Microsoft’s commitment to sustainability is demonstrated through their continual introduction of innovative solutions in their Cloud for Sustainability platform. Below Baseline is built on the Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability, in particular the Microsoft Sustainability Manager. These recent updates are designed to enable organisations to better manage their environmental, social, and governance (ESG) data, providing comprehensive solutions for carbon, water, and waste impact tracking.
Enhanced Microsoft Sustainability Manager
The Microsoft Sustainability Manager has been bolstered with capabilities surrounding agriculture, carbon credit lifecycles, and fresh ways to access Microsoft emissions data. Here are some key enhancements:
Record and Report Emissions and Water Impact
The process of recording, reporting, and reducing emissions and water impact has been automated, making these tasks more efficient.
Ingest Waste Data and Track Disposal Methods
Organisations now have the ability to ingest waste data, track disposal methods and materials, and calculate emissions using out-of-the-box or custom standards.
Calculate Carbon Footprint
Using the Emissions Impact Dashboard for Azure and Microsoft 365, organisations can now calculate their cloud footprint using Power BI template apps and validated carbon accounting.
Analyse Data from Buildings and Fleets
Integrated data solutions now provide organisations the capability to examine and manage the footprints of their facilities, fleets, and production processes.
Collaborate on Sustainability Goals
With Microsoft Teams, stakeholders and contributors can now collaborate seamlessly on sustainability goals, emissions data, and insights.
Streamline Data Collection
The Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability is now equipped to collect and centralise data more efficiently, making it easier for organisations to record, report, and reduce their environmental impact.
Project ESG Lake: A New Addition
The latest addition to the Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability is Project ESG Lake, a tool designed to collate and manage ESG data and reporting. Here are some key features of this new tool:
Build a Single Source of Truth for ESG Data
Project ESG Lake enables organisations to standardise ESG data from various sources and create a centralised ESG data estate.
Integrate Emissions Data
The tool also facilitates the integration of calculated emissions data from Microsoft Sustainability Manager or other third-party solutions into the ESG data estate.
Integrate Microsoft-based Emissions Data
Project ESG Lake allows organisations to integrate emissions data related to their usage of Microsoft Azure and Microsoft 365 into the ESG data estate.
Analyse Data and Build Custom Applications
Organisations can leverage Project ESG Lake to analyse data and build custom applications to track progress towards their ESG goals.
Predict Emissions
The platform integrates with Microsoft Fabric, an AI-powered analytics platform, to help organisations predict their business emissions.
These updates to Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability empower businesses to take control of their environmental stewardship. With the enhanced capabilities of Microsoft Sustainability Manager and the introduction of Project ESG Lake, organisations now have an arsenal of tools to manage their ESG data effectively, aligning their goals with global sustainability targets.
