At MTG, we keep track of our carbon footprint and encourage everyone across all our businesses to think and act green. We want our offices to be as energy efficient as possible, while we aim to provide our people with tools that reduce unnecessary travel.
In 2018, our overall energy consumption decreased by 22%. The main factor here is the exclusion of energy-intensive entities, such as our divested Baltic operations from the data. In addition, meter readings in our Stockholm office have been improved (and in some cases corrected).
Our overall carbon footprint during 2018 was 25,215 tonnes CO2e, which is a year on year increase of 7%. About 84% of MTG’s emissions during 2018 arose from business travel, with air travel representing 76% of total emissions. Most of the remaining emissions came from energy use in our facilities. We are a very travel intensive company, especially our esports businesses that operate events across the world. These companies stood for 68% of our total travel emissions during 2018.
We currently do not measure the carbon footprint of our events and festivals but are looking into ways to do this efficiently. On a positive note, DreamHack asks its venues if they have environmental certification, although this is not a prerequisite for hosting their events. In addition, local Scouts and sports club members, who volunteer at DreamHack festivals in Sweden, can keep deposit money from collected PET bottles and cans.
In Sweden, we continue to work towards reducing MTG’s energy consumption to meet the 20% reduction target set by the European Union’s Energy Efficiency Directive. Many small activities add up to a bigger contribution, which is why we are optimising the indoor climate in our main office in Stockholm. This creates a better work environment and saves energy too. During 2019, all lights in the building will be exchanged for LED lights, and we will continue to explore the possibility of recycling our office heat (especially from our server rooms) and feeding it back into local heating grids.
Our overall aim is to travel smarter as well as less, and to use tools that enable an equally efficient working experience. Travelling smarter means booking flights with fewer stops, combining destinations in a single trip, using the train rather than flying, and renting only hybrid or electric cars. Everyone needs to take responsibility for our footprint!
