With the ongoing pandemic, how people currently work and live has changed dramatically and therefore so has their carbon footprint. Whilst the emissions from offices and, more importantly, business travel have reduced, the majority of people are now working from home and creating emissions from increased energy use there.

Standard Life Aberdeen has estimated that their employees carbon emissions from working at home could represent up to 60% of their overall 2020 carbon footprint.  That is why the global investment firm has partnered with eco-tech business Pawprint, a company set up in 2019. Pawprint seek the most climate conscious businesses to join their Pawprint Pioneers Program and take the lead on the climate change.

As a Pawprint Pioneer, Standard Life Aberdeen will initially target a representative sample of 500 colleagues from around the world to use the Pawprint for Business app, an online tool which helps users measure, understand and reduce their carbon footprint. The results will give Standard Life Aberdeen data on the emissions their people create when working from home, and also allow them to offset those emissions as part of the company’s carbon neutral commitment.

Standard Life Aberdeen employs around 6,000 people worldwide in over 50 locations. They already have operational targets in place to reduce their emissions from energy use by 50% by 2030 and they offset their entire remaining operational footprint. In one year alone Standard Life Aberdeen reduced their absolute greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 39%, including a reduction in the emissions from air travel in 2019 by 42%.

Sandy MacDonald, Global Head of Sustainability at Standard Life Aberdeen, said: “Everyone at Standard Life Aberdeen is really excited to be teaming up with Pawprint to become one of their first Pawprint Pioneers. The Pawprint app will not only enable our people to understand and tackle their own carbon footprint, but also allow us to better understand the impact on emissions of our employees working from home. We will then be able to offset this as part of our carbon neutral commitment and further work with our people to reduce it. Standard Life Aberdeen is committed to help fight climate change and we can’t wait to get started on this project.”

The Pawprint app is fun, easy to use and highly interactive. Users simply answer a few questions to quickly find out what their biggest environmental impacts are. The app then calculates the users carbon footprint and suggests challenges they can take part in to reduce emissions and earn ‘Pawpoints’, which are converted into donations for environmental charities.

Christian Arno, Founder and CEO at Pawprint said; “We are delighted to confirm Standard Life Aberdeen as the second company to commit to using Pawprint for Business to engage their employees on sustainability. Having a company of this size and stature lead in this way really sets the standard for businesses of all shapes and sizes. Pawprint’s mission is empowering people to fight climate change at home, at work and beyond and we’re off to a strong start.”

The Pawprint Pioneers Program is seeking to attract climate conscious businesses and organisations looking to become sustainability leaders in their fields, to become early adopters and help shape the Pawprint For Business offering. The multinational brewery and pub chain, Brewdog became the first business to sign up earlier this year.

As part of the announcement Pawprint have today launched their second crowdfund. Hosted by Crowdcube, the business is seeking £400K to be used in scaling its business offering. For more information on the crowdfund and the Pawprint Pioneers Program  visit www.pawprint.eco/

To find out more about Standard Life Aberdeen and their corporate sustainability visit www.standardlifeaberdeen.com/corporate-sustainability