Zerofootprint and National Quality Institute Unite to Help Companies Benchmark Their Carbon Emissions

November 2, 2009

NQI/Zerofootprint Carbon Index Enables Organizations to Calculate Carbon Emissions, Compare Results with Peers and Reduce Environmental Footprint

TORONTO, Nov. 2 /PRNewswire/ -- The National Quality Institute (NQI), an independent, not-for-profit, organization committed to advancing organizational excellence across Canada, and Zerofootprint, a leading developer of tools to measure and reduce the environmental footprint of individuals and organizations, today announced that they have teamed up to create the NQI/Zerofootprint Carbon Index, to provide NQI members with greater insights about their carbon emissions through peer-based benchmarking.

"Benchmarking is a simple but powerful tool to help companies understand their carbon footprint and where it can be reduced," said Ron Dembo, founder and CEO at Zerofootprint. "Comparing your organization to others can also engage employees and help drive the behavioral changes that will be critical to reducing greenhouse gases. At Zerofootprint we are committed to helping create standards and best practices, and making it easier for businesses to participate in the battle against climate change. We are excited to work with NQI in spearheading these efforts for its membership."

New regulations, investor demands, and customer concern are driving companies to make green initiatives and carbon management top priorities. As the regulatory landscape evolves and industry standards emerge, more and more organizations are electing to participate in voluntary disclosure projects.

"We believe that this unique NQI/Zerofootprint Carbon Index, will form an important part of the NQI Environmental Sustainability Strategy," said Allan Ebedes, president and CEO of the National Quality Institute. "It will generate a valuable database for organizational benchmarking and will become an important tool for continuous improvement. Measurements and trend data are key elements in satisfying the Environmental Sustainability Criteria embodied in the NQI Progressive Excellence Program."

The NQI/Zerofootprint Carbon Index captures information from NQI members about common business activities, and calculates total carbon output, carbon per square meter and carbon per employee. Additional analysis provides rankings across key metrics, allowing NQI members to anonymously evaluate where they rank among similar NQI members.

For more information, or to participate in the project, please visit the NQI website at http://www.nqi.ca.

About National Quality Institute

Founded in 1992 by Industry Canada, the National Quality Institute is an independent, not-for-profit, organization that is committed to advancing organizational excellence across Canada. A Board of Governors comprised of leaders from the private sector, public sector, health care, and the not-for-profit sector, governs NQI. Since its inception, the National Quality Institute has helped thousands of Canadian organizations across many sectors. As Canada's national authority on Quality and Healthy Workplace® practices, the National Quality Institute has created a uniquely Canadian model, providing measurable standards for all Canadian organizations. For more information, visit http://www.nqi.ca.

About Zerofootprint

Zerofootprint is a socially responsible enterprise whose mission is to apply technology, design, and risk management to the massive reduction of our environmental footprint. Zerofootprint operates both in the for-profit and charitable domains through two entities, Zerofootprint Software and Zerofootprint Foundation, using shared technology.

http://www.zerofootprint.net.

SOURCE Zerofootprint