Taking stock and looking ahead: expanding Agendi's impact

As we enter a New Year, I wanted to share some of Agendi’s 2021 highlights, along with our goals and aspirations for 2022.

2021 was an exceptional year for Agendi

This has certainly been a year of growth and acceleration towards our mission to unlock business ambition and drive action on climate and sustainability. Since our rebranding and the launch of our new website in January 2021, we have tripled in size! Agendi successfully launched 2 subsidiaries in Canada and the UK, and we ended 2021 with a global, united, and talented team of engineers, scientists and economists working from 4 countries and 6 cities (New York, London, Montreal, Paris, San Francisco and Baltimore). Across our services, Agendi is now serving more than 50 clients, half of which are Fortune 500 companies.

To date, almost a dozen organizations, plus Agendi itself, have set science-based targets with the support of our consultants, and we are proud to have a 100% success rate with the Science-based Target initiative (SBTi). In December, our expertise in this area became recognized as we were accredited by the CDP as an SBT provider based on our previous successes.

Our impact goes beyond calculating complex GHG inventories and setting ambitious targets. For example, in 2021, we supported numerous international companies in sourcing renewable electricity. We contracted more than 300,000 MWh of Renewable Energy Certificates in more than 30 markets - the equivalent of fifty 2 MW wind turbines or the consumption of 25,000 average US households.

We also expanded our offering of voluntary carbon offsets, supporting more than 30 projects and developing partnerships with nature-based solution developers such as NCX or The Nature Conservancy of Canada and carbon removal pioneers like Carbicrete and Project Vesta. As a result, we are only a few months away from having sourced and retired 1 million high-quality carbon credits for our US clients alone, driving millions of dollars to climate projects all over the globe.

The diversity of the projects we have been working on is truly incredible. We feel privileged to work with great organizations and partners dedicated to finding solutions to the climate crisis.

Adapting based on new realities

This exceptional growth came, not coincidentally, within the context of changing government, scientific, and business realities. First, of course, the new political agenda in the US gave us some tailwind for increased interest in our TCFD services through the SEC’s intention for climate risks to be considered by CFO’s in 10-K reporting. But that only explains some of the shifts we are experiencing. The main driver for our services is the shift in the perception that climate change is real and already impacting us today, no matter where we live.  

A cold wave in February last year triggered temperatures 50°F (28°C) below averages in Texas, resulting in loss of lives and leaving millions without power and water. Heatwaves over the summer also broke records, killing hundreds in the northwestern US and Canada, and wildfires razed Northern California. In July, floods in Germany and Belgium brought 240 deaths and left thousands of families without homes. More recently, floods caused hundreds of thousands of people to leave their homes in South Sudan. According to insurance company Aon, 2021 is likely to be the fourth time in five years that global natural catastrophes have cost more than $100bn.

Agendi wants to become a better organization

This is a critical moment in which we need to address multiple crises - a global pandemic, anthropogenic wildlife extinctions, and of course, the climate crisis – that threaten humanity and many of the ecosystems we rely upon. Our vision of building a future that achieves equality across health, education, economic stability, and healthy ecosystems is more relevant than ever. Collaboration will be key to our success: we believe that the collective action necessary to transition to a lower-carbon future will need to be democratic, fair, inclusive, and thus understood and accepted by the majority of us to take place in harmony. Rising inequalities would increase the fragmentation of our societies, which is why even though we are climate consultants in our DNA, our actions go beyond carbon accounting and management to address Diversity, Equity and Inclusion as well as ethics and corporate governance.

Our strongest asset is the inclusive and welcoming culture we are building, both remotely but also in person, during numerous team-building events. We have built a benefits program including gym and bike sharing as we believe healthy people are happier. Agendi changed its legal status to a Benefit Corporation in March 2021, and we are currently going through a B Corp certification audit that should be completed in Q1 2022.

Agendi’s science-based targets were approved in 2021, and we will continue offsetting our residual GHG emissions following the PAS2060 specification. Finally, we also became green-e accredited, offering high quality US RECs to our clients.

2022 will see further expansion, innovation, and sustainability solutions from Agendi

In 2022, we intend to continue to grow in new markets, starting with the launch of a new physical office in Paris in the coming months. We plan to launch new solutions around technology-based carbon removal activities to help businesses meet net-zero goals sooner.

All in all, Agendi aims to make meaningful progress on our mission to build a better and safer future for generations to come. Our goal is to become a trusted advisor and solution provider to any organization seeking to pivot towards a low emission future. To achieve this ambition, we will continue growing our team with highly talented people from around the world who aspire to solve the climate crisis in the next generation.