Carbon Advantage Expertise and Client Projects

OUR APPROACH

Our organization’s expertise in energy efficiency, green building planning and design, sustainability, behavior change, organizational development, and efficient technologies positions us to address the climate change impacts of your buildings and business operations. Carbon Advantage offers a customizable set of solutions to addressing climate change risks and opportunities: 

• Greenhouse gas inventories, including third-party verification and analysis (providing rigorous data for decision making)
• Climate change risk and opportunity analysis (creating the framework for further action)
• Sustainability Reporting (adding transparency and credibility)
• Climate action plans (capturing opportunities and minimizing risks)
• Emission Reductions (realizing cost savings)
• Neutrality (leveraging leadership and commitment) 

We believe that an organization preparing to address climate change in a comprehensive and holistic manner must use a tiered approach: identify risks and opportunities, then measure, reduce, and offset emissions. Our service packages are designed specifically for clients and are tailored for their business objectives, organizational size, and business activities. 

OUR TEAM

The Carbon Advantage team is led by Indigo Teiwes, who has over eleven years of strategic sustainability analysis, advisory, and program management experience. Her expertise includes investment opportunity analysis related to environmental sustainability and climate change issues.  The team is further supported by Sean Penrith, executive director, who was founder of the Green Glass Company in Johannesburg, which he grew into an acclaimed, international sustainable glassware manufacturer with three high-speed plants worldwide.  Other in-house expertise includes Earth Advantage Institute staff with specialties in greenhouse gas footprinting, building energy efficiency, green building, planning, and education and training.  

OUR PROJECT WORK

Following is a selection of some of the Carbon Advantage projects and client work: 

Climate Change Strategy, GHG Footprint, and Integrated Data Collection Solutions: Working with an Oregon business with approximately 1,000 employees, Carbon Advantage provided a risk and opportunity analysis for activities and impacts associated with climate change. The project included auditing carbon footprint data, developing a comprehensive methodology and guidance document for the organization’s carbon footprinting efforts, integrating carbon data collection with the business’ accounting software, and performing a carbon footprint analysis. Results included identification of numerous cost saving measures. 

Climate Change Road Map: Carbon Advantage worked with a Washington tribe to produce a community-specific Climate Change Roadmap that integrates the community’s efforts around GHG emissions reductions. Included was an analysis of the community’s carbon footprint (utilizing the ICLEI protocols), an evaluation of policy conflicts (with GHG emissions reduction goals), and the creation of a tool for evaluating and prioritizing potential GHG emissions reduction projects.

Residential Home Life Cycle Assessment to Prioritize Building Construction Methods and Materials that Reduce Waste and Greenhouse Gases from the Building Industry: In association with the Oregon Dept. of Environmental Quality, Carbon Advantage provided the climate change and building science expertise for this study that utilizes life cycle assessment to identify and quantify the impacts of different building practices. The goal of the study is to identify options that reduce GHG emissions and solid waste, and that improve human and ecosystem health. The report is available here. 

Carbon Advantage VERs: Earth Advantage Institute is the developer and manager of an emerging program to monetize carbon emission reductions into carbon credits for trade on the voluntary carbon market. The program uses energy efficiency and renewable energy measures in new and existing building construction to mitigate carbon emissions that are quantified and monetized into carbon credits (also called voluntary emission reductions or VERs)