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Writer's pictureJoe McFadden

Digital Sustainability at GetZero

Businesses in every sector need to become more sustainable - whether to comply with environmental regulations, meet customer expectations, or to attract employees who increasingly want their work to have a positive impact on the planet.

A key sustainability challenge for businesses of any size is understanding and having a plan to reduce its carbon emissions. For a small remote startup team like GetZero, the majority of our emissions are scope 3, from the various software platforms we use to build and host our e-learning services - what is sometimes called our digital carbon footprint. As context, our scope 2 emissions are extremely low with the major sources being the emissions for our team's home offices, plus business travel. While our overall emissions are very low currently, we want to ensure they stay that way as we support more people in learning about green skills and green jobs.


Our sustainability action plan focuses on managing and reducing the 'digital carbon footprint' of the GetZero service. We commit to:

  • We will wherever possible select technology suppliers who offer services based on 100% renewable energy.

  • We’ll use independent tools like https://www.cloudcarbonfootprint.org/ to monitor emissions.

  • We'll follow best practices for sustainable technology services, including the Sustainable Web Manifesto the new W3C Web Sustainability Guidelines,

  • We will work with employees to measure their remote work footprint based on best practice guidance from EcoAct and offer a benefit to encourage using a 100% renewable tariff.

  • Our travel policy will mandate low carbon options by default.


Digital carbon is not as well known about as the more obvious high-emitting sectors such as energy or transport. The impact of the technology sector is between 3-4% of global carbon emissions, similar to aviation. This is growing quickly as technology becomes more and more embedded in every part of life, and new innovations such as GenAI can have a significant carbon emission impact. The GetZero team is committed to learning from other technology companies to manage and reduce the environmental impact of our digital services, and we'll share more on our progress here.

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