Root & Branch, a Brighton-based software sustainability consultancy, has launched a commercial platform to measure the energy use and carbon emissions of websites and web applications, based on its Innovate UK-funded Cardamon Web Model; this is a product launch, not a transaction, and no deal consideration or counterparty arises.

Root & Branch was founded in 2024 by Adam Newman and Oliver Winks, headquartered at Plus X Innovation in Brighton. It operates across digital sustainability training, low-carbon website development and digital emissions auditing. Revenue and EBITDA are not publicly disclosed; the company is at early revenue stage. There is no counterparty. Advisors: none mentioned.

The structural driver is the EU's CSRD Omnibus amendments under Directive (EU) 2026/470, which retain mandatory Scope 3 emissions reporting for more than 50,000 companies with over 1,000 employees and €450 million net turnover. Software and digital services sit within Scope 3 and are among the hardest categories to measure: emissions are distributed across devices, networks, cloud infrastructure and user behaviour. Existing top-down models can indicate aggregate digital footprint but cannot identify where within a site or application energy is consumed, the granularity both internal product teams and external auditors now require.

The CWM addresses this by reversing the measurement direction: instead of apportioning aggregate sector energy data downward, it traces individual hardware components and user actions through a site to build component-level attribution. The platform aligns with ISO 21031 and the Software Carbon Intensity framework, the two standards most likely to underpin auditor expectations for digital emissions disclosures.

For Ireland, the relevance is direct: Ireland hosts the European headquarters of nine of the ten largest global technology companies, all of which face CSRD Scope 3 obligations across their digital estate. A credible, auditable methodology for website and application emissions is a compliance input those companies currently lack, and Irish advisory and audit firms have no established domestic supplier providing it.

Root & Branch has identified the right problem at the right time, if the CWM achieves ISO and auditor acceptance, it enters a compliance market the CSRD has created but that no established provider yet owns.

Source: itbrief.co.uk / cardamon.io / knowledge.dlapiper.com / greensoftware.foundation / persefoni.com