What are CO2e numbers and what are they doing on Oatly cartons?

Sometimes webpages like to answer their own question with another question: Did you know that roughly one-third of global human-caused greenhouse gas emissions come from the food system?* Yeah, 1/3. As in like 33%. From our perspective, it seems pretty obvious that we humans need to transform how we produce and distribute our food in order to combat some of humanity’s greatest challenges across climate, health and lifestyle. And since consumer choice plays an integral role in shaping our food system, we believe people should have access to the information they need in order to make educated decisions about what they buy — and that information should absolutely include the climate impact of those products. All of which is why Oatly is committed to publishing our products’ climate footprints, expressed in kilograms of CO2e per kilogram of product, for everyone to see.

So, a product’s climate footprint is intended to be the best estimate we can get of the full climate impact of something**, accounting for greenhouse gas emissions from the cultivation of the ingredients to its distribution to market. The climate footprint of our products is expressed in kilograms of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent) per kilogram of packaged food product.  
 
This unit of measurement considers the effect of different greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and so on. The calculation aggregates the emissions into one single unit, based on how much of each of those greenhouse gases is emitted and their global warming potential (GWP) over a 100-year period, relative to carbon dioxide (CO2).
 
This all might sound super complicated and perhaps a bit confusing which is totally understandable. This is complex stuff. We’re trying to keep this as simple as possible but if you want to dive headfirst into all the science and learn more about how CO2e is calculated with our friends at CarbonCloud, head here!

We didn’t put CO2e out there for consumers to see just for fun. We did it in more of a ‘We believe that consumer empowerment should be a law, if not a human right’ kind of way. But change doesn’t just happen randomly. Someone needs to lead the charge. So we thought, ‘Why couldn’t it be a small oatmilk company that paves the way?’ And that’s exactly what Oatly has started to do. First in Europe, and now here in North America.

Unlike nutrition labels, there is no common or mandated methodology for CO2e labeling, so this is where consumers come in — and by “consumers” we mean you, all of your friends, family, enemies, frenemies, neighbors, the writer of this sentence and pretty much everyone on the planet, in case that wasn’t totally clear. Consumers need to educate themselves on what is included in a product’s CO2e label calculation methodology, or it won’t be an apples-to-apples comparison. Oatly’s contribution to that education means clearly explaining what is and isn’t included in our methodology. While we are hoping to see a standardized methodology for product climate footprints, getting everyone to agree on that takes time. So, while we’re working on that, we decided to go ahead and declare the climate footprint of our products in the most transparent and complete way we think is currently possible (in kg CO2e per kg product) and then share more information about the calculations on this webpage. While writing it all out on our packaging would have been cool, as you can see, we would have run out of space. 

Yeah, having access to a product’s climate footprint is great but it’s hard to understand what it really means in isolation. Can you imagine being able to compare different products from different companies next to one another and see for yourself which ones have greater or lesser climate impact? Now imagine the difference each consumer could make with their dollars just by having that information clearly stated on every food package. Amazing. So you can probably also imagine why we are calling on other companies—big and small—to also show consumers their numbers by declaring the climate footprint of their products. Come on, companies, let’s go! 

We collect data across our products’ life cycle stages from ourselves and our partners annually, and vet it thoroughly. To make sure the products’ climate footprints stay up to date Oatly will go through this calculation process every year or two. Because if, for example, there are significant changes in the supply chain (like changes in factory site, in factory energy consumption/sources, or in fuels used for long distances), that means the climate footprint could change. We are committed to continually updating the data behind our products’ footprints, meaning that the numbers can (and will) change over time. 
 
Of course, we couldn’t do all of this super complicated stuff alone. To calculate our products’ climate footprints, we currently use a highly accomplished, very scientific platform called CarbonCloud. It’s a platform dedicated to calculating climate footprints based on more than 20 years of scientific research. Once we model our products with our vetted data in CarbonCloud’s software, then run the analysis, the results are verified by CarbonCloud before they are published. Basically, all our work is being checked by people who really know what they’re doing. 
 
Still looking for more of the nitty gritty details? You’ve scrolled to the right place! Here’s a full list of the results for each of the US products we’ve calculated so far.