Purpose-led ad platform Good-Loop today (June 13th, 2023) launched a new tool that enables advertisers to significantly reduce the carbon footprint of their online ads by filtering out carbon-intensive publishers.

Part of Good-Loop’s industry-leading carbon measurement solution, the Green Ad Tag, the new feature allows advertisers to block media partners that do not meet their sustainability targets, significantly reducing the environmental impact of their online ads and helping them to deliver better ad campaigns.

The new solution enables brands and agencies to set their own targets based on the amount of CO2e each media owner generates per ad impression – and avoid any publishers that fall short. Using the easy-to-use slider functionality, users select the emissions savings they want to achieve and then export the sites to their block and allow lists accordingly. It also lets advertisers know how many emissions would be saved based on the threshold that’s been set, helping advertisers to continuously make changes mid-campaign to reduce their impact. 

Good-Loop created the new feature to help advertisers reduce the environmental impact of their online ads. The average online ad campaign emits 5.4 tonnes of CO2e (source: Good-Loop) – half what an average UK consumer and a third of what a US consumer produces in a year.

Where an ad is displayed can contribute significantly to a digital campaign’s overall carbon footprint, with the number of emissions generated varying dramatically from website to website. So by filtering out publishers that are more carbon-intensive, advertisers can drastically reduce the emissions generated by their online campaigns without making trade-offs in performance.

In one beta test, Brand Advance SSP, the leading diversity media ad tech platform, is working to cut its emissions by 18% – just by working with 10 domains highlighted by the tool.

The tool was also recently used to help reduce the carbon emissions of a global car brand’s digital campaign by an average of 41%.

Ryan Cochrane, COO of Good-Loop, said: “It can sometimes feel a little daunting looking at the scale of digital advertising's oversized carbon footprint and its impact on the environment. But despite the size of the task, advertisers can make a real difference right now by making simple changes to the way they run their campaigns. Our new domain filtering feature is the perfect tool to make that happen, making it easier than ever for brands to take action against high carbon inventory on a campaign-by-campaign basis. 

“It provides a simple solution to a complex, pressing issue and makes carbon reduction an essential campaign consideration without advertisers having to choose between planet and performance. Our new tool empowers advertisers by giving them all the data and insights they need to drive down emissions, giving them the flexibility to forge their own path to net zero and ultimately help create an ad landscape that's good for the planet.”

Good-Loop is a Certified B Corp on a mission to develop solutions that move the industry towards positive, sustainable advertising. To help, the company has developed a range of solutions to enable advertisers to measure and reduce the carbon footprint of their digital ad campaign, including its open-source Carbon Calculator.

The new solution can be accessed through Good-Loop’s Green Ad Tag, which enables advertisers to track the carbon emissions generated by their online ads in real-time through a customised dashboard. 

The Green Ad Tag was designed to serve as an educational tool to help digital advertising become more energy-efficient in future campaigns. It can measure the weight of files, and assess the publisher mix, buying strategies, failed bids and the full data transmission required to get a campaign from A (the ad server) to B (the user device) to determine how each element has a negative impact on the environment. 

To find out more about the new solution, email green@good-loop.com