Did you know that... 2 sectors represent 80% of CO2 emissions?

The climate issue is at the heart of today's thinking and policies. The environmental emergency is clearly one of the major concerns of our time. As we know today, climate change is mainly caused by greenhouse gas emissions. It is therefore essential to identify the biggest CO2 emitters.

The result is clear: greenhouse gas emissions come mainly from two sectors of activity. Manufacturing and transport. Between them, these two sectors account for no less than 80% of CO2 emissions ! The next highest emitters are construction, mining and agriculture.

What's interesting to note is that these sectors aren't necessarily the ones doing the most "greenwashing". Among those whose actions are least in line with their environmental discourse (and therefore do the most greenwashing), the real estate services sector (agencies, but also companies managing buildings such as offices…) are the "champions" of greenwashing, ahead of information and communication technologies (ICT), then the technical and scientific sectors… Conversely, the transport sector, for its part, is among those who are most in phase between their discourse and their environmental reality.

To highlight this difficult-to-assess information, Inoopa used its expertise and artificial intelligence algorithms to cross-reference and analyze company data from different angles. Our start-up has developed an original method for estimating the degree of "greenwashing" practiced in the professional world in Belgium. First, Inoopa identified some 800,000 companies and categorized them into fifteen sectors. Then, using these algorithms, Inoopa semantically studied the communication of these companies within each sector.

What was analyzed ?

Their direct environmental impact, the concrete measures they claim to be taking to reduce their emissions, and the intensity of their communication on the subject of sustainability… Inoopa used keywords for each of these axes, based on studies carried out by sustainability experts from the KULeuven and other partners. In all, over ten million keywords ("Sustainable development", "Environmental impact" or "Low-carbon economy"…) were generated for the 800,000 companies, then analyzed using semantic algorithms… On this basis, Inoopa assigned a score evaluating the link between the intensity of communication and the concrete measures taken by companies, the other evaluating the tendency to emit greenhouse gases. This is how the champions of greenwashing came to the fore…

Our start-up's ability to classify companies into sectors of activity (thanks in particular to semantics) and to identify trends in their communications has enabled us to draw out these interesting lessons, which can be applied to a host of other fields of study. This is the very model of our company.