SUSTAINABILITY

The importance of sustainability is growing throughout the corporate community. At ICG Commerce, our focus is our client’s bottom line, not only from a financial perspective, but also from the standpoint of corporate social and environmental goals. We are committed to helping our clients achieve their sustainability goals by implementing new and innovative ways to reach cost savings targets while making sustainably sound purchasing decisions.

ICG Commerce offers specific capabilities that align with our focus on optimizing spend including energy efficiency incentives and supplier diversity solutions

ENERGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT

With energy costs escalating and capital at a premium, companies are launching dual purpose initiatives to mitigate the impact of rising costs while continuing to improve and expand their infrastructure. At the same time, key internal and external stakeholders are placing increased pressure on companies to demonstrate their commitment to sustainability goals in a measurable, transparent manner.

ICG Commerce helps companies develop an integrated capital investment and energy management strategy that reduces energy usage and carbon emissions, optimizes capital investment in infrastructure projects that yield energy reductions, and provides detailed evidence to support corporate social responsibility reporting.

Capture cash incentives for capital projects that result in energy reductions via energy efficiency incentives

Access to the right mix of rebates, grants, and other financial incentives can be the difference between a successful energy efficiency project and one that never moves past the planning process. More than 1,000 programs are offered by national, state, and local governmental agencies with an existing pool of funds totaling $4.3 billion¹ that is expected to increase to as much as $12 billion² by the year 2020. However, less than 5% of those implementing eligible projects access the full spectrum of financial benefits available to them, mainly because of lack of awareness and the complexity of such incentive programs. Moreover, of the companies that apply for incentives on their own, two-thirds do not complete the process.

ICG Commerce helps our clients access standard rebate, grant, and incentive programs by continuously monitoring more than 1,000 programs in North America alone. In addition, we design and negotiate custom incentives with government agencies and utilities on behalf of our clients. Custom programs require measurement and verification of the energy savings achieved, but they can return cash payments equal to as much as 50% of total project costs. This can increase project ROI or accelerate the payback period of critical manufacturing and IT infrastructure improvements.

Although the impact is significant, the complexity of the process deters many companies from executing to completion. ICG Commerce has dedicated personnel with the market knowledge to navigate the funding agency’s process, negotiate the incentives, track performance to plan, and provide required reporting to maximize incentives. Our comprehensive solution combines the engineering expertise, market intelligence, monitoring technology, and customized processes to help clients maximize the benefits associated with energy efficiency incentives. Our process begins with capital expenditure project analysis, continues through financing of the project and measurement of savings, carries on to securing incentive checks, and ends with measurable results that contribute to the company's environmental goals. Savings can be re-invested in the business to move additional energy efficiency projects forward.

Provide measurable and marketable evidence of success toward sustainability goals through environmental credits

Companies are challenged to demonstrate the environmental benefits achieved through their energy efficiency projects. ICG Commerce helps clients maximize the benefits derived from energy efficiency improvements by generating Energy Efficiency Certificates.

Energy Efficiency Certificates (EECs) are environmental credits, each representing one megawatt-hour (MWh) of energy savings resulting from the implementation of energy efficiency projects. After measuring and verifying energy reductions, ICG Commerce works with our clients to register EECs on an internationally recognized environmental registry to add credibility and transparency to claims of energy savings and carbon reduction.

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

Social responsibility is an important component of an organization’s sustainability strategy. ICG Commerce supports our client’s objectives by selecting suppliers in accordance with their social sustainability goals.

Supplier Diversity

Organizations today are challenged by the community to engage and support a more diverse supplier base. ICG Commerce provides in-depth category expertise that delivers the desired supplier mix without sacrificing quality or increasing costs. Our approach is fully integrated into our comprehensive procurement solution. We enhance and accelerate client supplier diversity program goals through strategic sourcing and category planning activities tailored to our clients’ diversity criteria by applying a combination of deep category expertise, powerful supplier information, and proven supplier diversity identification tools.

ICG Commerce applies a unique diversity category opportunity matrix to sourcing and category management initiatives. By analyzing spend across multiple dimensions we target diverse sourcing opportunities to maximize customer impact. ICG Commerce's existing relationships with national associations and industry verticals support a proactive market search for high-caliber diverse suppliers. We leverage robust supplier identification processes, financial enrichment data, and prequalification assessment tools to foster competitive market dynamics, supporting both client corporate savings and diversity goals.

ICG Commerce utilizes online B2B networking tools, chambers of commerce, and proprietary networks to identify and categorize diverse suppliers. We leverage databases and real-time experience to identify thousands of diverse suppliers, including MBE, WBE, LGBT, SDB, 8(a), HUB Zone, veteran, service disabled, and small-business suppliers. We leverage this market intelligence to guarantee diverse supplier inclusion in client strategic sourcing initiatives, providing socially responsible opportunities to a wide range of diversity classifications in identity and cultural categories.

Our process closely examines a supplier’s scale and size to successfully perform the scope of work and meet or exceed contractual commitments. We execute rigorous RFI and RFP processes to ensure supplier scalability and capability of selected diverse suppliers. We help our clients achieve Tier I & II diversity reporting requirements and improve their diversity reporting and accuracy.

¹ - The 2010 State Energy Efficiency Scorecard, ACEE, October 2010

² - The Shifting Landscape of Ratepayer-Funded Energy Efficience in the U.S., Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, October, 2009