Overview:

• The client achieved a 95% reduction of its manufacturing footprint in just over two years, and aims to achieve similar success in each of its other ventures.

Challenge:

A conglomerate with worldwide operations in more than 90 different businesses, many of them in carbon-intensive sectors, had ambitious plans for the next ten years and wanted to find ways to achieve its growth targets while reducing its carbon footprint. They approached Challenge Advisory to help them establish a leadership position on tackling climate change without compromising their ambitions for growth, or the development of its operations both regionally and globally.

The Revelation:

The Challenge Advisory sustainability and energy teams began by helping the client create a baseline carbon footprint for its organisation over the next fifteen years, taking into account existing growth plans in clean technologies, and any cost-saving carbon saving technologies that could be implemented straight away. Once this was achieved, Challenge Advisory collaborated with the client, exploring sustainable growth options for the future.

The next step was to collaborate with Challenge Advisory teams in manufacturing, infrastructure, health and agriculture in order to identify sector-specific solutions, and to target business development opportunities in renewable energy and low-carbon fuels eg. manufacturing components for solar power industry. The risk team then examined the various threats in emerging technologies, and once this was achieved, Challenge Advisory devised a detailed strategy advising the client on the best areas of growth in various value chains, as well as the scope of investment for each opportunity.

Outcomes:

Thanks to Challenge Advisory, the client created roadmaps for achieving significant emission reductions in the four businesses that accounted for almost 85 percent of the group’s manufacturing footprint. In their manufacturing business, the team identified measures that would reduce carbon intensity by 15 percent within ten years.

With respect to power generation, they identified methods to reduce their carbon intensity by over the next fifteen years, while also quadrupling the size of their business. To support these projections and initiatives, Challenge Advisory revolutionised their talent pool, training and recruiting over one hundred executives to manage all sections of the conglomerate’s business with a view to raising awareness of climate change issues, as well as to assist in green decision-making and drive their organisational communications strategy.

The client achieved a 95% reduction of its manufacturing footprint in just over two years, and aims to achieve similar success in each of its other ventures.