We talked to Gasum's Sustainability Manager Elina Saarivuori and Communications Manager Anna-Sofia Malmi about CSR management, their CSR communication, the importance of their corporate responsibility and sustainability in the energy industry. And also why Gasum wants an "ecological handprint" to be established.

The energy company Gasum is a Nordic gas sector and energy market expert. It offers cleaner energy and energy market expert services for industry and for combined heat and power production as well as cleaner fuel solutions for road and maritime transport.

Elina Saarivuori: Gasum is committed to cleaner energy. In line with our strategy, we promote sustainable development. For example, climate change mitigation and circular economy are central to Gasum’s strategy. We are increasing the availability of low-carbon fuels for use in both road and maritime transport, as well as industry, and running our energy efficient operations on 100% renewable electricity.

In our operations, safety and security play a major role. Our aim is zero accidents and incidents as regards people and the environment alike. Our safety and security culture has undergone strong development and we have taken great steps forward.

We have summarized six key corporate responsibility themes and related objectives, which steer our responsibility work in all operating countries: safety and security, climate change, circular economy, access to energy, responsible business and people. The have been defined based on the expectations of the stakeholders and Gasum’s strategy.

Elina Saarivuori: We aim for a carbon-neutral future on land and at sea. The corporate responsibility themes support our strategy.

I’m proud of us at Gasum being able to offer our customers quick and sustainable solutions for carbon footprint reductions with our low-carbon products. There’s enormous potential in the gas sector to contribute to efforts to curb climate change. Demand for gas is surging is segments such as transport. Gasum is responding to this demand by investing in new infrastructure and new biogas plants. Promoting the production of renewable gases and strengthening their position are key to the achievement of climate targets. Natural gas also plays an important role in transport, in industrial use and when phasing out coal in energy production.

Elina Saarivuori: It is great that the important sustainability topics at Gasum involve not only environmental aspects, but also the aspects of social and economic responsibility, including responsible business. We just recently updated our Code of Conduct, which sets the core principles for how we work with our customers, with our stakeholders and together as a company. In addition, I am proud of the commitment of our senior management into responsibility, who for example participate in safety walks at our facilities.

Elina Saarivuori: I can see a growing need for enterprises to disclose the climate impacts and opportunities relating to their operations in greater detail. More specifically, communicating about the good we do. Methods for measuring handprint have been under development, and Gasum has participated in this. In contrast to footprint, which refers to the negative environmental impact caused by e.g. greenhouse gas emissions throughout the life cycle of a product, the term handprint refers to the positive environmental impact of a product throughout its life cycle. The handprint is achieved by improving the performance of another actor – for example by reducing a customer’s carbon footprint.

Anna-Sofia Malmi: Gasum communicates actively about responsibility themes on its website, in social media and in our Corporate Responsibility Reports. This way all those interested can continuously monitor how responsibility is achieved at Gasum.

We see that it is important to tell about our steps in corporate responsibility achievements and how we improved our functions in the sustainable perspective. The VERSO CSR tool is helpful for us because it is easy to use and publish our results.

Find out more about the steps of Gasum's responsibility in 2019 on their website.