Introduction
Fincore Limited is fully cognizant of the fact that reduction of Greenhouse Gas (GHG) missions will result in significant benefits for the company, our customers, and the wider community as a whole. We are committed to achieving net Zero Emissions by 2050.
This plan with baseline year 2019 information, setting clear targets for reducing Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions over key timeframes and listing our planned projects to achieve carbon net zero by 2050.
This plan conforms to the requirements of Procurement Policy Note PPN06/21 as published by the Cabinet Office June 2021; “Taking Account of Carbon Reduction Plans in the procurement of major government contracts”, published in June 2021 and the supporting “Technical standard for the Completion of Carbon Reduction Plans”. This document will be reviewed and updated annually and each revision will reflect changes in the company structure and specific projects undertaken to reduce our Carbon Emissions.
The Fincore financial year starts on 1st January and ends on 31st December. Our carbon plan has been aligned to this reporting cycle. The current period covered is 1st January 2021 to 31st December 2021.
Commitment to achieving Net Zero
Fincore Ltd is committed to achieving Net Zero emissions by 2050.
Fincore is a software publishing business. Because of the nature of our operations, our primary emphasis is on Scope 2 where any reduction has the biggest impact on our total carbon footprint. However, we also recognise the importance of reducing our Scope 1 and Scope 3 emissions to ensure steady progress towards achieving our Net Zero emissions target.
Reporting Standards and Scope
Fincore’s carbon footprint calculation is in line with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol Corporate Accounting and Reporting Standard.
Our current carbon footprint accounts for carbon emissions over which Fincore has direct financial control and Scope 3 emissions over which Fincore has direct influence.
The activities of related entities not under the direct control of Fincore Ltd are outside the scope of this report.
Baseline Emissions Footprint
Previous Year Emissions Report
Current Emissions Report
Emissions reduction targets
In order to continue our progress to achieving Net Zero, we have adopted the following carbon reduction targets.
We aim to reduce
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Scope 1 emissions to zero gradually in the period to 2050 but as rapidly as market options allow by incentivising the use of net-zero fuel options, i.e., the use of carbon-neutral electric energy for vehicle use on company business.
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Scope 2 emissions by:
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Making greater use of low emissions or net-zero cloud computing services in the production of our SaaS services with the aim of eliminating at least 15-20% of carbon emissions by 2025. We aim to only commission Net-zero cloud services from 2025 onwards or earlier when AWS and other vendors are offering these services.
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Further improving software efficiency through tuning in order to eliminate at least a further 15-20% of energy use for equivalent workloads over the next 10 years through the use of more efficient algorithms
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Scope 3 emissions by promoting
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Smarter commuting with better use of in-office time and incentivising modes of travel with a lower carbon footprint such as rail services, cycling and walking.
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Reduced business travel as a percentage of turnover and incentivising modes of travel with a lower carbon footprint such as rail services instead of air travel.
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Enabling customers to switch to equipment with lower carbon emissions faster wherever possible.
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We project that carbon emissions will decrease over the next five years to 32 tCO2e by 2025. This is a reduction of 35 % compared to the current reporting period and 50% compared to the baseline.
Carbon Reduction Projects
Completed Carbon Reduction Initiatives
The following environmental management measures and projects have been completed or implemented since the 2019 baseline.
Reduction of carbon emissions through:
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Reduction of business travel as a % of turnover and incentivisation of travel options with a lower carbon footprint such as rail travel.
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Restricting face-to-face business meetings to most essential and encouraging greater use of online video conferencing tools, e.g. Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Skype WhatsApp etc for business meetings.
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Reduction of carbon emissions from commuting through a more efficient mix of work from office/home. We have adopted a Hybrid model of working. Employees are now required to attend office three days a week and work from home for the balance two days.
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Performance improvements in our SaaS software to reduce energy use for equivalent workloads accounting for 5-10 % across different software products.
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Greater use of cloud services (like AWS and Azure) that have a lower carbon footprint than older data centres and which also have aggressive Net Zero Targets such as, e.g. AWS aiming for Net Zero by 2025.
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Fincore will be decommissioning its servers in co-location services in Byfleet and moving all data stored on physical servers to cloud by the end of 2022.
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Moving towards a totally paperless office, including e-signing.
The carbon emission reduction achieved by these schemes equate to 15.3 tCO2e, a 24% reduction against the 2019 baseline and the measures will be in effect when performing the contract
Declaration and Sign Off
This Carbon Reduction Plan has been completed in accordance with PPN 06/21 and associated guidance and reporting standard for Carbon Reduction Plans.
Emissions have been reported and recorded in accordance with the published reporting standard for Carbon Reduction Plans and the GHG Reporting Protocol corporate standard[1] and use of the appropriate Government emission conversion factors for greenhouse gas company reporting[2].
Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions have been reported in accordance with SECR requirements, and the required subset of Scope 3 emissions have been reported in accordance with the published reporting standard for Carbon Reduction Plans and the Corporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Standard[3].
This Carbon Reduction Plan has been reviewed and signed off by the directors.
[1] https://ghgprotocol.org/corporate-standard
[2] https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/government-conversion-factors-for-company-reporting
[3] https://ghgprotocol.org/standards/scope-3-standard
Version 1.1 Published: 01/06/2022