Crowley Maritime Corp. is the latest shipper committed to reaching net-zero emissions by 2050.
The Jacksonville, Florida-based company announced it submitted its emissions-reduction targets, which include scope 1 (direct), scope 2 (indirect) and scope 3 (all other) emissions, to the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) Tuesday.
“On emissions, admittedly this is a bold goal, and we need to ensure our goal and targets are credible. This is why we are submitting our interim targets to reduce emissions through the SBTi, which is the world’s expert on validating companies’ methodologies on emissions targets to include monitoring progress along the way to net-zero,” Alisa Praskovich, vice president of sustainability at Crowley, told FreightWaves.
In October, SBTi released a global standard for setting credible net-zero targets backed by climate science. Crowley is expecting its net-zero target to be approved by SBTi in the next few months.
Many companies with net-zero emissions targets will be required to include 95% of scope 1 and 2 emissions and 90% of scope 3 emissions to be approved by SBTi.
Crowley said that 80% of the company’s emissions come from its supply chain. Known as scope 3 emissions, these emissions are often referred to as the most difficult to reduce because companies have less control over them.
Reducing scope 3 emissions will be about “concerted engagement with our suppliers to work cooperatively on product life cycle and transport-related emissions for those products and services that enable Crowley to be a world-class maritime and logistics solutions provider,” Praskovich said.
“Crowley will need to take a hard look at its lines of business around the sale of fossil-fuel based energy products to our customers. How can we reduce life cycle emissions on these products? What tough decisions need to be made about continuing to operate the way we traditionally have in order to meet our GHG targets?” Praskovich said.
Partnering with Salesforce
The company will use the Salesforce Sustainability Cloud to monitor its emissions in different categories.
In a release, Ari Alexander, general manager of Salesforce Sustainability Cloud, said: “We’re proud to be supporting Crowley, our first-to-market customer in the maritime industry, in their sustainability journey to track and reduce their carbon footprint. With Sustainability Cloud, Crowley can now have a 360 view of its carbon footprint, with automated dashboards that provide real-time, actionable insights so they can take meaningful climate action across their supply chain.”
Crowley partnered with Salesforce to “jump in and develop solutions together” because Salesforce already knew the company and demonstrated its expertise in monitoring and reporting emissions, Praskovich said.
“We have the highest confidence that the Salesforce sustainability team will provide Crowley the clear measurements, analytics and ultimately real-time dashboards our customers expect,” Praskovich said.
Crowley’s sustainability efforts
Crowley is working on the first fully electric tugboat in the U.S. The 82-foot eWolf vessel will have 70 tons of bollard pull and release zero tailpipe emissions. The eWolf is expected to be operational by the middle of 2023.
Read: Crowley developing first fully electric tugboat in US
“Some solutions are considered relatively easy, such as retiring high-emission assets and replacing them with cleaner or zero-emission equipment. In other instances, it will be a concerted effort to evaluate each of our facilities and buildings to look for alternative, clean power sources. It will take creative thinking and vast partnerships on finding alternative fuel solutions for our assets that currently operate on traditional fossil fuels,” said Praskovich.
Crowley has a long history of providing shipping logistics support to offshore oil and gas companies. Now, it’s preparing to offer the same services and expertise to the offshore wind industry.
The company plans to redirect resources from offshore oil and gas operations to help transport wind turbine components, such as blades, nacelles and sections of the towers, from U.S. ports to offshore platforms where they will be constructed.
Read: Crowley readies dive into offshore wind farm work
“Sustainability is a journey. Crowley is on a mission to become the most sustainable and innovative maritime and logistics company in the Americas by 2025. There is tremendous pride in what Crowley has accomplished over the last 130 years, and our employees, customers and communities we serve are excited about the journey ahead,” Praskovich said.
WATCH: Journey to emission reduction with Bart De Muynck from Gartner
Click here for more FreightWaves articles by Alyssa Sporrer.
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