Environment
Over the past year, we have significantly enhanced our environmental initiatives across the firm. Our ongoing commitment to net-zero principles continues to guide our approach, with these foundations increasingly integrated into our operations and decision-making processes.
Throughout the year, we continued to prioritise initiatives that reduce our environmental footprint and enhance resource efficiency, with a focus on business travel, waste reduction, and energy performance. Supporting this work are our revalidated Science Based Targets, which ensure our approach remains aligned with the latest climate science and the ambition of limiting global warming to 1.5°C.
Our journey to date
We continue to progress against our updated greenhouse gas (GHG) and C02 emissions targets and actions for the period 2025 to 2030. To ensure alignment with the relevant reporting directives, we engaged with an external consultancy, Sustineo, to realign our base year for reporting data and emissions progress to our Financial Year 2019 as opposed to the calendar year 2018. This has created more consistency and alignment in our reporting, enabling us to focus on executing key actions to progress towards our ambitious targets.
Building on our commitment to net-zero principles, we have continued to embed sustainability throughout our business. This year our priority has been to reduce our environmental impact while improving resource efficiency, with a strong focus on business travel, waste and energy performance.
Looking ahead, we remain focused on delivering against our sustainability ambitions for 2025-2030. Although progress has been varied, particularly in the context of the firm's continued growth, we have achieved meaningful advances in several key areas. Significant improvements have been made in reducing Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions, while Scope 3 emissions remain an area of ongoing focus. Overall, our carbon footprint is 4% higher than our baseline year, increasing by 17% compared with the previous financial year. This increase reflects the firm’s commitment to introducing AI technology, coupled with the broadening scope of our carbon footprint reporting to include our IT services and employee commuting. To support continuous improvement and transparency, we will continue to partner with Sustineo to conduct annual independent audits of our carbon emissions. Following the successful revalidation of our Science Based Targets in December 2025, we remain firmly committed to achieving an 83% reduction in absolute Scope 1 emissions by FY2030 from a FY2019 base year and a 50% reduction in absolute Scope 3 emissions within the same timeframe.
Overall, our carbon footprint is higher than our baseline year (FY2019) by
increasing by approximately 17% compared with the previous financial year.
This increase reflects the firm’s commitment to introducing AI coupled with the broadening scope of our carbon footprint reporting to include our IT services and employee commuting.
Following the successful revalidation of our Science Based Targets in December 2025, we remain firmly committed to achieving a reduction in absolute Scope 1 emissions by
and a 50% reduction in absolute Scope 3 emissions within the same timeframe.
Our carbon footprint
Our Scope 1, including fuel combustion and fugitive emissions, has reduced by 50% against our re-aligned FY2019 baseline year, with our emissions from purchased electricity reducing by 49%. Our current aggregate Scope 3 emissions, on the other hand, have increased by 51% (1,773 tCO2e) against our FY2019 levels (1,199 tCO2e), a 22.5% increase from the previous financial year.
This is disappointing but contains mixed underlying news. On the one hand, within this, our emissions attributed to paper, waste, and water have decreased by 54%, demonstrating our commitment to resource reduction and efficiency. Unfortunately, in rebuilding client relationships post-COVID, our business travel emissions have increased by 47% when compared to our FY2019 baseline year. To address this, we have recognised the importance of devising and implementing a means of educating our people on how we can all collectively reduce our business travel footprint.
Over the past year, we have enhanced our environmental governance through the implementation of updated business travel and environmental policies, supported by revised travel guidelines.
We would like to thank Sustineo for creating the below graphs and charts which illustrate our progress against our carbon reduction targets.
Scope 1, including fuel combustion and fugitive emissions, has reduced by
Emissions from purchased electricity have reduced by
Our current aggregate Scope 3 emissions, on the other hand, have increased by
against our FY2019 levels
Long-haul business flights have been reduced by
against our baseline year
Our focus on business travel
The launch of our new Business Travel Policy in June 2025 marked an important milestone, establishing a clear framework for reducing travel-related emissions.
The policy has been rolled out firm-wide and we will continue to track and manage business travel to support our carbon reduction objectives. Whilst our absolute Scope 3 emissions have increased, this is largely in part to the expanding scope of our carbon footprint including employee commuting and IT services. While the number of flights has reduced by 29% from our FY2019 baseline year, the passenger-kilometres or total distance flown by our staff increased by 41% while the resulting emissions have increased by 24%. The increased efficiencies in air travel mean that the percentage increase in emissions is not as large as the percentage increase in air travel. Whilst this is a significant achievement, we are aware of the ongoing challenge and will continue to monitor and strive to reduce business travel aligned with our carbon reduction ambition.
Travel Dashboards
This year we also launched our travel dashboards, an interactive tool to provide the firm's Practice Groups with insights into their business travel. Our initial focus has been developing the platform and we conducted initial engagements with each Practice Group to gain valuable feedback on the dashboard and provide important insights into emissions, the firm’s ambition regarding emissions reductions, and proposed targets to meet the reduction aims. This year, we met with 294 people across 15 practice groups, which proved important in raising awareness of the firm’s commitment to sustainability and emission reduction, noting that business travel is the largest contributor to our Scope 3 emissions. As part of this engagement, we asked each Practice Group to nominate a Sustainable Travel Champion as a key contact point for business travel-related communications and monitoring progress on business travel in their Practice Group. Our Sustainable Travel Champions are vital to monitoring business travel, championing sustainable travel habits and serving as key contact points between the Sustainable Business team and the Practice Groups. Going forward, our focus is to further engage with our Practice Groups to ensure they have clarity on their contributions to our overall carbon impact. This collaborative approach will help us achieve our ambitious emissions reduction targets.
Our energy journey
We are committed to conserving natural resources and to reducing our carbon emissions. A key part of our carbon reduction strategy is a focus on energy reduction, coupled with a complete transition to renewable energy. As we look back at the past year, our Scope 2 purchased electricity consumption has decreased by 11% and our Scope 3 natural gas and other fugitive emissions have increased by 3%.
This year we were once again pleased to maintain our ISO50001 Energy Management accreditation from Certification Europe. As part of our Energy Savings Action Plan for the firm, we have conducted feasibility assessments for various energy efficiency projects this year, including a cost-benefit analysis for replacing our solar thermal system with solar PV electricity on the roof of our office buildings at Ten Earlsfort Terrace, Dublin.
Science Based Targets Initiative
The firm has been a signatory to the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi) since 2022. As part of our commitment to these targets, we report our carbon emissions annually through this report, which is also publicly available online and on our own website.
In 2021 we adopted an ambitious carbon reduction strategy aimed at reducing Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions to 50% of 2018 levels by 2026. Following a detailed assessment of our environmental performance and future ambitions, we revalidated our emissions reduction targets during the past 12 months. The revised targets for the period July 2025 to June 2030 build on the progress achieved to date and align with significant developments in EU climate policy and sustainability reporting frameworks.
Our revalidated Science Based Targets are as follows:
Reduce absolute Scope 1 emissions by 83% against our FY2019 baseline year
Reduce absolute Scope 3 emissions by 50% within the same timeframe
To support the achievement of these targets, we will continue to implement a range of initiatives, including:
- Conducting annual independent audits of our carbon footprint in partnership with our external sustainability consultants, Sustineo.
- Reducing greenhouse gas emissions from business travel through a combination of travel reduction measures, carbon performance dashboards and targets, and our updated Business Travel and Expenses Policy.
- Increasing our use of renewable energy as opportunities to transition become available.
- Expanding our sustainability education and awareness programme, including our annual Environment Awareness Month, to encourage sustainable behaviours across the firm.
- Engaging with suppliers and business partners to identify opportunities to reduce emissions throughout our value chain.
C02balance UK Zambia Safe Water Project Update
Over the past 12 months we have continued to invest in suitable certified sustainable GHG avoidance projects. We have continued to purchase our credits from CO2balance UK, focusing on the Zambia Safe Water Project due to the firm’s connection to Zambia through our founder Arthur Cox and our ongoing trainee project in Zambia.
CO2balance is registered under the Gold Standard foundation framework, ensuring all carbon emission reductions undergo rigorous monitoring, reporting and verification.
Our intention is to eventually replace our current certified avoidance offsets with local, verifiable, long-term, sustainable sequestration projects to counteract the impact of our residual GHG emissions footprint. This year we have diversified our purchase of offsets to include removable offset projects.
Paul Chiplen from C02balance UK, provides us with an annual update on the project:
The Zambia Eastern Safe Water Project continues to focus on ensuring the long-term sustainability of the rehabilitated boreholes through ongoing monitoring, maintenance and community engagement.
A key milestone this year has been the successful delivery of the Area Pump Minder (APM) training programme across the districts of Chasefu, Lundazi and Lumezi. Thirty community members received practical and theoretical training in the installation, repair and maintenance of the hand pumps. Delivered by District WASH Coordinators with support from our in-country partner, ROCS, the programme combined classroom learning with hands-on field exercises. By strengthening local technical capacity, the project is reducing borehole downtime, improving access to safe water and enabling communities to maintain their water points long after project completion.
Our field teams have also carried out regular follow-up visits to project communities, providing technical support, monitoring borehole functionality and gathering community feedback. In addition, routine water quality testing and borehole chlorination have continued to help safeguard safe drinking water and reduce the risk of waterborne diseases.
Through continued investment in local capacity, regular monitoring and preventative maintenance, the project is helping to ensure communities have reliable access to safe, clean water for years to come.
Borehole maintenance as part of the Area Pump Minder (APM) Training Programme
Local community members using a rehabilitated borehole
Minimising our waste
Waste reduction remains a key pillar of our environmental strategy. We are proud to have achieved Zero to Landfill certification for 2025 (July 2025 to June 2026), demonstrating our continued commitment to responsible waste management.
In February 2025,we joined the Re-Turn Children's Charities Campaign, enabling proceeds from all recyclable cans and plastic bottles collected across the firm to support six Irish children's charities: Barnardos, Barretstown, Make-A-Wish Ireland, ISPCC, LauraLynn, and the Jack and Jill Foundation.
Since signing up, we have successfully returned
bottles, raising almost €2,000 for the chosen charities.
Printing
Our indirect emissions for 2026 in relation to paper consumption have decreased by 47% compared to our FY2019 baseline. We continue to monitor our use and aim to further reduce our paper consumption. All our paper is recycled and FSC certified.
Catering
The past twelve months, FY2026, marked the first full year of our expanded dinner service at our onsite Restaurant, which increased overall food production and extended catering provision into the evening. Dinner service represented 15% of total site food purchases, while the recorded cost of food waste accounted for 2% of overall site food purchases.
The expanded service contributed to higher waste volumes but also provided a more complete and accurate operational baseline. Along with our onsite caterers Gather + Gather, we will use this insight to drive targeted reductions during FY2027 through improved forecasting, menu planning, production controls and daily waste monitoring.
IT Services
We have broadened our carbon footprint assessment this year to include our IT hardware and software. As per our latest carbon footprint report, IT hardware and software contribute to 7% of the firm’s total emissions. This in part offers an explanation for the increase in our Scope 3 emissions. As part of our commitment to transparency and completeness with our carbon footprint reporting, over the coming year we intend to monitor, develop and broaden our scope of data and information in this area.
Emissions associated with paper consumption has reduced by
compared to our baseline year
Out of overall site food purchases, recorded cost of food waste accounted for
IT hardware and software contributes to
of our total FY2026 emissions
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