On this interview, Information Medical speaks with Rosemary Durcan, CEO and Co-Founding father of Nocomed, about healthcare sustainability, measuring and decreasing carbon emissions throughout healthcare and life sciences, and the way higher sustainability information can help extra environment friendly, resilient organizations.
Are you able to please introduce your self and your position at Nocomed, and clarify what impressed the corporate’s concentrate on healthcare sustainability?
I’m Rosemary Durcan, CEO and Co-Founding father of Nocomed. We’re a Dublin-based sustainability information and measurement platform firm, and we constructed our platform particularly round healthcare and life sciences.
My background is in life sciences and healthcare, the place I’ve spent over 25 years. Quite a lot of years in the past, I accomplished a certificates in local weather change on the College of Cambridge, and that basically bought me fascinated about sustainability within the sector I had spent my profession working in.
I reached out to my community and spoke with round 30 corporations concerning the challenges they anticipated to face over the subsequent 10 years. Sustainability was one of many main challenges they recognized.
That’s actually how Nocomed was born. Organizations have been more and more being requested to measure sustainability information, however individuals didn’t essentially know the place to start out. Healthcare and life sciences are extremely regulated, so we noticed a necessity for a platform constructed particularly across the sector’s necessities.
Due to this fact, we developed our first merchandise with corporations within the sector, utilizing their information to grasp what they really wanted and what their information appeared like. We proceed to work that means at this time, so we’re consistently getting deeper into the sector-specific necessities.
What are the principle sustainability challenges confronted by healthcare and life science organizations, and the place ought to they start?
Usually, corporations come to us as a result of a buyer or third social gathering has requested them to offer sustainability information. Initially, that usually means calculating their company greenhouse fuel footprint throughout Scopes 1, 2, and three.
Scope 1 covers fossil fuels used inside the group, Scope 2 covers bought electrical energy, and Scope 3 covers emissions upstream and downstream throughout the provision chain.
One of many largest challenges is that organizations merely don’t know the place to start out. Folks typically really feel that they’re already behind, however sustainability remains to be comparatively new to the sector. Complete generations of workers and groups have been by no means educated in sustainability, so there’s a reskilling and training component concerned.
We assist organizations determine the data they want, determine the place that information sits inside the enterprise, and standardize that information. As soon as it’s on the platform, they’ll visualize their emissions throughout the completely different scopes.
That visualization creates a map of the emissions hotspots. Corporations can then make knowledgeable choices about the place reductions can have the best influence.
Many organizations start with Scope 1 and a couple of, which is a smart start line, nevertheless it’s necessary to look throughout Scope 3 as properly to see the place the true hotspots are. Then you may construct a discount plan that matches the group: its dimension, its price range and its individuals. Essentially the most profitable tasks work with the prevailing tradition that carry groups alongside.
As soon as corporations can truly see their information, they have an inclination to turn out to be fairly motivated by it. Sustainability information helps you make higher administration choices; along with decreasing emissions, you may cut back prices and waste, turn out to be extra environment friendly, and enhance productiveness.
How does the Nocomed platform measure environmental influence and translate that data into sensible carbon-reduction methods?
We help shoppers at two ranges. On the company stage, we measure emissions throughout Scopes 1, 2, and three utilizing the Greenhouse Gasoline Protocol. On the product stage, we work immediately with shoppers’ groups on lifecycle assessments of their medical gadgets and pharmaceutical merchandise.
Generally this requires inspecting the emissions related to a specific product or contemplating that product inside a affected person pathway. We are inclined to work with organizations on particular tasks after they wish to perceive merchandise or merchandise inside affected person pathways.
The distinction for us is that the platform was constructed particularly round healthcare information, healthcare merchandise, and the rules connected to them; we perceive how the sector operates and the regulatory surroundings round it.
As soon as emissions have been measured, we assist organizations determine sensible alternatives to scale back them. These modifications can then be mapped on the platform so groups can see the progress they’re making.
We have now additionally developed what we name carbon discount simulators. As soon as organizations turn out to be snug with their information, they naturally begin asking questions corresponding to, “What occurs if I alter this product, this provider, or this transport route?”
The carbon discount simulators permit them to look at each carbon and cost-benefit analyses, to allow them to forecast the potential influence of a change earlier than deciding whether or not to make it. This, in flip, also can assist a corporation prioritize carbon-reduction tasks.
The acquired data can then be communicated to inner and exterior stakeholders. That turns into significantly necessary with Scope 3 as a result of a lot of these emissions are exterior your direct management. It’s possible you’ll must work with suppliers, distributors, or service suppliers on modifications corresponding to packaging, transportation routes, or electrical autos.
The general course of is to measure emissions, develop a plan to scale back them, and report the outcomes. We construct reporting templates into the system for purchasers, stakeholders, and governance necessities. The purpose is to automate and streamline the measurement and reporting as a lot as attainable so organizations can consider truly decreasing their emissions.
The Nocomed platform supplies healthcare organizations with a centralized view of emissions throughout websites, actions and Scope 1, 2 and three classes. Picture Credit score: Nocomed
Why are Scope 3 emissions significantly troublesome for healthcare organizations to determine and handle?
Round 71percent1 of healthcare’s carbon emissions come from the provision chain: the medicines, medical gadgets, and different items and providers the sector buys.2 Prescription drugs account for an estimated 25–35% of healthcare emissions, and medical applied sciences for 15–25%.3
That places producers in a robust place to drive reductions, and plenty of are already main the way in which.
When corporations begin asking suppliers for sustainability data, they typically start with Scopes 1 and a couple of. These are simpler as a result of suppliers can compile their fossil gas utilization and bought electrical energy information and calculate the related footprint.
Scope 3 emissions are shared throughout the provision chain, so decreasing them depends upon patrons and suppliers working collectively on the information.
The primary key downside is possession: no single social gathering owns all the information, because it spans your complete provide chain.
The second problem is information high quality and standardization. It’s possible you’ll obtain data from transportation companions, waste corporations, service suppliers, and product suppliers, and there might be little standardization between these completely different information sources.
Some Scope 3 classes are comparatively simple. Worker commuting information can normally be gathered by way of a brief workers survey, and enterprise journey information is usually already held by finance. Others take extra work, significantly upstream and downstream transportation and distribution, and waste.
With transportation, an organization could use a number of logistics suppliers, all supplying information in several codecs. Waste information can current the same challenge. That’s the reason we offer a knowledge cleanroom service to scrub and standardize data earlier than it’s put onto the platform. Third-party information can require numerous work earlier than it is able to use. However as soon as information sources and processes are arrange, it turns into routine
Transport and distribution information might be visualized inside the Nocomed platform to determine emissions by vacation spot, cargo mode and transport route. Picture Credit score: Nocomed
How can emissions information assist organizations enhance effectivity, cut back prices, and decrease their environmental influence?
Step one is to drag collectively the information for Scopes 1, 2, and three. That data could come from finance, procurement, HR, logistics, and provide chain groups. As soon as it has been collected, cleaned, and uploaded, the platform calculates greenhouse fuel emissions and permits the group to visualise them. That is when you can begin asking, “Why are we doing this on this means?” Visualizing the information encourages wholesome conversations about alternate options.
We have now seen shoppers cut back prices fairly significantly whereas decreasing emissions. Inexperienced power might be cheaper, for instance, and dealing with suppliers can determine higher alternate options. Even one thing corresponding to altering the transport system could make a distinction.
There are additionally competitiveness advantages. Clients throughout the healthcare provide chain are more and more asking organizations not just for emissions information but additionally for plans to scale back them.
By measuring and visualizing the information and making stronger administration choices, you may cut back emissions whereas taking waste and price out of the system. On the identical time, you turn out to be extra aggressive in your prospects’ eyes.
Sustainability is an enormous phrase, and it doesn’t simply imply carbon emissions. Organizations must turn out to be sustainable throughout all elements of their operations, together with monetary and operational.
How do healthcare emissions join with public well being, affected person care, and the necessity for better local weather resilience?
That is one thing we take into consideration rather a lot at Nocomed as a result of there’s a troublesome contradiction inside healthcare.
All people working in healthcare is finally attempting to make individuals more healthy, however the sector can also be producing a major proportion of worldwide emissions. We’re more and more seeing the well being results of local weather change by way of air air pollution, excessive warmth, and flooding. For instance, warmth waves can put vital stress on healthcare methods, significantly by way of elevated attendance amongst aged and susceptible sufferers, and flooding can disrupt healthcare providers and services.
For me, there are two oars right here. The primary is discount; we have to proceed decreasing carbon emissions. The second is resilience. Healthcare organizations must turn out to be extra resilient to the results of local weather change already underway. This requires asking how hospitals and different healthcare organizations proceed working throughout warmth waves or flooding and assessing the resilience of provide chains.
Local weather change is a gigantic downside, and it may be overwhelming. At Nocomed, our method is to concentrate on the areas the place we will create change: healthcare and life sciences. If we may help cut back even a small proportion of the sector’s emissions, then it’s value doing.
What limitations do organizations encounter when beginning their healthcare sustainability journey, and the way can they overcome them?
When a corporation is requested to provide sustainability information, it all of the sudden has to find out what the sustainability journey seems like, the place the information is saved, and who must be concerned.
Corporations typically fear their information is not adequate. The hot button is to start out with what you might have and enhance it over time. As soon as the information is visualized, it turns into a strategic software for decision-making, not only a reporting requirement.
The longest stage is normally information assortment, significantly the primary time a corporation does it.
Regardless of these limitations, corporations can usually be up and operating inside a few months, though the regulated nature of healthcare can introduce delays. An organization may all of the sudden have a buyer audit or be concerned in a significant tender, for instance.
Over time, the method turns into routine. A company may start by reviewing its information yearly, then transfer to quarterly, each two months, and finally month-to-month reporting and evaluation.
The service component of our work is as necessary because the software program. We offer kickoff workshops, help with information onboarding, and produce sensible examples of carbon-reduction tasks to the desk.
I additionally suppose sustainability aligns very carefully with lean methodology and enterprise transformation. Hospitals and life science corporations typically have already got lean, enterprise transformation, or enterprise excellence groups whose position is to take away inefficiency and waste from the system.
For me, sustainability is basically lean with inexperienced lenses. You make the group extra environment friendly and eradicating waste, however you’re additionally measuring emissions, offering an extra information level for decision-making.
How are sustainability reporting necessities affecting healthcare suppliers, significantly these working with organizations such because the NHS?
Necessities are growing, and meaning organizations want methods able to coping with extra complete Scope 3 information.
The NHS has already been asking suppliers for Scope 1 and a couple of information, in addition to chosen Scope 3 classes. These can embrace upstream and downstream transportation and distribution, waste, worker commuting, and enterprise journey.
The necessities have gotten extra intensive, together with expectations for suppliers assembly related thresholds to report throughout all 15 Scope 3 classes.
As soon as the information sources have been recognized and processes are established, this turns into rather more manageable. The necessary factor is to construct a repeatable system quite than beginning over each time somebody asks for sustainability data.
Wanting forward, how do you anticipate sustainability reporting and inexperienced procurement to reshape healthcare and life sciences?
We’re shifting towards a world the place carbon and sustainability information have gotten more and more necessary alongside monetary information.
We will see that occuring by way of our prospects. A company might need had one buyer asking for sustainability data 12 months in the past, whereas now it might have six completely different stakeholders asking for that very same data. These stakeholders can embrace prospects, boards, traders, and landlords. Sustainability reporting now serves a a lot wider viewers.
Local weather change can also be a enterprise danger. Buyers more and more wish to perceive what a corporation’s emissions seem like, the way it intends to scale back them, and the way resilient that group might be sooner or later.
We’re additionally seeing healthcare transfer in direction of inexperienced procurement, the place sustainability information is used to help greener buying choices. Waste is a large challenge for healthcare organizations. More and more, they’re asking how they’ll work with suppliers to lower waste related to the services and products being bought by hospitals and healthcare methods.
For Nocomed, our position is to assist organizations make that transition sensible. It’s about making the information manageable, serving to individuals perceive what it means, and enabling them to make use of it to make higher choices.
About Rosemary Durcan
Rosemary Durcan is CEO and Co-Founding father of Nocomed, a Dublin-based sustainability information and measurement platform constructed particularly for healthcare and life sciences. Nocomed makes use of internationally recognised requirements to assist healthcare suppliers, insurers, MedTech and pharmaceutical corporations measure company and product emissions throughout their operations and provide chains. It additionally helps them mannequin the fee and carbon influence of discount tasks and meet sustainability reporting necessities.
A scientist by coaching, Rosemary holds an MSc in Meals Science from College School Dublin. She has greater than 25 years of expertise throughout Eire’s healthcare and life sciences sector, together with as COO of Sims Clinic, as a senior life sciences advisor at Enterprise Eire, and in management roles with the Irish Medical Gadgets Affiliation and the Irish BioIndustry Affiliation. She co-founded Nocomed in 2023 with Dónal Adams, the corporate’s CTO, after finishing the College of Cambridge’s Local weather Change for Choice-Makers programme.
About Nocomed
At Nocomed our mission is to empower life sciences corporations and healthcare suppliers to advance sustainability throughout the healthcare provide chain. Our foundational ‘why’ is a deep dedication to the long run: We care concerning the well being of the planet, your small business, and the worldwide inhabitants’s well being and wellbeing. Our purpose is to make sustainability less complicated, cut back working prices, and speed up carbon discount, thereby reducing world healthcare emissions and enhancing world well being.
References and additional studying
Healthcare’s International Local weather Footprint https://world.noharm.org/media/4364/obtain?inline=1
Well being Care With out Hurt and Arup (2019). Well being Care’s Local weather Footprint.https://world.noharm.org/media/4364/obtain?inline=1
MedTech Europe and Boston Consulting Group (2025). Decarbonising Healthcare: How a Aggressive MedTech Business Can Contribute. https://www.medtecheurope.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/decarbonising-healthcare.pdf
