IT asset lifecycle management company Greenbox Group has announced carbon neutral certification under the Australian Federal Government Climate Active Carbon Neutral Standard.
The certification will help Greenbox’s customers, which include corporations, government and tertiary institutions, stand out from competitors, meet shareholder expectations, attract and retain the best talent and meet ESG obligations, according to the company.
“It's significant for our customers because by using our services, it has a neutral impact on their carbon inventories as well,” Greenbox Group chief executive officer Ross Thompson told CRN.
“Companies and institutions are needing to report more on ESG (environmental, social, governance) requirements. The federal government has just announced a new target that we need to have achieved by 2030 in terms of the emissions that we need to mitigate by then. So now that we have this particular status, the big banks, the big corporates, the big government agencies, universities, are able to utilise our carbon neutral services and not have any negative impacts.”
“The certification really helps those enterprises to have transparency as well as the real time data on the impact they're creating for not only their communities, but also from the whole planet perspective,” added Greenbox head of revenue and innovation Viraj Meena.
“We’re very proud to be an Australian first organisation to go through this extremely rigorous process which not only helps our customers to win more business, but at the same time, we are making sure that we enable the right social impact and address the sustainability side of things for the customers as well,” Meena said.
Greenbox services range from deployment of new IT assets, to the safe, secure and sustainable management of end-of-life technology assets. The company diverts all of its customer’s technology equipment away from landfill, while providing real time access to data about the environmental impacts through a partner portal.
In addition to dealing with Australian and New Zealand schools and universities, state and federal government ministries and department, Greenbox provides services to the defence industry and securely manages sensitive assets on behalf of global financial institutions including major banks in Australia and smaller banks.
It also works closely with large Original Equipment Manufacturers including Dell, Lenovo, Hewlett Packard and Apple.
How Greenbox earned carbon neutral status
The company undertook a 12-month certification program which has involved an extensive audit of its carbon inventory.
“Firstly, we needed to undertake an analysis of what our three scopes of carbon emissions were based on the Australian Federal Governments peak body Climate Active,” Meena said.
Thompson told CRN that the company then “looked at projects and initiatives to invest resources and money towards both internal efficiency upgrades within our existing facilities, including energy efficient solutions around lighting, renewable integration and facilities, that solar PV, and future technologies, and also external projects like our indigenous forest regeneration project.”
As part of the certification, Greenbox partnered with the Moombidary Forest Regeneration Project in central Queensland to support the growth of native forests which covers a wide range of sustainable and social development goals. This project aims to give back to Australia’s first nations people through developing permanent native forests and assisted regeneration on land that was cleared of vegetation for livestock grazing.
“The Australian Forest Regeneration Project will deliver one million tonnes in emission reductions over the next 10 years,” Meena said.
Thompson told CRN, “Sustainability underpins a lot of what we do we. Over the last 22 years, Greenbox Group’s circular economy practices have prevented more than 65 million kilograms of CO2 from being emitted into the atmosphere along with preventing more than 120,000 kilograms of toxic materials from leaching into landfills around the world, which is equivalent to the energy consumed by 7 million houses over one year.”
"Whilst Greenbox is extremely proud of its environmental credentials over the last 20 years of operations, we acknowledge that more needs to be done via organisations such as Climate Active in order to reverse the catastrophic impacts of climate change.”
Greenbox intends to “continue investing in more projects like [the Moombidary Forest Regeneration Project] that have similar values and cultural benefits and alignment with what we stand for the business,” Thompson said.
"We will continue to invest in best practice internal and external activities, and initiatives that will leave a safe, secure and sustainable impact for generations to come.”
Meena added, “We have invested in energy efficiency upgrades and renewable solutions in our processes and will continue to do so. Electric vehicle freight, and onsite energy storage all factor into our roadmap moving forward.”
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