New York Climate Week Recap with CO2 AI (2025)

The world’s largest business, government, and climate leaders came together in New York City for Climate Week 2025 under the theme "Power On." Against the backdrop of a polarized political environment in the U.S. around sustainability and climate change, Climate Week was a bold reminder that the action is not stopping, but instead, accelerating quietly in the background.

As the climate conversation increasingly shifts from solely environmental urgency to one of strategic opportunity, the message this year was clear: economic success of the business is closely linked to sustainability. We witnessed firsthand how companies are eager to continue investing in sustainability, as long as there is a measurable ROI attached to it.

Team CO2 AI was on ground, hosting and participating in several events. Here are some of our key takeaways from Climate Week.

Helping suppliers become active stakeholders in the decarbonization conversation

​Most supplier strategies are designed without suppliers in the room. Which is why CO2 AI partnered with Scope 3 Peer Group and Accenture, to curate a workshop to enable cross-industry collaboration between companies and their suppliers. Split up into industry-specific breakout groups, suppliers had direct access to procurement teams, which allowed for a candid discussion around the main challenges suppliers are facing, and the kind of support they would need to make progress.

1. Demonstrating decarbonization as a growth lever 🚀

• A live poll was launched during the session which found that for 97% of attendees, decarbonization, especially tackling Scope 3 emissions, is a major focus area.

• The overarching challenge is shifting the supplier's view of decarbonization from a "burden / cost center" to a "business opportunity" and a source of competitive advantage.

• There's a critical need to better demonstrate how Scope 3 progress links to financial savings and supplier resilience to gain internal leadership buy-in.

2. The data problem: standardization and actionable insights 📊

• The most significant challenge remains data gathering, granularity, consolidation, availability, and accuracy. This is where CO2 AI offers the most value, by helping companies transform their data foundations and have a granular, accurate and reliable view of their sustainability data.

• Supplier fatigue is rampant due to a lack of standardization, with customers frequently sending custom Excels for PCF calculation, which suppliers are unwilling to fill out. We talked about our Product Ecosystem, jointly developed with CDP, which is the reference platform for companies to collect secure & auditable product-level data at scale from their suppliers, and can help solve for this by streamlining supplier data exchange.

• The consensus is that companies "cannot wait for perfect data to take action" and must use data to inform procurement processes, focusing efforts on top suppliers (80/20) first.

3. Incentives and commercial alignment 🤝

• Customer-supplier priorities must be aligned, and incentives should move beyond simple ratings. Customers need to incentivize decarbonization progress for their suppliers, and this requires creative solutions at times.

• Sustainability requirements are most effective when integrated into core procurement processes, such as becoming a key discussion point in top-to-top communications and a real decision factor in RFPs. For example, if company A makes the carbon footprint of a product a key decision factor in their procurement, the supplier will have a strong motivation to innovate and decarbonize their product portfolio to secure their business. This trend has already started emerging and will continue to grow in the future.

4. Pathways to scale: finance and tech 💸

• Participants discussed the need for external financial support, including central industry-level financing options and the use of 3rd party funds to de-risk energy projects for suppliers.

• Companies are accelerating decarbonization through mechanisms like offering renewable energy purchasing as a service (e.g., Virtual Power Purchase Agreements).

• ‍CO2 AI shared insights from our work with Reckitt, where we deployed our proprietary AI capabilities to help Reckitt obtain precise emissions data for each of their 25,000 products, improving the accuracy of their emissions footprint by 75 times — moving from 333 representative products to 25,000. This data revealed new ways to reduce their emissions by 2030 and significantly contribute toward the Net Zero target. Technology can therefore unlock significant value for companies that want to use their data to drive decision making.

Demonstrating the ROI of Sustainability

At our flagship climate cocktail organized with Boston Consulting Group, we shared results from the CO2 AI + BCG Climate Survey 2025. The theme of this event, and a running theme around all of Climate Week, was how can leaders calculate and prove the measurable value of their sustainability efforts. Boards are expecting answers - how will sustainability investment impact the company's bottom line? Our focus therefore, was helping business leaders do just that, and demonstrate sustainability as a driver of business growth and not a cost-center.

1. The value at stake is high and quantifiable 💰

• 82% of companies surveyed are capturing financial value from decarbonization initiatives.

• Value is primarily captured through volume-driven revenue growth (e.g., customers purchasing sustainable products) and operating expenditure savings (e.g., lower electricity bills from efficiency programs).

• $221 million is the average net benefit captured by the leading 6% of companies that are gaining "significant value" (over 10% of revenue annually) from decarbonization.

• Companies face an average climate risk of $790 million in 2030, with physical risks (acute and chronic) accounting for $411 million and transition risks accounting for $383 million.

2. Digital maturity is the key differentiator 💻

• Advanced digital solutions are the strongest enabler for capturing significant value from mitigation and adaptation.

• The use of multiple advanced digital solutions for both mitigation and adaptation increases the likelihood of reaping significant benefits by 2.3x.

• AI-driven solutions (Generative AI, Predictive AI, AI agents) are the most popular technologies used in sustainability efforts. CO2 AI was one of the first companies to launch sustainability AI Agents in the market, and we have first-hand seen the value it has delivered to our customers.

3. Practical application: integrating data into strategy ⚙

• Sharing practical case studies, we showcased how companies like General Mills are using AI to embed carbon insights into supplier relationships and operations, enabling them to automate emissions reporting and track supplier reduction progress.

Granular product data is an urgent need, not just for regulatory compliance but as a strategic asset

As a Partnership for Carbon Transparency: PACT compliant solution, we were thrilled to host a joint event with them on Scaling PCFs in the Chemical Industry. As regulatory pressure (e.g., CSRD, CBAM, SEC rules) and customer expectations accelerate, companies face increasing demand for granular, auditable Scope 3 emissions data. Product Footprints are therefore a crucial lever in understanding and addressing Scope 3 emissions, and more and more business leaders are focusing on getting this data. By no means, is this an easy task.

1. From compliance to growth driver 🚀

• Strategic repositioning: As we mentioned earlier, there is a strong trend of sustainability transforming from a mere compliance or reporting obligation to a fully embedded element of corporate strategy and innovation.
• Business relevance: Forward-looking companies are directly linking PCF-driven sustainability efforts to tangible growth opportunities, such as winning competitive RFPs and securing strategic customer accounts, ensuring climate ambition is balanced with day-to-day business pressures.
• Competitive edge: Providing reliable and quick PCFs transforms the supplier role from a vendor into a proactive partner, giving sales teams a distinct advantage in competitive situations and strengthening customer trust.

2. Digitalization and especially new technologies like AI can be the backbone for scale 📈

• Overcoming the cost barrier: Manual PCF calculation is prohibitively expensive, costing in some cases up to €1075 per SKU. Utilizing an AI-powered solution like CO2 AI drastically reduces this to around €53 per SKU, making large-scale PCF computation viable. Making the process cost-effective sets the foundation to scale.
• Technology as the foundation: The CSO of Symrise, Isabella Tonaco, was one of the speakers for the event. She had a strong message for the audience, which was to "not underestimate the scale" and to invest in a technology backbone from the start to ensure transparency, comparability, and auditability.

3. Data credibility and consistency build trust

• Credibility matters: A priority for leaders is setting up internal governance and processes to guarantee PCF numbers are auditable and comparable. Establishing a single source of truth for PCF data ensures customers receive consistent, credible numbers, which is vital for maintaining customer trust and reducing churn risk.‍
• Standardization is key: Industry collaboration (like engagement with TfS) is essential to reduce the methodology complexity and drive the necessary standardization of PCF data, which is a common barrier to scaling. Methodologies like PACT, developed for calculating and exchanging consistent, comparable, and credible Scope 3 emission data across value chains are moving the needle in this complex process of standardization across industries.

4. Embedding PCFs across the value chain

• Operationalizing PCFs: PCFs are not just for reporting; they are integrated to directly guide R&D choices for new formulations, influence greener sourcing strategies, and inform innovation roadmaps.
• Future simulation: Advanced digital tools enable scenario planning and the use of digital twins to simulate portfolio changes, helping prioritize investments in the most impactful decarbonization opportunities. This once again proves that investing in advanced technology is vital to scaling.
• Driving momentum: To succeed, companies must engage customers and suppliers early to build credibility and use their demand as the primary driver for internal momentum.

Transitioning from PCFs to the broader scope of Product Environmental Footprints (PEFs) represents the next logical step for leaders, encompassing a full lifecycle view beyond just carbon. To prepare for this, companies must first master the PCF process, building the robust, AI-driven data backbone essential for managing the increased complexity of a full PEF assessment. Here is our guide on scaling PEFs with more information on this topic.

Looking ahead - what next?

The overriding conclusion from Climate Week NYC 2025 is that companies are quietly but confidently continuing to make progress on climate action. Private sector is driving climate momentum, recognizing that addressing the average $790 million in climate risk in 2030 is essential for both resilience and growth. The path to achieving this commercial mandate is clearly paved with technology and collaboration.

Interested in how we can help you reach your goals? Get in touch with us today.