Working With BT Group on Climate Change
Climate change is expected to have unprecedented implications across the world as temperature changes and sea-levels rise, threatening our ecosystems and affecting human well-being. We therefore must act together to combat climate change and its impacts.
Through education, innovation, collaboration and adherence to our national and international climate commitments, we can make the necessary changes to understand the impacts that climate change brings, decrease our carbon emissions and protect our planet.
BT Group has been at the forefront of climate action for over three decades and has achieved significant milestones in reducing carbon emissions. As a pioneer in the field, BT Group was amongst the first companies worldwide to have its science-based targets aligned with a 1.5C pathway, as validated by the Science Based Targets initiative.
BT Group has set ambitious targets to achieve net-zero emissions for its operations by the end of March 2031. Additionally, we aim to achieve net zero for the carbon footprint associated with our supply chain and customer emissions (Scope 3) by the end of March 2041.
When considering BT Group's overall carbon footprint in 2022/23, only six percent of emissions originate from our operations. A significant portion, approximately 23 percent, arises from customers using BT Group's products and services. However, the majority, over 70 percent, is attributed to indirect emissions from our supply chain.
We're targeting a 42% reduction target by FY31 for our supply chain emissions.
Working with our suppliers to reduce their carbon footprint as well as understand the impacts of climate change on their operations is at the heart of our plan to manage our supplier risks and to be net zero.
We encourage our suppliers to do the following:
- ✓ Conduct a climate risk assessment to understand and manage the impacts and risks to your organisation and across your value chain
- ✓ Commit to decreasing your carbon emissions which includes:
- ➢ Setting a 1.5C aligned science based target
- ➢ Making your targets public by publishing it on their company webpage, annual report, or similar
- ➢ Report progress towards meeting the target on an annual basis.
- ➢ Engaging with your suppliers on climate action and carbon reduction
BT Group has introduced a Climate Change Procurement Standard to drive engagement in this area. The standard sets out expectations and requirements from suppliers on reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
You can view the standard here:
Climate change Standard (English)
Our Trust Your Supplier, Environmental Questionnaire is about supplier engagement, we want to know what you are doing, what plans you have and what we can expect from you in the future. Supplier action on Climate Change will feed into our tender adjudication criteria.
For further information please contact Melissa Reddy