Inetum in Belgium wants to sell 25% of its workplace hardware with CO2 offsetting beginning 2023

Inetum attaches great importance to sustainability. For example, it has launched several initiatives to reduce its CO₂ emissions: greening its vehicle fleet, promoting non-polluting travel and telecommuting, if it offers a better quality of life for its employees. The Inetum Group has also been awarded the Silver Ecovadis Certificate in recognition of its sustainability achievements. Inetum is now going one step farther in Belgium, offering its customers the opportunity to buy or lease CO₂-offset IT equipment.

CO₂ program to offset emissions

With more than 6000 customers in more than 60 countries, ClimatePartner is the most dispersed label with regard to sustainability; it measures the CO₂ footprint of a company, product or service in terms of its CO₂ impact. When workplace hardware is sold or leased out, the CO₂ impact includes the distance it travels from production to the customer, the energy supply it needs to operate, and the emission gasses released when the device is dismantled.

The remaining emissions are offset by supporting carbon offset projects with a Gold Standard or Verified Carbon Standard. These projects range includes forest conservation, the development of renewable energy, improving access to clean drinking water, expanding local infrastructure and creating jobs and developing and preserving biodiversity in developing countries. In that way, customers can offset the unavoidable emissions related to the purchased products. Inetum-Realdolmen customers therefore receive a charter from ClimatePartner as confirmation that the product is CO₂ offset.

Jo Leemans, Director Infrastructure Services, Outsourcing & Reselling at Inetum in Belgium, explains: “Specifically, customers in Belgium are given the option to purchase or rent products through our portal within our Workplace-as-a-service offering. Some of these product categories are assigned a CO2 footprint, which the customer can offset when buying, through an additional contribution. Once they’ve purchased or rented the product with CO2 offsetting, they receive the ClimatePartner charter and also an ID tracking code for each product to monitor the offsetting in actual practice.“

More than 40,000 devices are eligible for CO₂ offsetting

In an initial phase, Inetum is offering the CO₂ offset program for three major product categories within workplace hardware: desktops, laptops and monitors. More than 40,000 of these were sold in 2022. Inetum-Realdolmen will expand the number of products with optional CO₂ offsets at a later stage. Next to this, Inetum in Belgium offers a broad range of hardware material with eco-label to its clients.

Johnny Smets, General Manager at Inetum in Belgium, explains: “We are aiming for 25% of our devices sold by 2023 to be part of the CO₂ offset program. As an additional initiative, we have integrated a new functionality on our portal to select workplace hardware based on their green certificates. This allows our clients to choose more sustainable hardware, which also leads to less CO₂ emissions."

After being used by customers, leased workplace products subject to the ClimatePartner program continue their lifecycles as follows: 90% are given a second life by another customer, 5% are converted into new, reusable raw materials, and 5% goes to emissions.

The partnership with ClimatePartner

“We strongly believe that collaboration, knowledge sharing and action is the only way towards climate impact. We applaud the steps Inetum in Belgium is taking to encourage clients to be more environmentally conscious about their IT-materials and contribute to making the sector more sustainable through a recognizable label and high-quality Carbon Offset projects,” concludes Robert Viertelhauzen, Head of ClimatePartner Netherlands.

About Inetum, Positive digital flow:

Inetum is an agile IT services company that provides digital services and solutions, and a global group that helps companies and institutions to get the most out of digital flow. In a context of perpetual movement, where needs and usages are constantly being reinvented, the Inetum group is committed towards all these players to innovate, continue to adapt, and stay ahead. With its multi-expert profile, Inetum offers its customers a unique combination of proximity, a sectorial organization, and solutions of industrial quality. Operating in more than 27 countries, the Group has nearly 27,000 employees and in 2021 generated revenues of €2.2 billion.

About ClimatePartner

Operating in several European countries and the United States, ClimatePartner works daily to embed climate action within organizations. It does this by calculating the carbon footprint of organisations, products or services. And using this information to advise on reduction measures. In addition, with ClimatePartner, residual emissions can be offset. Through the ClimatepPartner label and integrated unique ID tracking, reduction measures, CO2 offset projects and more can be tracked. As a leading provider of climate action solutions, ClimatePartner combines individual advice with unique cloud-based software for various sectors.