"To get your emissions to zero, you first need to calculate them — accurately. And at the moment there is no standardised methodology for the advertising industry. That’s about to change, however, with the Global Media Sustainability Framework published in June 2024.

By all measures, the current industry footprint is big. When thinking about digital advertising specifically, the emissions emitted will be further inflated with the recent addition of AI tools, which have an incremental big footprint.

Despite concerns that emission reduction might compromise revenue goals, there is initial evidence that improving the efficiency of programmatic advertising (for example streamlining the amount of DSPs and SSPs connected to the same inventory) not only decreases the environmental impact but also benefits the bottom line.

Some great initiatives that make me hopeful are Clean Creatives, a coalition of agencies that refuse to work with fossil fuel companies, and #ChangeTheBrief Alliance a partnership of agencies and clients who vouch to promote sustainability at every opportunity.

Additionally, there is currently an effort across the biggest ad agencies to educate employees about making ads more sustainable, which is an essential step towards achieving net zero."

–Ellie Stamouli, founder of Matterra

Read the full article on MediaCat Magazine