Carbon Reduction Project

About the Project

Since early 2021, the European Outdoor Group has been facilitating the Carbon Reduction Project under the umbrella of our Climate Action Programme. The Carbon Reduction Project is a pre-competitive collaborative action initiative which aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and/or increase renewable energy usage within the outdoor industry supply chain.

The project exploits the fact that, while supply chains are global and diverse, many outdoor companies are sharing suppliers. By participating in this project organisations have the opportunity to collaboratively engage their shared suppliers, engage in peer-to-peer knowledge sharing, and take real action towards the decarbonisation of the industry.

Project Aims:

To reduce greenhouse gas emissions and/or increase renewable energy usage within the outdoor industry supply chain

Project Timeline

By participating in this project, organisations have the opportunity to:

• collaboratively engage their shared suppliers,  
• engage in peer-to-peer knowledge sharing, and  
• take real action towards the decarbonisation of the industry.  

The project is open to brands and retailers (with their own manufacturing facilities) and so far, over three cohorts, the members are:

Key Benefits

This project offers organisations an invaluable framework for joint action against climate change. The complexity of our supply chains requires out of the box thinking to tackle the challenges created by reducing the carbon footprint of goods produced and sold. The project not only offers a space where it is possible to together strive for changes within the supply chain, but also a great example that can be inspirational for other companies and networks.

With this project we are pre-emptively and proactively aiming for the outdoor industry to be ‘part of the solution’, as opposed to waiting until such time as European legislation forces companies into action.

Project Plan

The project’s 5-stage process is to:

1. Map the supply chain networks of participating organisations
2. Pre-screen facilities to identify those that most require brand support
3. Evaluate shared facilities to identify GHG hotspots and energy use
4. Remediate through jointly financed facility improvements
5. Track and monitor facility progress against targets and action plan
   

By collaboratively approaching facilities, organisations will have a greater influence in what infrastructure or technology improvements are made at each site and be seen as trailblazers within our industry in tackling emission reduction.

Working together in this way, organisations should be able to significantly reduce their individual financial outlay per facility intervention, which may encourage less experienced or financially constrained organisations to take part in similar supply chain facility improvement endeavours.

For more information please download the overview document below or read the full case study from 2023.

To express interest in participating, please contact verity.hardy@europeanoutdoorgroup.com