With leading technology solutions, IPL is committed to helping create a sustainable and decarbonised world.
Incitec Pivot Limited (IPL) is a leading global supplier to the resources and agricultural sectors via its two customer facing businesses, Dyno Nobel and Incitec Pivot Fertilisers (IPF). Dyno Nobel, IPL's explosives and technical blasting services business, is one of the largest industrial explosives distributors in North America and Australia, while IPF is a leading fertiliser manufacturer and distributor on the east coast of Australia.
With leading technology solutions, world-scale explosives and fertiliser manufacturing, IPL is committed to helping create a sustainable and decarbonised world. Its explosives are used to access resources ranging from gold, iron ore and copper, to quarry and construction materials, all of which are required for the development and manufacturing of new technologies, such as electric vehicles, wind turbines, and critical infrastructure. IPF supports the agricultural sector, helping meet a rapidly growing demand for food globally.
IPL has a strong safety culture and follows the values of Zero Harm for Everyone Everywhere and Care for the Community and Environment. In alignment with these values, IPL engaged South Pole to assist them on their climate journey.
South Pole experts worked closely with IPL delivering a number of projects that supported IPL's climate journey. IPL had previously been reporting on its Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions and requested South Pole to review its existing reporting to ensure that the inventory was complete and aligned with best practice, such as the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Protocol. Our experts provided IPL with a full update of their GHG inventory for Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions, including a deep dive analysis into their purchases and use of fertiliser products, ensuring that the inventory of emissions was as robust as possible.
Once IPL's GHG emissions baseline was confirmed, with Scope 3 GHG emissions from purchased products quantified using cradle-to-gate emissions factors, our experts provided assistance in quantifying both near-term and long-term emission reduction targets for Scopes 1, 2 and 3, in line with the latest criteria from the Science-Based Target initiative (SBTi)*. As there is currently no specific emissions reduction pathway for the chemicals sector that is aligned with a 1.5oC outcome under best practice frameworks such as the SBTi, our experts used a cross-sectoral approach to assess targets and also considered specific requirements around Forest, Land and Agriculture (FLAG) emissions associated with the downstream use of fertilisers. Next, South Pole conducted an intervention assessment to identify and evaluate potential GHG emission reduction opportunities. Together, these outputs provided a detailed roadmap on how IPL could extend its current emissions reduction strategy to include Scope 3 to 2050.
To ensure that IPL could continue to accurately account for its GHG footprint, South Pole experts provided a detailed methodology, or Scope 3 Calculation Handbook, for IPL to use when calculating Scope 3 emissions, often the most challenging category to measure. This will ensure IPL's business units are empowered to consistently track their value chain GHG emissions.
"Across IPL we've been making practical progress on our transition to net zero and putting significant resources and focus into finding solutions to the challenges we face. Through our work with South Pole we've been able to demonstrate IPL's commitment to understanding its carbon footprint, reducing GHG emissions and maintaining our position as a climate leader in our industry."
Sunil Salhotra, Chief Strategy and Sustainability Officer, Incitec Pivot Limited
*IPL has not yet submitted these targets to the SBTi. Its current targets are based on the global best practice recommendations included in the SBTi criteria v5.0 and Corporate net zero standard v1.0.
