GHG Emissions

Greenhouse Gas Emissions

As a sustainability-oriented company, PT Perkebunan Nusantara III (Persero) is committed to building environmental awareness as a form of support for the Paris Agreement. PTPN realizes how critical this topic is, and has appointed the Head of Strategic Business & Sustainability Division (DBSS) as the person in charge of implementing PTPN’s efforts on this topic, under the direct supervision of the Vice President Director.

The first step for the Company to create a GHG emission reduction strategy is to conduct an inventory of both scope 1 (direct) and scope 2 and scope 3 (indirect) GHG emissions along the Company’s value chain. In 2022, PTPN worked with Bureau Veritas to conduct GHG emissions inventory calculation. Reported emissions consist of direct emissions, originating from within the actual working boundaries of all PTPN units and indirect emissions, originating from the corporate value chain and associated personnel (employees, guests, clients).

Across year 2022, PTPN’s scope 1 emissions were 1,968,689 ton CO2e, and scope 2 emissions were 197,553 ton CO2e. As such, the total emissions of scope 1 & 2 were 2,166,403 ton CO2e.

According to the inventory data, the Company focused on scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions due to their greater contribution to emissions. The Company also noted a negative GHG emissions contribution to Land Use, Land Use Change, and Forestry from Gain carbonstock from the Company’s plantation areas (which were offset by carbon stock losses from replanting, tree felling, area depletion, etc.), however the Company strived to reduce direct emissions output from its operations to contribute as much as possible to GHG emissions reductions.

Going forward, the Company has developed a decarbonization roadmap with a commitment to reduce, by 2030, 48% of total GHG emissions against 2021 emissions as a baseline.

To achieve this target, PTPN has taken several steps to reduce GHG emissions from its operational processes to drive sustainable environmental performance. These steps include:

1. Zero POME Initiative
The capture of Methane emissions from POME (Palm Oil Mill Effluent) liquid waste, in which the resulting biogas can be used to augment as a combustion material in the Boiler in the plant (Co-Firing), generate green electricity (PLTBg), and compressed into BioCNG. The emission reduction from this particular initiative reached up to -179 kton CO2e/annum.

2. Improving Peatland Management
Reducing peatland emissions through water management by making canals inside the plantation and sluicegate on the outer side of the plantation, to regulate the height of peat depth in water (from 80 cm targeted to 40 cm).

3. Reducing chemical fertilizers
Using empty fruit bunches (by product of palm oil processing) and land application of POME. In optimizing the use of POME and Empty Fruit Bunches as fertilizers, the use and emissions of chemical fertilizers and its content can be reduced.

4. Reducing the use of pesticides
Efforts are made to reduce the use of pesticides (glyphosate) to reduce CO2 emissions by manual weeding for watersheds, ground cover management, and selective weeding management.

5. Other initiatives aimed at reducing energy-related GHG emissions