Klaas Puul | Turning commitment into three evidence-based climate targets 

  • How we helped Klaas Puul make the right choices to arrive at three well-substantiated SBTi targets.

10 Customer Satisfaction

  • • Full greenhouse gas inventory across scope 1, 2 and 3 processed and entered into the SBTi platform
  • • Scenarios developed for both an absolute and an intensity target, modelled against the organisation's expected growth
  • • Three SBTi-compliant climate targets set and submitted
  • We helped Klaas Puul, an international processor and trading company in seafood products, set climate targets through the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). Klaas Puul committed to SBTi climate targets in 2026. More and more organisations are taking this step: SBTi helps translate climate ambitions into concrete, credible targets that guide strategy, investment and decision-making. A validated SBTi target demonstrates that a company is contributing to the 1.5-degree pathway, which builds trust among customers, financiers and regulators. That is precisely where the strength of SBTi lies: it doesn't ask for a non-committal ambition, but for a genuine commitment. You register, commit to the process, and then go through the steps of developing targets, having them validated, implementing them and reporting on them. Once validated, there's no going back to an easier or less demanding target. For Klaas Puul, a growing company, that meant a number of fundamental choices that would shape the rest of the process. We supported Klaas Puul in making those choices, from getting the underlying data in order to jointly discussing the options with the board.
  • Our Approach
  • Checking and processing existing data
  • Klaas Puul already had a greenhouse gas inventory across scope 1, 2 and 3. We helped organise these figures properly and process them correctly in the SBTi platform, so they could serve as a reliable basis for the target calculation. This also immediately revealed where the data still fell short and where secondary data had been used instead of the company's own primary data. This check was necessary because an SBTi target is only as strong as the inventory it is based on: incomplete or unreliable data results in a target that is difficult to substantiate or achieve later on.
  • “The SBTi process involved a number of important choices for us. Been guided us throughout the entire process in a pleasant and professional manner. They helped us to make the different scenarios and their impact clear, so that we could make well-considered choices. The result is three well-substantiated SBTi targets and a clear basis for further shaping our climate strategy in the coming years.”
  • Suzanne Wolke, Klaas Puul
  • Getting clear on which target fits best
  • The key question in this process was not how to set an SBTi target, but which type of target best suited the organisation. For scope 1 and 2, that choice is largely fixed by the SBTi methodology, which requires an absolute target there. For scope 3, the picture was more nuanced: there was also room for a different type of target (an intensity target), which decouples reduction from revenue and volume growth. For a growing organisation, that choice determines the size of the reduction challenge. An absolute target requires total emissions to fall, regardless of growth. An intensity target allows for growth, as long as each product becomes cleaner. To see what that would mean for Klaas Puul, we modelled the different targets in scenarios against the organisation's expected growth: what happens to total emissions under an intensity target if the organisation keeps growing, and is that still credible to SBTi and the market? And how feasible is an absolute target alongside the growth ambitions? And what if the mix of product groups shifts, how does that affect total emissions? Those scenarios formed the basis for the conversation, and for making the final call.
  • Setting and submitting the targets
  • The outcomes and choices were discussed jointly with the board, leading to three targets being set. The conversation wasn't only about the figures, but above all about which target would best suit Klaas Puul. These targets were then submitted to SBTi for validation.
  • Impact and results
  • The result is a set of climate targets that demonstrably meets the SBTi methodology, but that was, above all, deliberately chosen. The chosen targets align with what is scientifically necessary and what is convincing externally. For a growing organisation, that is a demanding starting point: every step the organisation takes must contribute to achieving these targets, even as the company continues to grow. This gives Klaas Puul a credible and clear starting point for its climate strategy, and a basis for working out which reduction steps are feasible within its own supply chain. Just as important as the outcome was the process of getting there. By making the choices explicit and substantiating them with scenarios, the board was able to make a well-considered decision rather than relying on gut feeling about what would be feasible or ambitious enough. That makes the targets not only credible to SBTi, but also better supported internally.
  • "The challenge isn't in the SBTi process itself, but in the choices you make for the targets."
  • Selma van Rhee
  • Senior consultant

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