A Collaboration with World Energy Helps Meet the Company’s Ambitious Climate Goals
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The Challenge: Delivering for Both Clients and the Climate
Boston Consulting Group (BCG) has committed to ambitious climate goals. The company is focused on ways to reduce the carbon footprint tied to corporate air travel (Scope 3 emissions), which represented about 80% of its emissions in 2023. But as an airline customer, BCG doesn’t control what kind of fuel goes into the planes that carry their personnel around the world.
To continue delivering the best service to their clients, BCG needs the flexibility to meet clients face-to-face more sustainably, when necessary, even as it reduces business flights.
The Solution – SAF Certificates
Beyond rethinking the company’s travel norms – a key priority that has resulted in significantly reduced emissions since 2018 — BCG chose to support emerging SAF technology to further address Scope 3 emissions. Since 2021, BCG has taken significant action in the market by setting up SAF deals with airlines, producers, and brokers.
During this early phase, BCG also joined the Sustainable Aviation Buyers Alliance (SABA), which enabled a second large SAFc purchase in 2024. BCG quickly became the first member of that coalition to finalize a long-term contract with World Energy for SAFc decarbonization totaling about 100,000 metric tons of CO2e — the equivalent of decarbonizing the trips of more than 177,000 economy class passengers flying round trip between Boston and London.
The Collaboration – Real World Knowledge and Customized Support
World Energy collaborated closely with key leaders at BCG to understand the company’s sustainability needs. Operating our own SAF production plant helped us explain the reality of supply-side dynamics to BCG, which then integrated these learnings into its SAF strategy. Our teams also collaborated to come to a final agreement that enabled both flexibility and long-term investment in SAF. Combined with a shared knowledge of carbon accounting and the Book & Claim tracking system, BCG is now better placed to harness SAF to help meet the company’s climate commitments.
“World Energy brought deep expertise and clarity to the process,” says David Webb, Chief Sustainability Officer of BCG. “Their ability to supply high-quality SAFc made them an invaluable partner in our efforts to address Scope 3 emissions. With their support, BCG is now better positioned to leverage this important technology.”
For their part, BCG leaders brought a flexible mindset to the table. They were forward thinking in their understanding of how BCG could accelerate SAF production by becoming a long-term off-taker.
“BCG leaned into being a leader in decarbonizing corporate business travel,” says Kathleen Wight, Director of Net-Zero Skies at World Energy Net-Zero Services. “Their strong commitment to reducing their business travel emissions and position to help clients achieve the same played a big part in cementing our partnership.”
The Future
After BCG committed to its largest purchase of SAFc to date, the company and World Energy continue to work closely together, navigating the process of verifying and tracking the SAFc carbon reductions. This partnership is helping BCG personnel travel more sustainably to existing and new clients, delivering the company’s world-class consulting services while staying on track to meet its climate commitments. Collaborations like this will continue to expand the SAF economy and have precedent-setting implications for other hard-to-abate sectors, as well.
