As the first full-service carbon consulting firm, Clear Carbon Consulting has nationally recognized experience in carbon, energy, and information management, creating a set of solutions that are practical, cost-effective, and focused on return-on-investment. The goal of each of our projects is to allow the company to learn more about itself, and as a result, afford new decision-making opportunities for profitability. We offer solutions in three areas: carbon management, energy management, and information management.
Carbon Management
Corporate Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Inventories. More than ever before, companies are faced with strong drivers for measuring their GHG inventories. Investor interests such as the Carbon Disclosure Project
©, regulatory uncertainty, and public awareness each serve as a reason for corporate action. However, if done effectively, the GHG inventory can also serve as a valuable management tool. For many companies, carbon is one of the best means of revealing operational inefficiencies as well as new opportunities.
To maximize the value of inventories, Clear Carbon Consulting has developed a two-phased approach to developing a corporate GHG inventory (see our paper “CCC Phased Inventory Approach”). Using this approach, a wide range of companies have not only identified their carbon footprints, but have also found a critical management tool to help them become smarter and more profitable.
Product Life-Cycle Analyses (LCA). An emerging and dynamic issue is carbon footprint analyses for individual consumer products. With major retailers such as Wal-Mart, Home Depot, and Tesco developing carbon or eco scorecards in response to their customers’ concerns about the climate change issue, companies must take notice.
Clear Carbon Consulting offers significant experience in product-based footprints. Our expertise includes calculating emissions for energy use, manufacturing, supply chain, and transportation components of a product’s life cycle. We have developed a proven methodology for: Mapping steps of the production process, identifying each GHG emission source, associating required data, and finding necessary information both within a company and its supply chain.
Event Carbon Footprints. Recently, many high-profile events have sought to achieve “carbon neutral” or “green” status, largely in response to public interest and concern regarding the climate change issue. Clear Carbon Consulting along with its network of partners has developed a full suite of capabilities to credibly measure the carbon and energy footprints of events, identify practical energy management solutions, research the applicability of emerging “green” technologies to further reduce the footprint, and find high-quality carbon offsets. Our combined skill set ensures that the footprint of your event is transparent, and that steps to reduce the footprint are practical, effective, and credible.
Scenario Planning and Project Analysis. After companies complete a GHG inventory, they have a comprehensive view of past business activities and their associated environmental footprint. However, in order to look to the future and develop meaningful business strategy, companies must determine how corporate growth, new product lines, or other corporate dynamics will impact carbon emissions and energy use. This need, combined with uncertainty regarding energy costs and possible carbon emission regulations, provides a strong rationale for scenario planning.
By utilizing our combined carbon, energy, and information management skill sets, Clear Carbon Consulting is uniquely qualified to provide valuable, forward-looking insight and tools that effectively meet the competitive pressures of today and tomorrow. By applying our knowledge of possible regulations, energy prices, carbon markets, and emerging technologies, we build analyses that allow companies to see a range of future possibilities and to plan most effectively today. Moreover, we are committed to building customized analytical tools that transfer our knowledge and institutionalize business processes for our clients.
Energy Management
Integrated Corporate Energy Efficiency and Green Energy Procurement. Energy management continues to be a critical issue for companies, even in industry sectors that were formerly not considered to be energy-intensive. With concerns such as energy cost fluctuations, exposure to potential carbon regulations, and business continuity demands, energy management has taken on a heightened level of importance.
To optimize corporate opportunities for effective energy management, a systematic approach is required to create economies of scale and to ensure that financially attractive energy management opportunities are not missed. Using Fortune 50 energy management experience, Clear Carbon Consulting and its business partners work closely with clients to find suitable energy management projects and create corporate best practices programs. Working with corporate managers, our consultants identify financial thresholds for capital investment, learn corporate energy and carbon goals, and review operations. The result is an energy management best practices program that institutionalizes energy project decision-making and ensures that the most attractive energy projects are selected.
Energy Site Audits. Energy audits offer a quick opportunity to identify viable energy efficiency or renewable energy projects for a location. Working with business partners, Clear Carbon Consulting can perform comprehensive facility energy audits to identify practical and profitable energy management solutions. Because of our combined energy and carbon expertise and our clients’ needs for more decision making criteria, we are able to provide audit findings and forecast project impacts for energy, financial and carbon returns.
Information Management
GHG and Energy Data and Business Requirements. As corporate energy and GHG management evolves, finding an effective means of managing the ever-growing set of information requires documenting present and future needs. Business requirements documents are comprehensive, detailed analyses of how business needs drive data collection, analyses, and reporting within a company. Requirements documentation serves as a "blueprint" for information management systems by clearly translating business activity needs into the language of information systems.
Clear Carbon Consulting's method for developing GHG business requirements relies upon our unique combination of subject matter expertise and information technology capabilities. Our team reviews corporate documents and information systems to understand business processes and corporate information technology standards and rules. Then, we consolidate all collected information and write a requirements document that details information management needs that support GHG and energy management.
Information Management Feasibility Studies. Clear Carbon Consulting offers corporate managers a consolidated report of best methods to gather data, interconnect corporate databases, and streamline energy and environmental information management efforts. Stakeholder and end-user interests are integrated into the process of generating the feasibility report to ensure that all needs are fulfilled.
Employing energy and environmental subject matter expertise and a software/information technology background, Clear Carbon Consulting adheres to a disciplined and objective evaluation methodology to recommend information technology solutions that fit client data needs as well as risk and cost thresholds. The evaluation methodology provides clients with a better understanding of where gaps in processes and technologies exist.
The feasibility study not only recommends technologies to improve energy and environmental management, but also recommends ways to institutionalize business processes, enhance governance, and define roles and responsibilities. Our technology recommendations will match system design to exact needs, thereby reducing time-intensive data reporting, eliminating excess costs, adding analytical value, and addressing risks.
GHG and Energy Management Systems. The difficult task of data collection, analysis, and reporting for corporate GHG and energy inventory management can be streamlined using information technology. Clear Carbon Consulting provides clients with customized tools that interface with existing corporate information technology investments, automate manual data manipulation tasks, and fit client needs and budgets, resulting in a maximum return on investment.
Our approach is different from pre-designed off-the-shelf solutions, because we attempt to leverage existing corporate information management investments. By improving the tools companies already own, we can save our clients money, cut development time, and allow users to continue to work in an information environment that is familiar to them. Our broad proficiency with many commercially available tools allows us to leverage existing corporate investments by using software where companies already have licenses for user interface design, data warehousing, databases, and reporting and analysis.
Clear Carbon Consulting's GHG and Energy Management Systems are designed specifically for each client. Each solution provides managers with the capability to determine the most cost-effective GHG mitigation options, streamline the work of internal users, and provide corporate transparency to external stakeholders.
