Avoided carbon calculator tracks savings

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Sustainability initiatives are becoming more common in the corporate world, so when a Portland software company wanted to prove its produce would reduce customer carbon footprints, it partnered with Fluid Market Strategies to prove it.

Revelation Software makes it possible for large corporate clients to conduct market research without resorting to focus groups. Working with Portland-based Fluid, Revelation made a custom calculator available to its customers — which include companies such as General Mills, Wieden + Kennedy and Coleman — that will tally the amount of carbon that was not emitted by using its Web-based service.

"Sustainability has become more and more of an important initiative, especially for the companies we serve," said Steve August, CEO of Revelation.

Three-year-old Revelation offers a Web-based research platform that garners the kind of information surfaced in focus group-type research without requiring people to travel.

Fluid Market Strategies, a consulting firm, built the calculator based on the carbon emissions reported by a typical focus group. Unlike a carbon offset calculator, which determines the amount of greenhouse gas emissions generated by a company or activity, an avoided carbon calculator calculates the difference in carbon emissions between two products, services or activities. A whitepaper describing the methodology is available online.

Alison Hopcroft, an associate for Fluid who designed the calculator, said in a press release: "The carbon calculator built for Revelation is an example of a specialized tool that helps businesses validate their environmental claims – ultimately setting them apart from their competitors."

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