Founded in 2014 in Australia, Sendle focuses on reducing the environmental impact of shipping with initiatives to improve on maximising vehicle and packing efficiency. In late 2019, Sendle expanded its operations to the United States and Canada, and is now also providing its simple, reliable, affordable and climate-conscious delivery service to American small businesses.
Sendle has committed to minimise negative externalities and maximise positive impact, and has worked towards this by being the 'first carbon neutral shipping service'. Sendle has also been continuing with other initiatives such as the rollout of Australia's first fleet of solar-fuelled electric vehicles (EVs) for small businesses.
Sendle is now taking the next step in its climate journey and has committed to going beyond carbon neutrality, working with South Pole to develop a roadmap which will outline how they can achieve net zero by 2040.
At Sendle, we work to minimise negative externalities and maximise positive impact. Simply, our goal is to do what is best for people and the planet.
James Chin Moody, co-Founder and CEO, Sendle
South Pole has been working closely with Sendle for several years, helping them to fund climate action by purchasing carbon credits to compensate for the emissions generated by their deliveries. As Sendle aims to increase their climate ambition, they have also engaged South Pole on their net zero strategy.
Sendle has been working with South Pole to develop a roadmap towards net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 2040. To develop this roadmap and set emission reduction targets, such as science-based targets (SBTs) under the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) framework, Sendle established their 2021 (calendar year) GHG baseline. This helped Sendle to identify the major emissions hotspots in terms of delivery journey distances, transportation types, and geographies.
Sendle had previously set a target for net zero emissions by 2030, which was in line with the B Corp Climate Collective (BCCC) commitment. Now with an ambition to align with SBTi guidance, which has different requirements for scope 3 emissions, Sendle is revising their net zero target. South Pole's experts have assisted Sendle in re-assessing their emission reduction targets in line with the SBTi requirements, determining a 2040 net zero target as most appropriate.
By setting a more ambitious net zero target of 2040, rather than the SBTi minimum required target of 2050, Sendle continues to demonstrate climate leadership.
South Pole's experts developed near-term and long-term target scenarios for Sendle, aligned with 1.5oC. Using the base year of CY2021, Sendle's near-term target sets a year-on-year (YoY) reduction requirement of 7.7% reduction in GHG emissions per parcel. By 2030, this YoY reduction will lead to a total reduction of 51.6% of GHG emissions per parcel. Aligning their target reductions to emissions per parcel rather than absolute emissions sets a more realistic reduction target as Sendle has a high projected growth.
Sendle's long-term target is set as a reduction of emissions per parcel by 97% by 2040, equal to 90% of absolute emissions reduction and in line with the SBTi.
South Pole is currently working with Sendle to submit these targets to SBTi for validation.
To assist Sendle in achieving their net zero target, South Pole experts provided Sendle with key interventions which can be implemented across their business, spotlighting near-term targets and overall reductions for scope 3 emissions.
In addition to reducing its own emissions, Sendle also continues fund climate action and help to reduce global emissions by purchasing carbon credits. Sendle supports a range of nature-based and renewable energy projects in different countries that protect ecosystems and support the energy transition as well as reducing emissions.
The South Pole team were excellent partners to our team at Sendle to figure out how to turn our climate ambition into an actionable plan to get to net zero emissions by 2040.
Veena Harbaugh, Director of Sustainability, Sendle
