Environmental Reporting Strategy - Aligning Environmental Goals and Obligations With Your Business
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Environmental Reporting Strategy Environmental Reporting is not just a Corporate Governance issue, even though this is now a significant driver for many organisations - a streamlined and consistent approach to environmental reporting allows a business to;
- - improve the way in which it delivers products and services,
- - reduce operating costs
- - reduce waste
- - reduce consumption of resources (such as water or energy)
- - improve the bottom line
A reporting strategy will ensure that no area of the business is left out, and that all possible opportunities to minimise the company's impact to the environment are exposed, which in turn will enable action to be taken by everyone in the business.
Corporate Governance & Australian Reporting Schemes Australias corporate reporting environment has now developed to the point where Boards and Directors are required by law to provide the results of their triple bottom line. This means that reporting to government and regulatory agencies now covers financial information as well as information relating to the organisations energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions generated as a result of business activities.
Not only that, but much of the leigslation requires that information relating to emissions data must be recorded and maintained in the same manner as financial records, because the data provided to the Government now will eventually become the data behind the CPRS, and Emissions Trading Scheme.
Businesses that cross certain energy consumption or production, or emissions production thresholds face a fine of $220,000 for failing to register and report this data back to the Department of Climate Change.
Download the full National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act 2007
The NGER Act 2007 The NGER Act has been a catalyst pushing many companies to formally act due to the lowering registration & reporting thresholds.
Many companies that need to report for NGER are already reporting and participating both in australian based environmental reporting schemes, or international environmental reporting schemes. However the NGER Act is designed to replace or streamline reporting for all Australian based environmental reporting schemes.
Reporting Internationally Many of Australias key export partners have legislation in place requiring environmental reporting from businesses - while Australian companies exporting goods to those countries may not be required to report emissions data under that legislation, many of the companies they do business with in foreign markets will be required to report, and as such they may require that data from Australian companies.
The Wine industry is one such industry that is experiencing issues with reporting internationally. Very few wineries would be required to report their emissions data under the NGER Act - however in many cases their trade partners in the EU and the US are required to report emissions data as it relates to the products they sell, and are therefore requiring emissions data as it might relate to the supply chain of a bottle of wine.
Some of the countries with mandatory reporting legislation include
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Canada
- France
- Germany
- Japan
- New Zealand
- Switzerland
- United Kingdom
Capturing Data and Business Intelligence The single greatest challenge identified by businesses trying to report on their CO2e footprint was gathering the data and subsequently managing that data in accordance with the principles originally outlined by the GHG Protocol.
For many businesses the sources of CO2e emissions is diverse, and varying emissions factors apply depending on the way in which a gas or fuel is used, or where energy is purchased from. Not only that but emissions factors change from year to year.
The Greenhouse Gas Protocol - and the NGER Act - require emissions data to be captured in accordance with the same principles that apply to financial records - whereas the business may wish to utilise the data to set reduction targets by fuel type or business unit, as well as generate the reports required by legislation. This sort of data manegement and reporting can only be managed by ERP software.
Contact us to obtain a copy of the full system overview - or arrange a demonstration nger@ndevr.com.au