From the first "carbon neutral" trendy toy figure to the "zero-carbon sparkling water", and then to Nike's first zero-carbon smart logistics park with integrated wind and solar, it is positioned as a zero-carbon technology partner, empowering enterprises to achieve low-carbon and zero-carbon transformation, and fighting for the sustainable future development of mankind.
DIMOO is one of the classic IPs of the trendy toy brand Bubble Mart, which carries the value and significance of biodiversity, harmonious coexistence between man and nature. In October this year, DIMOO Mengxin Beaver evolved into the industry's first "carbon neutral" figure.
In addition to Pop Mart, leading consumer goods brands such as Nike, Starbucks, and Genki Forest are at the forefront of advocating sustainability and ESG.
Nowadays, many consumers are also paying attention to the performance of brands in ESG practices. With the awakening of consumers' concept of sustainability, leading consumer goods companies have begun to take the lead in practicing low-carbon and zero-carbon transformation. Sun Jie, chief sustainability officer and general manager of carbon management business of Envision Technology Group, analyzed.
Sun Jie, Chief Sustainability Officer and General Manager of Carbon Management Business of Envision Technology Group.
Behind the successful launch of the first carbon-neutral product of Pop Mart, it is inseparable from the empowerment of Envision Technology Group (hereinafter referred to as Envision). Sun Jie said that Envision has conducted a full life cycle product carbon footprint analysis for this figurinary product, covering from raw materials to packaging, to manufacturing, transportation and distribution. "After our analysis, we found that the important carbon emission hotspot of the product was packaging, and finally Pop Mart replaced the plastic weight bag with a weight bag made of degradable diatom pure particles and spunlace non-woven fabric, which greatly reduced the overall carbon footprint. ”
As a zero-carbon technology partner, Envision uses the Ark carbon management system to empower the carbon footprint management of the "product life cycle", helping Pop Mart implement a series of carbon reduction measures, and the remaining emissions are also offset and neutralized through the one-stop purchase of high-quality carbon credit projects, and the verification and certification is completed by the authoritative China Quality Certification CQC.
Cooperating with leading consumer goods companies is a common exploration. Although the cost of the company will increase in the short term, in the long run, this will convey the company's sustainability philosophy and social responsibility to consumers. This will also enhance the differentiated competitiveness of the product. Sun Jie said.
01 Become a "Zero-Carbon Technology Partner".
Founded in 2008, Envision started from wind power and gradually expanded to energy storage, hydrogen energy, power batteries, intelligent Internet of Things and other fields. According to the latest data from consulting firm Wood Mackenzie, in the first half of 2023, Envision Energy grew at a rate of 9The total number of orders for 7GW ranks first in the world, ahead of Yunda (8.).7GW) and Siemens Gamesa (82gw）。At present, Envision's business layout includes three business segments: Envision Energy (smart wind power, energy storage systems and green hydrogen solutions), Envision Power (power batteries and energy storage batteries), and Envision Intelligent (zero carbon and AIoT technology company).
Sun Jie said that when he joined Envision more than a decade ago, the company's mission was to "solve challenges for a sustainable future for mankind", and it has never changed since. Today, the company is positioned as a zero-carbon technology partner, which is to empower and work with partners to jointly promote the zero-carbon transition and solve challenges for a sustainable future for mankind.
Envision is a technology company rooted in the field of green and low-carbon. The company has not only the 'hard power' in new energy fields such as wind power, power batteries, energy storage, and hydrogen energy, but also the 'soft power' of intelligent Internet of Things and digital technology. Sun Jie said that new energy is "relying on the sky to eat", and it is urgent to grasp the ability of climate ** and the corresponding algorithm model through digital technology in order to truly understand and "control" new energy.
At present, Envision's business has long been not only "selling wind turbines", but also covering the power generation, power consumption and energy storage side of new energy, and even has a layout on the smart grid side. Envision has become a green technology enterprise covering the whole value chain of new energy.
Envision empowers the first carbon-neutral figure.
As countries around the world have successively established carbon neutrality goals, Envision has started to deploy carbon management business in 2021, and based on the self-developed intelligent IoT operating system ENOS, it has launched the super application of "Ark" carbon management system, which provides real-time carbon footprint monitoring, automatically generates carbon emission reports, and simulates and optimizes emission reduction paths in a combination of "artificial intelligence + Internet of Things + big data technology", so as to achieve one-stop closed-loop services for carbon neutrality.
Sun Jie said that ENOS currently connects to manage about 2With 2.4 billion smart terminals and more than 600GW of energy assets, we have accumulated rich experience in energy asset management. The "Ark" carbon management system has also provided end-to-end digital carbon management services to more than 300 customers around the world, helping to reduce and manage a total of more than 1 billion tons of carbon dioxide.
In addition to cooperating with Bubble Mart to create a carbon-neutral trendy toy, in recent years, Envision has also built the first zero-carbon smart logistics park for Nike. Building the first carbon-neutral factory in the pharmaceutical industry for Boehringer Ingelheim; Helping Saint-Gobain build a carbon-neutral pilot factory in Asia; Joined hands with Yuanqi Forest to launch the industry's first "zero-carbon sparkling water" product; Use intelligent IoT technology to help Starbucks ...... "Greener Store" program
02 "Trinity" carbon management
When it comes to carbon management, Sun Jie vividly calls it a "trinity", including three major directions: organizational carbon management, first-chain carbon management and product carbon management.
For organizational carbon management, Envision has successfully achieved the goal of carbon neutrality in operations in 2022, and how to achieve carbon neutrality in the entire value chain in 2028 is a difficult problem for Sun Jie.
Envision first sets the mechanism and goal of green and sustainable development for the first chain. For example, by 2025, 100% of core business providers will use green electricity; By 2025, core merchants must use digital tools to declare energy consumption and carbon emission data. Due to the large number of quotients, Envision has graded the quotients and also proposed incentives to achieve the purpose of incentives. Sun Jie said.
Envision not only sets goals for the first businessmen, but also empowers them, provides them with corresponding digital carbon management tools, helps them build green power generation equipment such as wind power and photovoltaics, and assists them in energy conservation and energy efficiency optimization.
Of course, in any process of carbon reduction, the first business has to bear some additional costs. Sun Jie pointed out that Envision has also cooperated with some banks or financial institutions to provide green credit products for leading businesses to promote carbon emission reduction and carbon management at low cost.
Before joining Envision, Qiu Lin, Chief Scientist of Zero-Carbon Products, worked at the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Swedish Academy of Environmental Sciences, and has conducted in-depth research on "carbon".
Qiu Lin believes that in order to achieve "zero carbon" products, it is necessary to reduce carbon emissions in the production process by combining software and hardware, such as increasing the proportion of green electricity, reducing the use rate of traditional fossil energy, and improving production energy efficiency, so as to reduce carbon emissions. "However, at present, it is difficult to achieve 100% zero carbon emissions in the whole life cycle, there will always be a certain amount of residual emissions, and the mainstream method is to offset with carbon credits, so the product can be called a 'carbon neutral product'. ”
Qiu Lin said that there are already many standards and specifications for determining the carbon content of products, such as ISO 14067 of the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), which is a common framework standard for calculating the carbon footprint of products throughout their life cycle; When it comes to specific product categories, product category rules such as PCF (Product Carbon Footprint) are generally used to calculate carbon footprint, covering categories in different industries such as daily necessities, automobiles, power batteries, photovoltaic modules, and fans.
At the same time, the definition of "carbon" is controversial in different countries and regions. For example, some countries consider zero carbon only to have zero carbon dioxide emissions; In some countries, the conversion of greenhouse gases to carbon dioxide equivalents is also taken into account, which includes other gases such as methane and nitrous oxide.
Therefore, there is still no global unified standard for carbon-neutral products, and there are differences in various certification standards, which need to be refined and standardized. At the same time, most of the carbon footprint standards come from abroad, while domestic standards are relatively lacking. Qiu Lin believes that in order to avoid the question of "greenwashing" and "greenwashing" caused by the purchase of carbon credits, standards and specifications must be further refined in the future, and a complete set of carbon management parties is even more essential. In terms of promoting product carbon footprint, Envision is also actively participating in the creation of environmental product declaration (EPD) standards for the battery industry and the database of product environmental footprint for the battery industry, in line with international standards, and promoting the establishment and improvement of the green evaluation standard system for battery products. In November this year, Envision, as the exclusive knowledge partner, joined hands with the United Nations Global Compact to officially release the "Power Battery Carbon Footprint and Low-carbon Circular Development" Envision also cooperated with the China Chamber of Commerce for Import and Export of Machinery and Electronics to create a "Photovoltaic Product Carbon Footprint Public Service Platform" to help photovoltaic enterprises complete product carbon footprint accounting, and connect with Bureau Veritas, a French century-old certification body, to complete the audit and certification with one click.
03 "MAOC" Carbon Manager**
When it comes to carbon management, Sun Jie mentioned "MAOC", where "M" is for measurement; "a" is abatement; "o" is for O set; The "C" stands for certi cate, which covers the four key steps of carbon management. Envision Ark's carbon management system is designed and developed around this party.
At present, the carbon management method of most enterprises stays at the first step of accounting, which is to account for carbon emissions through their own algorithms, models and data. Sun Jie said that compared with most companies that use manual data input, Envision focuses on connecting electricity meters, gas meters and other devices through IoT (Internet of Things), directly obtaining first-hand data, and importing it into the corresponding algorithm model for calculation. The benefits are clear, reducing the possibility of manual intervention and being traceable and traceable. He emphasized that Envision uses digital means to monitor and track carbon emissions, and then calculate the effect of carbon reduction, so as to output the most suitable emission reduction plan, which is the differentiated advantage of Envision carbon management business.
For emission reduction, Envision, which has been deeply involved in the new energy industry for 16 years, has its own unique advantages, and can provide systematic new energy and zero-carbon solutions including wind, solar, storage, hydrogen, piles, and intelligence.
In the process of offsetting and certification, Envision also has its own advantages. In terms of offsetting, Envision's Ark carbon management system can help customers place orders to purchase green certificates and carbon credits, and the system can automatically match and match transactions, and can also view, trace the source and write off in real time, and realize the whole process of visualization and tracking.
In terms of certification, Envision cooperates with third-party international certification bodies, and the verification results can be directly certified by the institutions, which greatly accelerates efficiency and reduces costs.
Qiu Lin, Chief Scientist of Envision Digital's zero-carbon products, believes that in order to achieve "zero-carbon" products, it is necessary to reduce carbon emissions in the production process and improve production energy efficiency through a combination of software and hardware, so as to reduce carbon emissions.
Qiu Lin, Chief Scientist of Envision Zero-Carbon Products.
04 The way to break the "carbon barrier".
On October 1, 2023, the European Union officially implemented the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM, also known as "carbon tariff"). Based on this, for enterprises with export needs to Europe, they must do a good job in product carbon reduction and carbon management. This is not only a business requirement, but also a compliance requirement. Qiu Lin said.
Qiu Lin believes that for B-end enterprises, product carbon management has become a common "rigid need", a typical example is the recent European Union's "New Battery Law", which is the world's first policy to make mandatory standards for product carbon footprint.
In order to break the EU's carbon barriers, Sun Jie mentioned another case - Envision Ordos Zero Carbon Industrial Park. In the park, Envision uses the intelligent IoT source-load interactive control system to produce green electricity based on wind power and photovoltaics, and ensures 100% green and zero-carbon energy supply through green power trading with the power grid. At the same time, based on the intelligent Internet of Things of the zero-carbon industrial park, the park calculates the carbon footprint of the whole life cycle of the products in the park, and completes neutralization, and finally forms a "zero-carbon green code" for the products that can be traced and traced, meets various international standards, and has been certified by authoritative institutions, so as to realize the production of zero-carbon products.
At present, the park has formed a battery and energy storage industry chain led by Envision Technology Group and supported by Huajing, Wanlitai and Yongli; the photovoltaic industry chain led by LONGi; Hydrogen fuel cell and green hydrogen equipment manufacturing industry chain led by Meijin Guohong and GCL Group; The new energy vehicle manufacturing industry chain led by SAIC Hongyan and Hydrogen Jet Technology. The upstream and downstream of the industrial chain will work together to achieve zero-carbon transformation.
Sun Jie emphasized: "In the context of carbon neutrality, European and American countries are building green barriers, and these new rules put forward new requirements for carbon emissions and green environmental protection of export products. The model of zero-carbon industrial parks and the low-carbon or even 'zero-carbon' products produced also provide a solution for Chinese enterprises to break the 'carbon barrier'.