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NET ZERO PLAN

Tide removes 100% of emissions, becoming first fintech to do so using carbon removals

Tide makes three pledges to deliver its Net Zero Plan, as laid out by CEO India & Global Head of Net Zero, Gurjodhpal Singh.

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Our three pledges to deliver Tide's Net Zero Plan

Pledges 1 and 2 will make Tide Net Zero by 2030.

Pledge 1

Carbon Removal

Tide commits to removing 100% of our scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions with durable carbon removals every year from 2022 onwards.

Pledge 2

Net Zero

Tide will reduce 90% of CO2e emissions per employee and 97% of emissions by revenue by 2030, vs a 2021 baseline.

Pledge 3

Members

Tide commits to making Net Zero simpler for our members by developing support for them to get to Net Zero.

Why is Net Zero important for us?

SMEs play a key role in the transition towards a greener future. In the UK, the British Business Bank estimates that SMEs collectively account for around half of UK business greenhouse gas emissions.

There can be no Net Zero without SMEs being on board. We recognise that we have a role to play in supporting our growing member base, by measuring, reducing or removing their carbon footprint, and saving time and money along the way.

But we understand that we need to walk the talk. We have been busy on our own journey towards Net Zero. In 2022 we started removing our entire annual carbon footprint using durable carbon removals, while also focusing on our 2030 target of reducing our CO2 emissions per employee by 90%, vs a 2021 target.

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Carbon Removal

Tide is the first Fintech to remove 100% of emissions, and we have been doing so since 2022.

In the last three years we have retired 8,080 tCO2 of durable carbon removals via two biochar projects, with an additional 7,500 tCO2 to be delivered by the end of 2026, in total this is equivalent to removing over 5,000 petrol cars off the street, or enough carbon emissions to fill Wembley stadium, twice! 

As the Voluntary Carbon Market matures and technology plays a key part in enabling more high quality carbon removal projects to be developed, we remain flexible in our carbon removal strategy. 

Transparency in our journey towards Net Zero is essential, and so all our carbon removal purchase history is publicly available here

Discover additional carbon removal projects Exomad Green and Wakefield BioChar

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Net Zero

By 2030, Tide will reduce 90% of its Scopes 1, 2 and 3 emissions per employee to reach Net Zero, and 97% by revenue.

In 2024, we reduced our emissions per employee by 44% vs a 2021 baseline, through action like limiting long-haul flights to include a two-week minimum stay, as well as procuring only renewable electricity across our offices and to also cover the electricity consumed by Tideans working from home in the UK, Bulgaria and India. 

We are fully transparent about our Net Zero reduction journey. More on our carbon footprint in our Statement of Facts.

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Members

Pledge 3 means we plan to roll out initiatives to help our members kickstart their own journey to Net Zero using the same two-pronged approach.

We already offer all our members in the UK free access to a carbon calculator as part of their Tide membership. 

We are now developing our members’ Net Zero functionality further, so that we can support members in their own journey saving time and money.

Stay with us on this journey.  Discover our Case Study

Breakdown of our market-based location global emissions by reporting category 

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Beyond the pledge

While we have set some ambitious goals, we understand that the journey towards Net Zero is complex, for us and for our members.

As we grow as an organisation, we continuously review our commitment to align to a fast changing regulatory landscape.

We are advocates of taking action now, which is also reflected in our commitment to remove our entire carbon footprint every year since 2022. This also comes with risks and the unknown. We see our Net Zero pledges as a starting point on the journey, which we’ll continuously review and update as we learn more about our and our members’ experience.

Partnerships

Tide is an early and active member of the campaigning initiative in the UK, B4NZ (formerly Bankers for Net Zero) that brings together banks, businesses, and regulators to enable them and their clients to accelerate the transition to Net Zero, and a founding partner of Perseus, a multisector national collaboration managed by Icebreaker One to automate pre-competitive, assurable energy data for UK SMEs.

We are also signatories of Tech Zero, the climate action group for tech companies of all sizes committed to fighting the climate crisis

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Net Zero - FAQs

  • Pledge 1: Carbon Removal

Tide commits to removing 100% of our scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions with durable carbon removals every year from 2022 onwards.

  • Pledge 2: Net Zero Tide will reduce 90% of CO2e emissions per employee and 97% of emissions by revenue by 2030, vs a 2021 baseline

  • Pledge 3: Members

Tide commits to making Net Zero simpler for our Members by developing support for them to get to Net Zero.

Pledges 1 and 2 will make Tide reach Net Zero across scope 1, 2 and 3 by 2030.

Since 2022, we have calculated our entire carbon emissions across scope 1, 2 and 3 and purchased durable, carbon removal credits to match 100% of our annual emissions since 2022.

As of today, we have retired 8,080 tons of CO2 via high quality, durable carbon removals, with an additional 7,500 tCO2 to be delivered by December 2026.

You can find all details in the public registry CDR.fyi.

The Science Based Target Initiative corporate guidance for Net Zero requires organisations to set a  97% reduction target for economic intensity (on an added value basis). 

Given Tide’s emissions are predominantly determined by our employee and supply chain footprint, we have also introduced an employee-based intensity reduction target  to hold ourselves to account, and to drive reduction of emissions on this basis. In doing so, while our business scales, we will ensure we will also meet the 97% target reduction on a revenue basis.

The SBTi corporate guidance is currently under consultation and so we remain flexible on our approach, as we aim to align our targets with the latest best practices and science.

Our investment in high quality durable carbon dioxide removals makes us one of the first fintech organisations to invest in this technology at this scale. We’re in a forward-thinking and action oriented group of businesses, which puts us in the top 50 carbon removal buyers in the world. 

Visit the live cdr.fyi aggregator of registries to find out more about Tide’s carbon removals, as well as the broader market.

We believe it’s vital to begin our Net Zero journey now – taking a strong early stand and signaling our commitment, thereby laying a solid foundation for what lies ahead.

By investing in carbon removals now alongside carbon reductions, we are leading from the front. We hope other fintechs, as well as our Members, will join us on this journey.

We want to do the right thing for the planet and create a more sustainable future by acting now.

We are taking a comprehensive approach to reduce emissions across all aspects of our business. This includes purchasing renewable electricity across our offices, reducing business travel emissions, working with our supply chain and maintaining our remote working policy for employees in the UK and EU.

It is international scientific consensus that, in order to prevent the worst climate damages, global net human-caused emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) need to fall by about 45% from 2010 levels by 2030, reaching Net Zero around 2050. Global warming is proportional to cumulative CO2 emissions, which means that the planet will keep heating for as long as global emissions remain more than zero. This implies environmental damage caused by global heating will continue escalating for as long as emissions continue.

Net Zero refers to a state in which the greenhouse gases going into the atmosphere are balanced by removal out of the atmosphere. The term represents an important milestone because this is the state at which global warming – that related to CO2 at least – stops. 

Net Zero is the internationally agreed upon goal for mitigating global warming in the second half of the century. You can find more information on Net Zero over on this page.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) shows that if we fail to limit global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, the floods and fires we have seen around the world in the last couple of years will get more frequent and more fierce. Crops will be more likely to fail and sea levels will rise, driving mass migration as millions are forced from their homes around the world.

Above 1.5°C we risk reaching climatic tipping points like the melting of arctic permafrost – releasing millennia of stored greenhouse gases – meaning we could lose control of our climate for good.

The science could not be clearer: by the middle of this century the world has to reduce emissions to as close to zero as possible, with the small amount of remaining emissions absorbed through natural carbon sinks like forests, and new technologies like carbon capture. If we can achieve this, global emissions of greenhouse gases will be Net Zero by 2050.

We will continue to review our Net Zero progress annually, reporting on the Tide Net Zero Plan at regular intervals.

As we scale, we will focus on key Net Zero initiatives and key impact areas in our geographical markets, targeting Net Zero progress, with milestone-based initiative-level announcements.

We endeavour to be open about Tide’s Net Zero journey. We will always make sure that we hold ourselves accountable to the latest thinking in carbon accounting.

We will continue to take guidance on carbon removals from global best practice, including endeavouring to follow standards set by the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi).

We will also keep measuring and publishing  our carbon footprint annually in line with the Greenhouse Gas Protocol.

Still have questions? Please email us at Netzero@tide.co if you couldn’t find the answer on our website.

Help, my question isn’t answered here…

Find answers to all our most frequently asked questions or contact us at netzero@tide.co