Weighing the environmental impact

The CoClear Calculator is due to come out in June to help businesses identify sustainability factors of their operations. The product began as a collaboration between Columbia University and PepsiCo.

This calculator will also help businesses understand the impact of alternate ingredients and methods. A feature of the calculator is to analyze any single product or brand, but it will also be able to assess entire corporate portfolios to project the impact of sustainable strategies.

CoClear is an interactive and rather comprehensive tool with financial and environmental metrics. In short, it appeals to the business sense of corporations, while still meeting sustainable goals.

As an example, CoClear could analyze a fictional yogurt company’s ingredients and identify that coconut milk is its top ingredient. It could also analyze that this ingredient makes up 37.14 percent of the company’s greenhouse gas emissions while also accounting for 22.57 percent of the product line’s expenses. With that information, the calculator can then assess changes in these percentages if the company used dairy, nut, soy, or other coconut milk substitutions.

“Substitution scenarios can be run through the application to search for alternatives that may lower both GHGs and cost, and result in a supply chain optimization opportunity,” adds Paridis, CoClear’s CEO.

Source: http://www.inquisitr.com/2097702/coclear-calculator-tracks-business-sustainability/