Page 8 - Trihydro Sustainability Report
P. 8

GREENHOUSE GAS INVENTORY

Our 2014 Greenhouse Gas inventory yielded similar results as in recent prior years. In 2014 our total emissions were
1,391 tons of CO2 equivalent. Similar to our past results, this equates to about 3.50 CO2-equivalent per employee.
Our vehicle fleet continued as the largest single source of emissions at 61% of the total, followed by building heating
and cooling. Reductions in our footprint on a relative, per-employee basis has been and likely will remain a challenge.
Driving is essential to our operations and most would agree that it is not realistic to materially alter the thermal
settings in our buildings. We did implement a few changes though that should help moving forward, as follows:

1.	 Our headquarters building server room had been maintained at the mid-range of the temperature range
    recommended for optimum operation of the servers – the setting was raised to the high end of the range which
    should reduce power consumption for cooling, without impacting the system performance.

2.	 While the company fleet in vehicle monitoring system (IVMS) was initiated for other reasons, it should also
    help us realize a reduction to our fuel consumption, as fuel efficiency is improved at lower vehicle speed and
    wasted fuel consumption due to idling will be highlighted, and hopefully reduced. Also, the systems have in
    general been shown to reduce ancillary driving. In general reductions in greenhouse gas emissions often derive
    from reduced or avoided energy use, which also equates to cost savings. While we probably won’t be able to
    quantify the avoided fuel use associated with the IVMS initiative, every little bit helps!

3.	 The solar PV system will of course result in a significant reduction in our foot print by replacing about 12%
    of main HQ building power draw with a non-carbon emitting power source. During the first 5 ½ months of
    system operation through 12/31/15 the system has avoided the generation of 18.4 tons of CO2 emissions!

LOOKING FORWARD

Trihydro was a founding member of the Climate Registry and we completed our seventh certified inventory in 2014.
As 2015 came to a close, we made the decision to discontinue the company’s participation in a formal registry,
but plan to continue monitoring our footprint and implementing additional greenhouse gas reduction measures
as feasible. The cost in fees and employee time to work through the registry certification process was significant.
Another consideration was that while there was initially a benefit to our Air Services Team Sustainability Services
members learning and applying the formal inventory and certification process to our operations, the process is now
routine and our carbon footprint profile is relatively static, so there is limited potential for additional learning. Also,
it does not appear that national or international carbon reduction efforts are heading in the direction of individual
businesses with operations similar to Trihydro each undergoing a third-party registry inventory certification process.
Moving forward we plan to gauge our annual emissions in a more cost-effective manner, and will welcome any ideas
you may have for future footprint reduction initiatives!
   3   4   5   6   7   8   9   10   11   12   13