This week’s brief highlights continued expansion across Net Zero Compare, with 16 new or updated policies, 22 software products, and 88 industry events added. Featured policy developments such as the ACT Ecolabel and the Critical Entities Resilience Directive show how sustainability governance is increasingly connecting verified product information with operational resilience, especially across laboratories, procurement systems, essential services, and critical infrastructure.

The latest software additions also reflect growing demand for more granular environmental data across buildings, agriculture, and local climate planning. eco2soft supports building life cycle assessment and carbon accounting, while Biocode helps food supply chains move toward more farm-level emissions insight. Together, these tools show how carbon and LCA workflows are becoming more sector-specific, where better data can improve design, procurement, reporting, and reduction strategies.

In this issue, we cover policy signals shaping lab product ecolabelling and critical infrastructure resilience, introduce tools for building LCA and farm-level carbon accounting, highlight upcoming events on hydrogen, biogas, and clean fuel markets, share community perspectives on green hydrogen storage in depleted North Sea fields, and spotlight Envirodual Local Emissions Insight’s role in supporting place-based emissions analysis and climate planning.

This week, we added 16 new or updated policies to our website, including:

What happened
The ACT Ecolabel is a voluntary global ecolabel for laboratory products, managed by My Green Lab. ACT stands for Accountability, Consistency, and Transparency. It provides third-party verified environmental impact information for lab products such as consumables, chemicals, equipment, instruments, reagents, lab plastics, and other laboratory supplies. ACT Ecolabel 2.0 strengthens the framework with enhanced scoring and clearer communication of sustainability attributes for scientists and procurement teams.

Who is affected
Laboratory product manufacturers, suppliers, procurement teams, scientists, lab managers, universities, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, biotech companies, healthcare laboratories, sustainability teams, and green lab programs that use or request verified product sustainability information.

Why it matters
Laboratories can be resource-intensive, with impacts linked to energy use, water use, chemicals, plastics, packaging, shipping, and product end-of-life. The ACT Ecolabel helps buyers compare laboratory products using standardized and independently verified environmental information. For manufacturers, it can support more credible sustainability communication and reduce the risk of unsupported environmental claims. For procurement teams, it provides a practical tool for choosing lower-impact lab products where environmental performance is part of purchasing criteria.

What to monitor next
Monitor updates to ACT Ecolabel 2.0, product categories covered by the program, third-party verification requirements, and how universities, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, and green lab programs use ACT labels in procurement. Also watch how ACT connects with broader green claims rules, sustainable lab initiatives, lifecycle data, and supplier sustainability requirements.

Click here to read more about the ACT Ecolabel on Net Zero Compare.

What happened
The Critical Entities Resilience Directive establishes EU rules to strengthen the resilience of essential services and critical infrastructure. It requires Member States to identify critical entities, assess risks, and ensure that organizations providing essential services take appropriate measures to prevent, resist, respond to, and recover from disruptive incidents. The directive covers threats such as natural hazards, climate-related events, accidents, sabotage, terrorism, public health emergencies, and other risks that could affect essential services.

Who is affected
Critical infrastructure operators, public authorities, energy companies, transport providers, water and wastewater operators, healthcare organizations, financial market infrastructure, digital infrastructure providers, public administration bodies, space-sector entities, and organizations designated as critical entities by EU Member States.

Why it matters
The directive is important because climate change, geopolitical instability, cyber-physical risks, and infrastructure interdependencies are increasing the vulnerability of essential services. For affected organizations, CER creates expectations around risk assessment, resilience planning, incident response, business continuity, security measures, and cooperation with public authorities. It also reinforces the link between sustainability, adaptation, and operational resilience, especially for sectors exposed to extreme weather, energy disruption, water stress, and supply chain instability.

What to monitor next
Monitor national implementation across EU Member States, designation of critical entities, sector-specific risk assessments, reporting obligations, supervisory activity, and links with the NIS2 Directive for cybersecurity. Also watch how critical entities integrate climate adaptation, physical risk assessment, emergency planning, and resilience investment into governance and compliance programs.

Click here to read more about the Critical Entities Resilience Directive on Net Zero Compare.

Click here to browse all 1048 policies on Net Zero Compare.

This week, we added 22 new software products to our website, including:

Category: Carbon Accounting and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA)
Target Market: Architects, planners, consultants, researchers, construction professionals, sustainability teams, and organizations assessing environmental impacts across new construction, renovation, and building-material choices.
Recent Context: The construction sector is under growing pressure to measure embodied carbon, improve material transparency, and use lifecycle data in building design, certification, and subsidy processes. There is increasing demand for tools that combine reliable construction datasets with practical whole-building assessment workflows.

eco2soft by baubook is a building life cycle assessment tool designed to help users calculate environmental impacts across building elements and life-cycle stages. The platform supports assessment of construction materials, components, replacement, operation, and disposal, helping project teams compare design choices and improve buildings' environmental performance.

View eco2soft on Net Zero Compare

Category: Carbon Accounting
Target Market: Food brands, agricultural producers, farmers, primary producers, supply chain teams, sustainability professionals, and companies seeking to calculate product footprints, corporate Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions, and farm-level climate impacts.
Recent Context: Food companies are under growing pressure to improve visibility into agricultural emissions, especially where climate impacts occur upstream before ingredients reach processing or manufacturing. There is increasing demand for tools that connect farm-level activity data with product carbon footprints, Scope 3 accounting, FLAG emissions, and supplier-specific emission factors.

Biocode Carbon Footprint Calculator is a carbon accounting platform designed to connect farmers and primary producers with food brands. The software supports corporate carbon footprints, product carbon footprints, primary production accounting, FLAG emissions calculations, emission factor management, and scenario analysis, helping food supply chains move beyond generic averages toward more granular emissions data.

View Biocode Carbon Footprint Calculator on Net Zero Compare

View all newly added Software Products on Net Zero Compare

This week, we added 88 new events to our website, including:

In Person - Montreal, Canada | September 29-30, 2026
Audience: Hydrogen producers, clean energy companies, industrial users, mobility providers, policymakers, investors, technology suppliers, infrastructure developers, and organizations working on low-carbon hydrogen and energy transition projects.
Focus: Hydrogen production, clean fuel infrastructure, industrial decarbonization, hydrogen mobility, storage and distribution, policy support, investment opportunities, and the role of hydrogen in reducing emissions across hard-to-abate sectors.

View Event on Net Zero Compare

In Person - Brussels, Belgium | December 10, 2026
Audience: Biogas producers, biomethane suppliers, energy buyers, investors, project developers, legal teams, finance teams, procurement professionals, and organizations involved in biogas purchasing, contracting, and project financing.
Focus: Biogas purchase agreements, contract structuring, financial performance, risk allocation, pricing mechanisms, revenue certainty, project bankability, regulatory context, and commercial strategies for improving the economics of renewable gas procurement and supply.

View Event on Net Zero Compare

In Person - Berlin, Germany | March 10-11, 2027
Audience: Hydrogen producers, industrial users, utilities, clean energy developers, policymakers, technology providers, investors, infrastructure operators, and organizations working on hydrogen deployment and industrial decarbonization.
Focus: Hydrogen markets, production technologies, infrastructure, storage and distribution, industrial applications, policy frameworks, project finance, and the role of low-carbon hydrogen in supporting the energy transition and reducing emissions in hard-to-abate sectors.

View Event on Net Zero Compare

View all newly added Events on Net Zero Compare

Reddit users in r/climatechange are discussing research on whether depleted North Sea oil and gas fields could be used to store large volumes of green hydrogen. The conversation focuses on the role of underground hydrogen storage in balancing renewable electricity systems, especially during periods of high demand and low wind or solar generation. The study cited in the discussion estimates that suitable depleted North Sea fields could provide 3,659 terawatt-hours of hydrogen storage capacity, equivalent to more than seven years of projected UK electricity demand in 2040. The discussion is relevant because it connects clean hydrogen with a practical infrastructure question: where large-scale seasonal energy storage could happen. Supporters see depleted oil and gas fields as a way to reuse existing geological knowledge and energy infrastructure for a low-carbon system. At the same time, the topic raises important questions around cost, leakage risk, reservoir suitability, hydrogen production capacity, and whether green hydrogen should be prioritized for power backup, industry, transport, or other hard-to-electrify uses. The broader takeaway is that hydrogen storage may become an important part of energy system resilience, but its role depends on careful technical validation, policy design, and realistic deployment economics.

https://www.reddit.com/r/climatechange/comments/1vxc0xf/storing_green_hydrogen_in_depleted_north_sea_oil/ (Reddit)

In this episode:

View Show Notes on Net Zero Compare

If there are specific policies, tools, events, industries, or regions you would like us to cover, reply directly to this email. Reader’s input informs our editorial priorities.

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