Net Zero Strategy

Cutwel is on a mission to drive positive change. We are proud of our progress to date and our ambitious decarbonisation targets as we aim to become Net Zero by 2040.

Making a positive impact is part of our company culture and our roadmap provides feasible steps to help us protect our planet at pace.

We are taking action

The climate crisis is arguably the most critical challenge of our times.

Because small businesses collectively account for around half of UK business missions*, we must play our part in driving emissions down, to prevent catastrophic global impacts on our planet and its people.

Transitioning to Net Zero is also rightly becoming a business choice we must and want to take.

Customers are increasingly making choices based on a company’s environmental ethos, whilst governments and investors in general are increasingly mandating ever-cleaner companies and practices.

It is important that we acknowledge both the climate risks to business, and the opportunities presented by embracing environmental sustainability.

Risks

Supply chain disruptions (due to extreme weather)

Human health risks (due to extreme weather/pollution)

Rapidly changing regulations

Changing customer demands

Increased insurance costs

Increased heating and cooling costs

Reputational risks

Opportunities

Attract and retain talent and customers

Develop new offerings

Attract investment

Decrease insurance costs

Optimise efficiencies, reduce costs

Increased resilience to change

Brand enhancement

Measuring our footprint

In devising our carbon reduction plan with the goal of achieving net zero, it is critical that we first understand where our emissions come from. To support this, we have partnered with Positive Planet to measure our emissions.

Scope 1 - Direct Emissions

Direct greenhouse gas emissions that occur from sources owned or controlled by a company, such as emissions from combustion of fuels in on-site boilers, furnaces, or vehicles.

Scope 2 - Controllable Indirect Emissions

Indirect greenhouse gas emissions that result from the generation of purchased electricity, steam or other forms of energy consumed by a company.

Scope 3 - Influencible Indirect Emissions

All other indirect greenhouse gas emissions that occur in an organisation’s value chain, including emissions from upstream and downstream activities.

Total emissions*
5,257.0 tCO²e
202.2 tCO2e/£m revenue

Scopes 1 & 2
78.6 tCO²e
3.0 tCO2e/£m revenue

Scope 3 Procurement
4,419.0 tCO2e
170.0 tCO2e/£m revenue

Scope 3 Non-Procurement
78.6 tCO²e
3.0 tCO2e/£m revenue

Emissions breakdown

An easier way to view our emissions is by category instead of scopes. We have measured our scope 1, 2, upstream scope 3, and downstream non-product scope 3 emissions. These categories appear in our footprint:

■ Purchase of Sold Products (80.9%)

■ Distribution (12.8%)

■ Goods & Services for Operations (3.4%)

■ Commuting (1.1%)

■ Capital Goods (1%)

■ Other (0.8%)

Our Net Zero targets

An easier way to view our emissions is by category instead of scopes. We have measured our scope 1, 2, upstream scope 3, and downstream non product scope 3 emissions. These categories appear in our footprint.

Reduce scope 1 & 2 emissions by 100% by 2030

Reduce scope 3 emissions by 42% by 2030

Reduce our total emissions by ~90% by 2040, becoming Net Zero

We are able to see how much carbon emissions we have to reduce each year by applying each of our carbon reduction targets to our current measured emissions.

The graph above shows that to reach our emission reductions targets, we must achieve an annual decrease of: 14% of scope 1 & 2 emissions to 2030; and 6% of scope 3* emissions to 2030, then 8% to 2040.

In addition to reporting our annual footprint as an absolute emissions figure, we will also report our carbon intensity (in emissions per million pounds of revenue (£m).

It is important that we measure both to accommodate any changes in the size of our organisation. This will also allow us to align with the latest Net Zero guidance more effectively as it evolves over time.

Steps we've taken to reduce our emissions

Measuring our Carbon Footprint

In 2022 we committed to measuring and reporting our business’ carbon footprint annually, allowing us to understand where our emissions come from and take action to reduce them. We appointed experts Positive Planet to support.

Employee Engagement

We started delivering certified carbon literacy training to our employees in 2023. Carbon literacy training is designed to increase awareness and understanding of climate change and its associated impacts. The goal of this training is to empower individuals and organisations to take action and make more informed decisions, both at home and work, to protect our planet. On average, certified learners reduce their footprints by 5-15%, of which ~50% are work-related.

Electric Cars

In December 2023, we proudly replaced all of our company cars with fully electric (with the exception of one van). We also downsized our fleet by one car, saving further emissions.

Remote First

Since the Covid pandemic, we have substantially reduced face-to-face client meetings by switching to remote conferencing, which has substantially reduced business travel.

Reducing Deliveries

Throughout 2023 we have been looking at the numbers of deliveries of stock we receive from suppliers and have reduced down the numbers of journeys taken to deliver stock to our warehouse. We have also reviewed how we dispatch parcels to our customers and put in systems to group together orders to ensure customers don’t receive multiple packages in one day.

Cloud Services

We have removed the majority of our onsite server system and switched to cloud-based services, which is more energy efficient and reduces procurement and maintenance of physical equipment.

Our Net Zero strategy can be summed up into three major steps

1. Measure

We will measure our emissions each year and review our priorities for the year ahead each time. During this time, we will place a particular emphasis on gathering supplier-specific data from our suppliers.

2. Reduce

We’ve already outlined some short to medium term initiatives to begin work on this year. Using future measurements, we should be able toprovide more insight into emissions hotspots as data quality improves.

3. Offset & Inset

In the short to medium term, we will invest funds into our own operations to reduce emissions. Once we see we have reduced the emissions that we can control and influence (especially as we approach the original 90% emissions reduction target), we will look to offset or inset the remaining emissions, thus reaching net zero.

Our goal is Net Zero by 2040

We are proud of our progress to date and our ambitious decarbonisation targets as we aim to become Net Zero by 2040.