How Borgestad turned carbon accounting into a business asset

Borgestad ASA started carbon reporting to meet investor demands during a bond refinancing in 2021. With Morescope, part of Position Green, as its platform and KPMG as project lead, it now has a group-wide carbon account across Norway, Sweden, Finland and Poland that shows where risk and emissions concentrate in its value chain.

For Norway’s oldest publicly listed company, climate reporting began as a compliance exercise. “We risked drowning in reporting requirements without getting much commercial value back,” says CEO Pål Feen Larsen. Today its data supports investments and strategic decisions, not just regulators and one-off requests.

The challenge: reporting pressure with little commercial return

Borgestad didn’t need an internal sustainability team. It needed smart tools to do the heavy data lifting and a good adviser to manage the process. As a company with limited bargaining power over large international suppliers, it also had to improve supply chain data to guide its own decarbonisation investments.

The solution: the right tool and the right partner

With KPMG’s help, Borgestad evaluated several software solutions. It needed a system that worked with its current data, improved as it matured, was cost-effective and could scale. “Based on this KPMG recommended Morescope, so we went in that direction,” says Larsen. According to Synne Helletun Næss, Manager at KPMG, many enterprise systems were overkill for Borgestad’s size and data maturity.

With KPMG coordinating the rollout of Position Green, every business unit took part. Standardised templates replaced a patchwork of spreadsheets. Where detailed figures were missing, particularly in scope 3, spend-based estimates filled the gaps; these are replaced with activity data as the company matures. Borgestad also chose to report against VSME instead of the full CSRD.

“Being able to use spend data in an efficient and accurate way, especially with a substantial scope 3 footprint, is key for Borgestad. The smooth transition from spend to activity data as you get increased data quality was key for choosing Morescope.”

Synne Helletun Næss, Manager, KPMG

The results: clearer risk, broader ownership, credible data

Borgestad learned that the operations with the highest risk exposure, such as certain overseas suppliers, also have the highest emissions. “We’ve gotten a much clearer idea of where to ask for more data, where we can minimize risk and eventually eliminate emissions,” says Larsen. Climate is now on the agenda at management meetings, and people across departments contribute.

Customer requests for documented sustainability performance have grown sharply over the past five years, so credible data matters commercially. “The easier it is to get data into the system, the easier it is to get actual work done,” says Larsen.

“Morescope has given us a much more reliable carbon accounting and a far more comprehensive overview than we had in previous years. Getting an overview of our complex value chain, seeing where our biggest risks and dependencies lie, is incredibly important for figuring out how we can influence things going forward.”

Pål Feen Larsen, CEO, Borgestad ASA