Environmental Sustainability, Microsoft Dynamics, and your business
Getting started…
It is hard to miss the topic of "environmental sustainability" these days. Whether you are walking past a newsstand, searching the Web, listening to your radio, or turning on the TV, there are stories about the environment to be seen or heard everywhere. It may be that the only place you aren't constantly hearing about these issues is when you are at work. Ironically, it is there that your awareness and the resultant changes you might make can have the greatest positive effect, on both the environment and your business.
At least we think so.
That is why, at Microsoft Dynamics, we are currently developing an Environmental Sustainability Dashboard. This dashboard will serve to enable companies that may not have the luxury of hiring an environmental consultant to begin the process of understanding where they are in terms of their effect on the environment in order to determine what their opportunities for improvement are.
What is the Environmental Sustainability Dashboard?
Built on the principle "if you can measure it, you can manage it," this application will allow small- to midsize businesses who are Microsoft Dynamics AX customers to implement a dashboard that will display four of the Core Environmental Performance Indicators (CEPI) as identified by the Global Reporting Initiative. Those indicators are:
| • | EN3: DIRECT ENERGY CONSUMPTION |
| • | EN4: INDIRECT ENERGY CONSUMPTION |
| • | EN16: TOTAL DIRECT AND INDIRECT GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS |
| • | EN17: OTHER RELEVANT GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS |
Direct energy consumption includes the energy sources that you buy and consume on-site, like coal or natural gas. Indirect energy consumption is typically electricity whereby you consume energy that is generated somewhere else, in this case by a utility. EN16 basically takes the results from EN3 and EN4 and converts them into carbon equivalents. And EN17 computes emissions from business travel. Together, EN16 and EN17 constitute what is commonly referred to as your "carbon footprint." Understanding your energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions is the first important step to becoming more environmentally aware. We are hoping that this information will help you recognize changes that you can make to lessen your effect on the environment. And as many companies have found, by making these types of improvements, they are also realizing significant cost savings and thereby adding to their bottom line.
Next steps
| • | Check out our blog: Shades of blue and green. Check out this blog maintained by a passionate group of people who believe it's important to make it easy for companies to become socially and environmentally sustainable. They want to learn as much as they can about "blue/green" issues and will share their thoughts and what they learn in this blog. |
| • | Contact us. Learn more about how you can drive environmental sustainability practices with Microsoft Dynamics. Contact us with questions and for help finding a Microsoft partner. |
| • | Download an AMR Research alert (284 KB, Portable Document Format file; get Adobe Acrobat Reader) AMR Research has released findings of a research study on Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Sustainability. Use the link above to download the research alert. |
| • | Read a customer case study. Learn the story of bakery manufacturer Lantmännen Unibake Poland, part of Svenska Lantmännen Group. The company rapidly expanded its market with new production lines to meet domestic and international demand. See how—with the introduction of Microsoft Dynamics AX—the company has benefited from improved production flexibility, more rigorous quality systems, reduced product returns, and a more motivated, efficient workforce. Order management has also been improved and overall revenue has grown by 43 percent. |
