, and easily determine and implement your reduction strategies.
• Minimize internal costs by receiving support to increase supply chain efficiency, optimize energy use, and reduce waste.
• Periodically track your emissions for sustainability and ESG reporting, add them to your report, and show your commitment to reduction targets.
• Dynamic structure that provides interactive calculation and analysis with constantly updated data considering users' energy consumption, transportation habits, and other environmental factors.

Start using the Carbon Gate platform today to manage and reduce your carbon emissions!