The Law Society aims to stay on top of any ESG-related opportunities in accordance with the recommendations of consultancy firm Pragmatica, in partnership with the executive leadership team and the Law Society’s Glas Team, which is tasked with implementing the strategy. 

Ambitions

In our 2023 report, we set out the following ambitions and have made significant progress to date.

• Assess the Law Society’s current ESG performance and identify relevant issues. Early in 2024, we carried out a situational analysis as part of our sustainability strategy development. The findings have now been incorporated into a new sustainability strategy for the Law Society.

• Set specific and measurable objectives that align with our vision and mission. We have developed a sustainability roadmap that is aligned to our organisational strategy (2024-2028). This roadmap prioritises objectives in sustainability and how the Law Society can lead the way in supporting solicitors and trainees in sustainability.

• Engage stakeholders to understand their concerns and gather input. In January and February, we held workshops with staff, trainees, and solicitors to ensure our sustainability strategy was aligned to the needs of our stakeholders

• Integrate ESG considerations into our core business strategy, policies, and procedures. This is currently underway and aligned to objectives as set out in our sustainability roadmap.

• Establish a robust monitoring system to measure and track progress, including carbon emissions on an annual basis. A full carbon measurement for 2022 was completed in 2023, a reduction strategy is currently in development, and an energy audit will be completed later this year.

• Foster a culture of sustainability within the legal profession in Ireland. This is about partnerships, and the United Nations sustainability goal ‘Partnerships for the Goals’ is a core pillar of the Law Society strategy.

• Continuously improve and innovate to adapt to emerging reporting standards. Like so many other businesses, this is an evolving landscape, and we are continuously monitoring any associated reporting standards that are relevant to the Law Society.

• Develop resources to educate and enable the legal community in Ireland to drive their own sustainability agendas. We continue to embed sustainability in our educational and professional development objectives, offering training and resources that included an ESG masterclass for practitioners and a free MOOC (massive open online course) in ESG for trainees and solicitors in 2024. In April 2024, our trainees also participated in the International Environmental Law Moot Court Competition in Florida. The Law Society has a long history of participation in this competition, which it has won three times.

• Achieve an independent sustainability certification. The Law Society is reviewing applicable certifications.

Carbon emissions

To get a true representation of the carbon emissions of the Law Society, we started the process of measuring all emissions across the activity of the Law Society in 2023 to achieve a baseline for 2022, including:

• Scope 1: any direct emissions, such as emissions from on-site combustion of fossil fuels,

• Scope 2: any indirect greenhouse gas emissions associated with the generation of purchased electricity or heat,

• Scope 3: all indirect greenhouse gas emissions that occur in the value chain of the Law Society, including emissions from purchased goods and services, transportation, and waste disposal.

As part of the Scope 3 analysis, a full business analysis project was carried out to identify the source of emissions, and includes:

• travel and commuting by all Law Society staff,

• the impact of employees working from home offices,

• travel by all trainees and solicitors to events, including education activity, exams, and CPD events,

• all print, including the Law Society Gazette,

• all IT infrastructure, including electronic devices and data storage,

• all food and drink consumed in the Law Society in 2022.

To date we have captured over 80% of the required data to measure emissions, and initial calculations indicate that the 2022 baseline is 966t CO2 (tonnes of carbon dioxide).

The full report on the Law Society’s carbon emissions, along with reduction strategies and other initiatives, will be included in a sustainability report to be published in the coming months.

Scope 1: direct emissions

Scope 2: indirect emissions

Scope 3: business activity as outlined above