Fulfilment of Kinnevik’s Climate Targets
Kinnevik has two climate targets to reduce greenhouse gas (”GHG”) emissions and to align our portfolio and organisation for a low-carbon economy:
- Reduce greenhouse gas emission intensity in Kinnevik’s portfolio by 50% in 2030, with 2020 as base year (scope 3 category 15 Investments)
- Reduce greenhouse gas emissions from Kinnevik’s operations by 50% in 2030 and by 90% in 2050, with 2019 as base year (scope 1-3 excluding category 15 Investments)
Between 2020 and 2021, the companies in Kinnevik’s portfolio that report on emissions (50% of portfolio value by 31 December 2021) decreased their emissions intensity by 11%, thus exceeding our annual target of 7%. More information about methodology and included companies is available in our Climate Progress Report 2022. The target fulfilment for 2022 will be published in our Climate Progress Report in June 2023.
In 2022, Kinnevik set a new climate target related to our own operations. This focuses on absolute emissions reductions and replaces the old target. To reach our target for our own operations by 2030, we updated our travel policy in 2021, with more restrictions related to air travel. In addition, at the start of 2023, we analysed Kinnevik’s emissions from air travel to facilitate better internal travel planning from an emissions efficiency perspective. The analysis was done for both the management team and the different investment teams.
Kinnevik’s investment focus on Europe and the US means we will likely invest more in those regions in the coming years. We believe being physically present is important in active ownership and that the benefits of driving our sustainability agenda on site need to be balanced against the negative impact of business travel on the environment. Our ambition is therefore not to stop travelling, but to significantly increase travel efficiency.
Overview of Kinnevik's own emissions
(scope 1-3 excluding category 15 Investments)
Kinnevik’s emissions during 2020 and 2021 were materially lower compared to 2019 and 2022, which is the result of significantly less business travel due to the spread of the Coronavirus. In 2022, three new categories were added in scope 3; employee commuting, upstream leased assets and downstream leased assets. This increased our 2022 emissions compared to 2021 by 11 tonnes CO2e like-for-like. We aim to continue developing our reporting going forward. An account of our portfolio emissions is available in our Climate Progress Report 2022.
Kinnevik's GHG emissions (tonnes CO2e) | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 |
Scope 1 | 17.5 | 11.7 | 5.3 | 7.7 |
Scope 2 | 6.9 | 4.8 | 5.5 | 3.2 |
Scope 3 | 485.9 | 73.1 | 79.6 | 315.4 |
Total | 510.3 | 89.6 | 90.4 | 326.3 |
Per full time equivalent employee | 12.9 | 2.2 | 2.3 | 7.3 |
Per square metre office space | 0.66 | 0.12 | 0.12 | 0.27 |