Who Controls Your Emissions Data

Beati Possidentes

One of the challenges organizations face in managing their emissions data is deciding where to store their data and who controls it. Do you know who owns your company's emissions data? Of course, you do; your company owns its data, but managing it can be more complicated. A host of problems come with turning over control of your data to an outside entity. When it comes time to transfer your data from one vendor to another — whether because of contract expiration, a merger and acquisition, or the new software your IT department just selected — that process can quickly go sideways. Some consultants or software vendors can hold your data hostage, or parts of it could mysteriously disappear. Why would they do this? Simple — they don't want to lose your business. And if you don't have complete control over your data, there's not much you can do. For that reason, having full ownership and control of your data is a blessing for any company that wants to manage its environmental and sustainability activities effectively.

Figure 1: Examples of applications and emissions data that need to be managed and reported.

Lack of control can be detrimental to your business in many ways. Emissions data is often essential in validating a company's environmental performance in these ESG times. No one wants to discover that they do not have full and unfettered access to their data when assembling the necessary information and proving their net-zero goals…