We are calculating our global carbon footprint to set one consolidated target
Computershare has made considerable efforts to reduce our carbon footprint over the years, particularly by minimising the energy used to operate our data centres and buildings, and focusing on paper consumption, travel, and recycling IT kit. We’ve always taken the view that effecting immediate change was more important than talking about potential future plans.
Aligned with this approach, historically, we’ve measured our carbon footprint on an office-by-office basis (where primary data has been available from landlords) and set targets for individual offices to help drive down energy use, water use and waste consumption.
In FY20, we decided to engage a third party, Climate Partner, to help us calculate our total carbon footprint, using secondary data where primary data isn’t available or where landlords simply don’t provide it. This allows us to set one consolidated target to reduce our carbon footprint globally. This target replaces all previous targets.
The results
Between January and December 2020, our business activities generated a total of 48,951.21* tonnes of CO2, 3.7% of which were Scope 1 emissions, 43.2% Scope 2 emissions and 53.1% Scope 3 emissions. Electricity procurement, employee commuting (or home-working) and paper use were the most emission-intensive activities and represent the largest share of our carbon footprint.
While no formal benchmarks exist, Computershare’s footprint is broadly in line with available data from similar financial services firms. Along with Climate Partner, we are performing detailed analysis to ensure our footprint remains in line or is better than firms with similar activities. In future years, we will be able to share a trend analysis based from this initial footprint.
We recognise that while we are in a low impact sector, we do use significant amounts of paper and electricity. In the next year, we expect to significantly increase our procurement of renewable energy and will be reviewing the types of paper we use. These two items represent the biggest opportunities for carbon reduction at Computershare.
It should be noted that 2020 was not a normal year from a business activity perspective, particularly with regard to business travel and commuting, so we expect to see some fluctuation in emissions numbers as these activities resume.
Our carbon reduction target
We will unveil our plans for carbon neutrality in the near future.
We’re also continuing our work with Climate Partner to create a carbon footprint view of our products and services. This will help our clients to make greener choices when commissioning our services.
Finally, we have increased the data available in our CDP submission and look forward to sharing our rating from that once available later this year.
*includes a 10% error margin
Moving to flexible working
Our long-term move to flexible working reduces the number of employees commuting to an office each day, representing a further reduction in transport carbon emissions. In the UK, we’ve been able to close two of our Mortgage Services office sites, primarily because more than 70% of those employees now work from home, either full or part-time. This has also allowed us to rationalise our application server infrastructure, achieving a 60% reduction in server numbers, bringing with it a similar decrease in energy consumption for power and heating and cooling systems.
Reducing paper production in Communication Services
In Communication Services, we have seen overall communication volumes remain at high levels and demand for delivery via digital channels steadily increase. There has been a year-on-year decrease of 6.3% in physical mailpacks and a related increase of 5% in digital communications. Much of the reduction in demand for physical mailpacks resulted from regulatory authorities around the world permitting companies to issue a physical notice of AGMs via mail and deliver the other meeting materials information online. Many clients moved to take up these Notice and Access solutions to ensure they could fulfil shareholder needs to receive materials and vote despite postal service disruptions and other challenges experienced during the pandemic. On average, the notice-only mailing is 90% lighter than a full meeting mailpack while also being much faster to produce. As clients begin to move across to this option, some regions have already up to 26% less paper when compared to the previous year’s mailings.
Enhancing digital products in Issuer Services
The launch of our new Virtual AGM product has expanded our capacity and features for holding virtual and hybrid shareholder meetings for our clients. This format enables significant carbon savings compared to the in-person events they replace, due to eliminating most or all of the travel involved. During FY21, we coordinated 2,457 virtual and 21 hybrid meetings – that’s one-third of our total client meetings and more than double the number held during FY20. We expect that number to increase in FY22. For our own AGM, we saved more than 110,000 sheets from being mailed out by adopting Notice and Access rather than mailing the full Notice of Meeting – Computershare’s shareholders were issued two pieces of paper rather than eight. In Australia, we offered electronic new shareholder packs to clients as an option to replace printed ‘Welcome’ packs. In FY21, this meant approx. 585,000 fewer pages and 292,000 fewer envelopes were printed and posted. We deployed online self-service capabilities for statements and accounting detail updates in the US, enabling thousands of shareholders to eliminate a range of paper forms and increasing our self-service rates from 72% to 76%.
Offering online and self-service options in Mortgage Services
We have continued to manage a significant proportion of mortgage payment holidays or forbearances through online tools, avoiding the need for paper-based processes. In the US, borrowers were able to utilise an enhanced self-service platform to establish forbearance and extensions. This platform supports two-way SMS, web and IVR options as alternatives to traditional paper-based applications. In the UK, the main reason borrowers call us is to check or modify their payment schedules – 48% of these enquiries are now completed via self-service. 1,400 other customer actions per month are now undertaken via online and digital methods.
A new digital platform for Employee Share Plans
As we roll out our upgraded Employee Share Plans platform, EquatePlus, to new regions, we are also deploying a digital-first strategy. By directing participants to our mobile and web platforms to access their Plan holdings, transact and view communications, we can also eliminate the need for many paper forms and statements. Since May 2019, we’ve upgraded 226 clients to EquatePlus, encompassing three million participants across the UK, Europe and Australia.
Reducing our energy consumption through technology
We have continued to invest in more efficient data centres, which has allowed us to substantially reduce our physical infrastructure and achieve considerable savings in energy consumption. We estimate that we have saved 10% in power use for our Storage and Compute appliances as a result of our data centre platform refresh in the UK and Australia. We are also continuing to recycle devices that have reached the end of their service life. With most of our employees working from home due to the pandemic, they remain well connected, able to collaborate virtually over Microsoft Teams. We expect to be able to continue this with flexible working remaining an option for our employees in the future.
Each day, 12,000 active users participate in:
Green Office Challenge 11 – Green Home Challenge
During FY21, we introduced a new format for our annual Green Challenge in response to the number of people now working from home. The Green Home Challenge encouraged employees to make a pledge to improve their environment, at home or in their local community, in one or more of four categories. These were: Food and Drink, Travel and Transport, Natural Wildlife and Conserving Resources. During the competition period, we received 302 pledges from employees, covering everything from insect hotels and homemade bird feeders to riverside clean-ups and clothing swaps.
There were prizes for the offices that received highest number of pledges (based on headcount), as well as individual prizes. Some individuals had really gone above and beyond in not only setting themselves ambitious pledges (and in some cases multiple pledges), but also following them through to completion, with evidence to prove it. In total, 18 people received a prize.
Tree planting program
In 2017 we launched our global tree planting program. We aim to plant enough trees to cover 10% of the carbon emitted as a result of our business air travel. Each year we maintain our global tree planting program and plant trees across North America, Europe and Australia. We have planted 9,225 trees to date.
Computershare is committed to being a responsible business.
We recognise the environmental and social impacts of our activities and seek to manage them appropriately.
Follow the link below to view our Corporate Responsibility Policy.