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- Audit of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions following the established Greenhouse Gas Protocol
- A plan for reducing the company's own emissions over time
- Purchasing carbon offsets to offset current emissions to achieve carbon neutrality. The offsets are often themselves certified by standards bodies such as the Gold Standard or Verified Carbon Standard.
- Obtaining a carbon neutrality certification from a certifying entity. There are many different certifications today, including BSI PAS-2060, Carbon Neutral by Natural Capital Partners, Climate Neutral, Zerofootprint to name a few.
Related to this is the Environmental Product Declaration (EPD), which is a document which describes the environmental impact of a product, including its carbon emissions footprint. For examples, click here. The EPD is the result of a Lifecycle Analysis (LCA) based on standard Product Category Rules (PCR.) See this brief explanation of the relationship of LCA, PCR, and EPD.
While these initiatives represent a significant step forward on climate change, there are many challenges for companies which embark on such paths. Most of these challenges center around the issues of data and trust. Fortunately, distributed ledger technology or blockchain, especially an open source platform like Hyperledger, are naturally designed to solve the problems of data and trust.
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