Doconomy is a Swedish impact-tech startup that aim to provide both consumers and brands with digital tools to help understand and reduce the climate impact of consumption. Doconomy is now providing a new tool that enables fast and reliable product carbon footprint calculations for brands and manufacturers.
The 2030 Calculator aims to enhance impact transparency and democratize fast and reliable product carbon footprint calculations. In turn readily available and consistent calculations enable labeling of all products, so that producers and consumers alike can contribute to reaching the cut in 50 % of emissions by 2030. Transparency will create a new kind of loyalty and brand preference, being able to compare products based on carbon footprint, not only quality and price, enables a much needed shift in consumer behavior.
Calculating the carbon footprint of products has been difficult and costly, with regular LCA (Life Cycle Assessment) calculations taking weeks to complete per product. This creates a significant hurdle for brands that aspire to become more transparent. The challenge of product carbon footprint calculations is especially difficult for small- and medium-size brands, which is a problem since many are willing to carbon label their products. The 2030 Calculator can generate a result in minutes, at no cost, empowering brands to be more transparent and motivate consumers to choose lower-impact products.
With the release of the 2030 Calculator, Doconomy wants to encourage and invite businesses and institutions, to calculate footprint, share their data and collaborate in co-creating the most accurate, free calculator of carbon footprint of products.
Methodology & Data Sources
The 2030 carbon footprint for products calculation tool is based on a database of CO2e emissions data for the cradle-to-gate emissions generated by materials used for all parts and pieces of packaging of a product (by total weight of each product part and material), average energy use for product assembly (by product category, country location and type of energy used in assembly) and transportation (by total product weight, distance travelled and mode of transport between supplier, manufacturing facility and distribution center).
The material emissions factors used in the calculator have been sourced from a variety of validated, third-party, open data sources including ICE (The Inventory of Carbon & Energy by the University of Bath), IVL (the Swedish Environmental Institute) and DEFRA (the UK government Department of Energy, Foods & Rural Affairs). Energy data for European countries was sourced from AIB (the Association of Issuing Bodies) and for non-European countries from IEA (the International Energy Agency). Transportation distances are calculated using Google Maps Places API with emission factors sourced from NTM (the Network for Transport Measures). Data includes a blend of CO2 and (GWP normalized) CO2e values, with final carbon footprints calculated in kg CO2e.