Beyond Green Claims

Bringing sustainability data into meeting room design with new Sustainability-Screened Reference Designs.

Procurement teams want to work with sustainable suppliers and source more sustainable solutions. But that’s easier said than done.

Over the past few years, we’ve seen a steady increase in the frequency of Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) and sustainability criteria in requests for proposals (RFPs) and bid tenders. The challenge? Buyers cannot reliably compare sustainability factors, and proving them can be even more challenging.

Product-level sustainability information varies widely. One manufacturer may publish recycled content percentages and detailed product carbon footprints. Another may provide energy-efficiency certifications. Others offer little product-level environmental information but prominently promote their corporate climate commitments.

Sustainability is increasingly a purchasing requirement, but the information needed to make informed choices hasn’t kept pace. For customers, finding and evaluating that information takes time. AVI-SPL’s new Sustainability-Screened Reference Designs are designed to make it easier.

Bringing sustainability into standardized technology design

AVI-SPL Reference Designs provide standardized technology architectures that organizations can repeatedly deploy across meeting spaces and scale across locations. Sustainability-Screened Reference Designs add another dimension to that process by evaluating the products within each design against defined sustainability criteria.

The goal is simple. Give customers greater visibility into the environmental characteristics of their meeting room technology so they can make more informed purchasing decisions.

Rather than simply labeling select designs as “eco-friendly,” AVI-SPL now sources documented sustainability attributes across its Reference Design catalog. Our design engineers can then use sustainability screening as a handy filter when qualifying designs.

The screening draws on publicly available and manufacturer-provided information, applying objective requirements at the Reference Design level.

Four core sustainability considerations

AVI-SPL’s sustainability screening methodology focuses on four areas where credible information can help procurement teams evaluate their technology choices:

1. Manufacturer climate commitments. We track whether manufacturers have active, validated Science Based Targets, providing evidence of established commitments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
2. Recycled content. We look for manufacturer documentation identifying recycled materials used in products, including the types of materials and their percentages.
3. Energy efficiency. Where recognized energy-efficiency programs apply, we document certifications or ratings such as ENERGY STAR, EU Energy Labels, or China Energy Labels.
4. Product carbon footprint transparency. We collect independently audited or assured Product Carbon Footprint (PCF) data verified against recognized standards. This provides customers with embodied carbon values as well as predicted carbon emissions from product use and disposal.

Together, these criteria help move sustainability beyond broad claims and toward something customers can actually evaluate and defend.

Better information supports better decisions

Transparency and traceability are central to the methodology. We also recognize an important reality. Sustainability data for technology products is still limited, inconsistent, and evolving.

AVI-SPL conducts sustainability screening annually with its preferred partners and supplements that information with publicly available manufacturer documentation. To pass, a Reference Design must meet the defined requirements across all four sustainability qualifiers.

This rigor gives customers confidence in their sustainable purchasing decisions and data to forecast environmental impacts. Clear criteria are key to procurement, IT, and sustainability teams having more productive conversations about those choices.

As manufacturers provide better information on materials, energy performance, climate commitments, and product carbon footprints, customers will have an increasingly valuable dimension for evaluating technology.

AVI-SPL will continue screening its Reference Designs as new information becomes available.

We set out to make technology decision-making easier and confidence in those decisions greater. That’s ultimately what our Sustainability-Screened methodology is designed to do: Making credible sustainability information easier to find, easier to understand, and easier to consider alongside the performance, experience, scalability, and lifecycle requirements that already shape technology decisions.

Beyond products to choosing a sustainable service provider

Sustainability isn’t only measured by the products in a meeting room. The services to design, deliver, and manage those technologies are part of the equation, too.

AVI-SPL can screen meeting room designs against sustainability criteria and provide the supporting data to help customers forecast their technology footprint. But our role can go further, through ongoing collaboration on customers’ sustainability goals and targets.

We have many of the same goals. AVI-SPL is committed to setting Science Based Targets, with our Near Term targets readying for validation under the new Corporate Net-Zero Standard Version 2.0 in 2027. We’ve lowered our global Scope 1 and 2 emissions from our own operations and have publicly set goals for further reductions through fleet innovation and renewable energy procurement.

Beyond our operations and value chain, we’re also working to mitigate climate change through an award-winning UN REDD+ rainforest and biodiversity conservation project in Ecuador.

We recognize that AVI-SPL’s own environmental footprint is part of our customers’ sustainability equation. We’re making progress, and we want to help our customers do the same. When we work toward those goals together, the potential for impact multiplies. Check out our Sustainability-Screened Reference Designs and contact us if you’re interested in partnering with a technology provider that believes environmental impact should be measured, understood, and verifiably reduced, not simply claimed.