Conventional “business wisdom” suggests that a company can increase its cost savings and improve its bottom line by just becoming more energy efficient. The Cable Television Industry, for example, uses Network and Facility Efficiency Studies as an effective means to identify these opportunities. However, contrary to this belief, a Carbon Impact Assessment can actually help create a more complete picture of the savings possibilities. In fact, it can actually expand a company’s profits in their top line. Here is why conventional “business wisdom” may have gotten it wrong:

Using the Cable Television Industry’s Network and Facility Efficiency Studies as an example, one would discover that, by nature, they are inextricably linked to the Carbon Impact Assessment. The purpose of both efforts is to identify types of energy sources, gather data about frequency and degree of consumption, discover areas where inefficiencies dominate, and determine comparative references which articulate those inefficiencies. The primary difference between the Network and Facility Studies and the Carbon Impact Assessment is that energy efficiency is articulated in terms of cost, rather than carbon emissions. The same information needs to be generated to calculate either reference. Therefore, the example CATV company is already doing 80% of the work needed to create a Carbon Impact Assessment when they conduct the Network and Facility Studies. The marginal cost of completing the extra 20% is worth the added benefit the CATV company will receive should it choose to complete the Carbon Impact Assessment.

A major benefit to the CATV industry, as well as all other industries, is that the company performing the Carbon Impact Assessment will have a clearer knowledge and awareness of all of their associated emissions across their entire operation. Their knowledge base for energy savings will not be limited to only the facility, network, or transportation sector, for example. Another major benefit is that it will further improve a company’s “top line” by increasing the competitiveness of their business in a more environmentally-aware marketplace. We are in the “Age of Accountability”. Our interdependent and wired world has changed the market landscape to one where consumers are more aware and educated about the operations of the businesses they patronize. According to Andrew Savitz and Karl Weber, authors of The Triple Bottom Line: How Today’s Best-Run Companies are Achieving Economic, Social and Environmental Success, “Transparency is increasing just as corporate reputation, brands, and other intangible assets are becoming dominant value drivers” ¹. Conducting a Carbon Impact Assessment serves to add to a company’s transparency and “green” reputation. These “intangible assets” associated with this exercise are only net positives for an organization. The active efforts taken by an organization to improve energy efficiency for both their network and facility operations will lead to immediate and recognizable reductions in carbon emissions in addition to cost savings.  Communicating these successes effectively will help the company build brand loyalty and gain new customers.

The true opportunity for all companies is to adopt a holistic approach that goes beyond the sole recognition of the traditional financial impact to the bottom line. The Carbon Impact Assessment will add to the credibility of a company’s green image by addressing the financial bottom and top lines, as well as the environmental and social bottom lines identified in The Triple Bottom Line. The question now is, “Why wouldn’t a company want to conduct a Carbon Impact Assessment?”

¹Savitz, Andrew W., and Karl Weber. The Triple Bottom Line: How Today's Best-Run Companies Are Achieving Economic, Social, and Environmental Success - And How You Can Too. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2006. Print.