Scope 1–3 calculator – D&R Dispersions & Resins interview

What was your goal, and why did you decide to measure your carbon footprint?

10:02

We are a B2B company. Our customers are large corporations, and we are part of their value chains. They started to ask for this kind of information. So, to meet their needs, we learned about the carbon footprint.

Then there were certificates and ratings, for example EcoVadis, which gives points for carbon footprint data. It also matters for supplier rating systems and for checking targets in SBTi. All of this gave us reasons to act.

10:04

Apart from the report and meeting customer needs, what did the carbon footprint give the company?

10:06

Going through all the scopes is a great chance to look at the business and the value chain. When you collect data and calculate, you see how mature the processes are. Is the data collected? Does anyone draw conclusions from it? Is this done in a regular way?

It also involves many departments: technical, accounting, environment, purchasing, sales and sometimes logistics. Everything is connected. Along the way, you get a picture of how the company works.

10:08

What concerns did you have before you chose a tool for the carbon footprint?

10:10

To be honest, I had no concerns. I was even a bit glad that it was Excel. Many software tools work like black boxes: you enter data, you get a result and that is all. That does not help a deep analysis. Here I had a chance to understand how the calculation works. And if you know what is being counted, you can manage it better.

Excel also gives control. The file stays on my computer. I have the data and I know where everything comes from. I do not share sensitive company data with outside servers.

10:12

What were your first steps after you started on Scope 3? Where did you begin?

10:14

First we had to decide which categories we would report and which matter to us. Some categories make no sense in our case, or there is no data for them.

One example is the end of life of the final product. Our products are paints and coatings. What will someone do with paint on a wall when it wears out? We cannot know that. So mapping the categories at the start was essential.

10:16

What was the hardest part in the early stages of work on Scope 3?

10:18

At the start, it was good that I did not fully know how much work it was. If you go step by step and do not see the whole job at once, it is easier. If I had known at the start how much there was, I would have been more worried.

The most important thing was to split the work into smaller parts and categories. Then it is easier, and you do not feel overloaded. This is true above all in the first year. You collect the data for the first time and plan where and how to get it. In later years, many things repeat and it gets simpler.

10:21

Was anything missing in the calculator, or did anything need extra work?

10:23

Our largest category is purchased raw materials. Our sector is quite specific, with very specific chemical raw materials. Sometimes there were no factors for these special materials. So we had to use the ecoinvent database to find the right items.

But you have many general factors. For companies from more “general” sectors, that is fine. A clear plus is that you can add your own factors to the calculator, for example from suppliers.

10:25

What in the calculator made the work easier compared with working without a tool?

10:27

Above all, the report is automatic. You can create it, and the formulas carry the data over. The second thing is the categories and the factors already assigned to them. That saves a huge amount of work. You do not search by hand or copy from one table to another. Typing and adding up by hand could cause errors. Here, everything is much better organised.

10:28

When did the result and the report become useful for you, and what did you use them for?

10:30

Certainly for target validation in SBTi and for EcoVadis. EcoVadis also gives points when reports are published on the company website, so we have published ours.

There is also a marketing side: it shows that we do this kind of work. We also use part of the data to calculate the carbon footprint of our products. So in practice, it started working right away.

10:32

How do you rate the work with the EXERGY team during the whole process?

10:34

For me it was great. Contact with the team, including Mr Radosław, was very good, and everything went smoothly. We had a consulting meeting that explained a lot, and everything was presented clearly and accurately.

10:35

What advice would you give to a company in a similar sector that faces its first carbon footprint and must choose a tool?

10:37

This is a complex project, so think about your approach at the start. Decide which categories matter: the ones you can influence and have data for. It is better to focus on a few clear ones than to try to do everything at once. Otherwise half of the result may be impossible to check or based on poor data.

It also helps to look at it more widely. A process like this shows how the organisation works: communication, data collection and work between departments.

10:39

If you had to describe the calculator in one sentence, what matters most about it?

10:41

What I value most is that the tool is not overcomplicated. It is concrete and simple, and it helps you understand how the calculation works. It is not a black box where you put data in and get a result out.

To be honest, today almost everything has AI inside, and users often do not fully know how a tool works. That is why an approach like this is really valuable.

10:43