eco3 services

Carbon footprinting your business? Are you going to get the full story? Probably not, unless you look at low-carbon design of products. The vast majority of your carbon footprint can result from the use phase of products you make rather than the manufacturing and distribution phases. This use phase is determined by the design approaches in your product development process. Whilst most carbon footprinting exercises deal with energy use for manufacture and distribution directly related to a company’s activities very few look in detail at other life-cycle stages to get a true picture of the full-life carbon impact. When developing a carbon-led design strategy you need to consider all areas of the life-cycle stage from extraction to disposal, included embedded carbon in materials, carbon impacts of using resources such as electricity, water or other consumables during the products life with the customer, transit impacts, storage impacts (particularly in the retail food chill-chain), and disposal options.