The Science Of Web Sustainability
Cardamon is a research-led project measuring the energy and carbon impacts of websites and cloud applications, providing transparent, ISO-aligned insights for enterprises.
What is Cardamon?
Cardamon began in 2024 as an open-source research project funded by Innovate UK and delivered by Root & Branch. Its purpose is to provide scientifically robust measurement of website and cloud energy consumption and carbon emissions.
- Implements ISO 21031. SCI for Web and SCI for Cloud.
- End-to-end measurement across hosting, content delivery and end-user activity
- Supports enterprises in making defensible, low-carbon decisions for complex web estates
Browser rendering, network transfer, device energy consumption
Hosting, CMS, compute resources, data center energy
Methodology & Whitepapers
Cardamon's methodologies are fully documented in open whitepapers for full transparency.
SCI For Web
The world's first documented implementation of ISO 21031 for energy and emissions measurement of end user activity in web-based applications
SCI For Cloud
Extending ISO SCI methodology to applications hosted in shared resource and dedicated cloud environments
Statistical Sampling Of Large Scale Websites
Exploration of streamed and fully parsed statistical sampling of large websites from user analytics
Case Studies
Cardamon isn't just theory. We're applying our methodologies to some of the world's most complex websites.
Wikipedia
Estimating the environmental impact of one of the world's largest knowledge platforms.
GitHub
Using Cardamon to deliver emissions benchmarks for the sustainability team at GitHub and their web sustainability tooling.
More case studies coming soon
We're working with more organisations to measure their digital carbon footprint.
Why Cardamon Matters
The web has a hidden impact. Cardamon exists to give visibility to web practitioners and inform more sustainable decision making in the digital product lifecycle.
Transparent, ISO-aligned methodology
Built on ISO 21031 (SCI) for defensible, standardised measurements
Websites, cloud apps, digital services
From simple sites to complex web estates and enterprise platforms
Measurable reductions
Track improvements over time with quantifiable metrics for whole website impact to individual user journeys
Defensible data for sustainability reporting
Meet compliance requirements and set measurable science based targets with confidence