PPD
At a Glance
Industry
Health Care
Project Types
Data Analysis, Goals/Targets, Supply Chain
Year
2021
Location
Wilmington, NC
Summary
Harrison Meyer calculated Scope 1, Scope 2, and Scope 3 global Emissions for PPD; determined water and electricity usage; and estimated savings from existing reduction projects.
Goals
PPD is a leading global contract research organization providing comprehensive, integrated drug development and laboratory and lifecycle management services with clients and partners including pharmaceutical, biotechnology, medical device, academic, and government organizations. PPD’s Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) team and Global Procurement team has been reviewing PPD’s overall environmental footprint and resource use. Although PPD local offices have tackled projects to save energy, PPD realized the importance of aligning sustainability efforts across all sites and creating reliable GHG baselines for future mitigation efforts. EDF Climate Corps Fellow, Harrison Meyer, was brought on board to calculate greenhouse gas emissions and make reductions recommendations across the company.
Solutions
To calculate the company’s carbon footprint, Harrison reviewed Scope 1, Scope 2, and Scope 3 Emissions data for all offices and emissions related to employee work-related travel and also calculated the carbon footprint for all PPD subsidiaries. Harrison worked with team members from across the globe and collaborated closely with other departments and suppliers to aggregate the data and identify gaps. He found that Scope 2 direct emissions was the highest category. He also determined that 8% of PPD electricity consumption comes from renewable sources and has increased from previous years. Harrison determined that due to COVID-19 and decrease in business travel that Scope 3 emissions decreased by 67%.
He also assisted with PPD EcoVadis assessment reporting.
Potential Impact
Thanks to Harrison’s analysis, PPD has a better picture of its total carbon footprint and insight on where to concentrate reduction efforts. Current initiatives, remote work, and increased recycling as well as energy efficiency programs are saving an estimated 35,124 metric tons CO2-e. Moving forward, PPD is researching methods for maintaining annual reporting, researching various Energy Management Systems, decreasing unnecessary business travel, and joining public reporting frameworks.