Today, I’m thrilled to introduce you to a game-changing tool that’s about to make your sustainability journey a whole lot easier. Meet Emissions AI—the ultimate sidekick for small and medium-sized businesses aiming to reduce their carbon footprint without breaking the bank or their backs. Try the Emissions AI Demo for free.

Who is Emissions AI For?

Emissions AI is designed with small and medium-sized businesses in mind. If you’re part of a small team with big dreams of building a more sustainable business but lack the resources to conduct an in-depth carbon inventory, this tool is your new best friend. Think of it as your sustainability consultant that doesn’t require a six-figure salary or a corner office.

Why You Should Use Emissions AI

Why should you care about your emissions? Well, aside from the obvious moral imperative to save our planet, there are some very compelling business reasons to get on board. Emissions AI can help you:

• Set Emissions Benchmarks and Targets: Know where you stand and where you need to go. Show the world you are serious about sustainability and how you are taking action to reduce your emissions.
• Report Emissions: Whether it’s to suppliers, investors, lenders, or regulators, having accurate data at your fingertips is invaluable. A solid emissions reporting framework can help your business unlock new funding opportunities, sign new clients and stay ahead of regulations
• Evaluate Your Climate Risk: Understanding your risk exposure to increasingly devastating weather events and new climate regulations is critical for ensuring the long term health of your business.
• Improve Brand Reputation: Showing your business is committed to sustainability and protecting the communities and environments your operate in can help you stand out in the market and win new business.

The Emissions AI Advantage

Emissions AI is designed to significantly speed up the carbon accounting process allowing you to calculate your organizations carbon footprint in weeks instead of months.

• No Manual Data Entry: Emissions AI extracts all the information it needs from your purchase documents, no manual data entry required. Upload one or hundreds of files at once to quickly calculate your emissions.
• Audit Ready: Every emission can be traced back directly to your documents ensuring accurate and reliable results and making audits a breeze.
• GHG Protocol Compliant: Under the hood emissions AI follows the GHG protocol recommended calculation methodology for Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions.
• Automated Report Generation (coming soon): Harness the power of Generative AI to quickly generate disclosure reports for popular reporting frameworks such as the CDP.

How It Works

So, how does this magical tool work? It’s simpler than you might think. Emissions AI analyzes your purchase documents, extracting crucial information such as vendor, location, date, purchased goods, and price. It then matches each purchased item to an emission factor to calculate the emissions associated with the production of that purchase. Voilà! You get a clear picture of your carbon footprint without the headache. Read our article about emissions factors to learn how we calculate them at Tool Zero

What Types of Documents Are Supported?

We know that businesses come in all shapes and sizes, and so do their documents. That’s why Emissions AI supports a variety of file types:

• PDFs: Up to 10 pages.
• Images: jpg, jpeg, png, and webp.

We support all types of document formats. As long as the document contains vendor name, country, purchase date as well as an itemized list of purchases with descriptions and prices somewhere in the document we can find the relevant info and extract it.

So, whether you’re scanning in a receipt or uploading a multi-page invoice, we’ve got you covered.

Limitations

Of course, no tool is perfect, and Emissions AI is no exception. Here are a few limitations to keep in mind:

• Scope: Currently, we only support Scope 3 category 1 and 2 emissions with Scope 1 and 2 support coming in September 2024.
• Readability: If the text in the file isn’t easily readable by a human, it’s unlikely that Emissions AI will be able to read it either.
• Language: We currently only support documents in English.
• Missing Information: If some information, such as vendor name and location, is missing, the results may be less accurate.
• Generic Descriptions: Generic item descriptions can lead to less precise results.

Looking Forward

We’re not stopping here. In the next few months, we’ll be adding support for Scope 1 and 2 emissions, alongside the full release of Emissions AI. And that’s not all—automated report generation to support popular reporting frameworks is also on the horizon. So, stay tuned!

In conclusion, Emissions AI is here to make your sustainability efforts more manageable and effective. It’s time to take control of your carbon footprint and show the world that small and medium-sized businesses can make a big impact. Ready to join the sustainability revolution? Let’s do this!

Until next time, stay green and keep innovating!

Cofounder and CEO at Tool Zero

Chris Walton