Two and a half years ago, a small batch of remanufactured laptops were delivered to the Port of Brussels after having travelled by boat from Saudi Arabia. This experiment was run by Paradigm Brussels, an administration of the Brussels region that supports other administrations in their digital transformation. Paradigm wanted to see if it was possible to reduce the environmental impact of such a delivery in terms of transport emissions.

By removing the most carbon-intensive transport modes, namely air and road transport, and instead using maritime transport and cargo bikes for the last-mile-delivery, Paradigm Brussels reduced the emissions impact by 74%.

For this to work, the client had to accept a longer delivery time, which went from a few days to six weeks, and potentially a minor additional cost, “although it is difficult to compare as this was a small batch,” specifies Constance Mathieu, Sustainable IT Advisor at Paradigm Brussels.

This example showed the team that reducing the impact of the delivery of their IT equipment was possible and it pushed them to include the option in their services. This means that administrations in the Brussels region placing an order on specific items of the Paradigm catalogue will have the option to choose delivery by lower-carbon transport.

Transport represents only about 5% of the environmental impact of IT equipment, “but we still considered it something interesting to try to reduce,” says Mathieu. This proves the commitment of Paradigm Brussels towards sustainable IT procurement throughout the whole value chain.

Introducing sustainability in public tenders

Four years ago, the Brussels regional government assigned Paradigm Brussels the mission of supporting a more sustainable and more inclusive digital transformation in public administrations. “We have the mission of coordinating and helping other administrations in the deployment of their own sustainable digital approach,” explains Mathieu.

Among other tasks, Paradigm Brussels acts as the central purchasing body for IT equipment for other administrations of the Brussels region. Their procurement team specialises in public tenders for hardware, software and services. Together with the sustainable digital unit, the procurement team works to include clauses and reflect on how to make public procurement more sustainable.

The lower-carbon transport option is a small example of Paradigm’s work. They have spent the last year refining the criteria for their main public procurement, which they launch every 4-5 years to select the suppliers for their regional catalogue. “We worked on several sustainable clauses for this tender,” says Mathieu. “We are interested in reducing the impact of our equipment at all stages of its lifecycle – manufacturing, usage, transport, and end-of-life.”

Paradigm computers ready to be sent by boat

Paradigm computers arrived in Brussels and are ready for the last mile

Make it count

One of the key issues Paradigm worked on was to increase the overall sustainability score in the tender to ensure it made a real difference. “In previous tenders, sustainability criteria accounted for only 1% to 3% of the total score. For a bidder, that’s not enough of an incentive,” explains Mathieu.

The team managed to increase it to 10% of the total score. For Thierry Chappe, Sustainable IT Manager at Paradigm Brussels, this is the most crucial aspect for public procurement.

“I believe we should go even further, towards 15% or even 20%,” Chappe insists. “We need to help IT teams understand that sustainable measures participate in extending product lifespan, which leads to savings.”

He explained that by extending their laptops’ life from 4 to 6 years, they calculated 36% of annual savings on laptop investments. “A portion of these savings can be reinvested in higher-quality equipment that is more robust, lasts longer and performs better,” adds Chappe.

Another sustainable measure that will also bring overall savings is Paradigm’s decision to include the energy consumption aspect of IT equipment. There are established methods to monitor and share energy performance data, which made addressing energy consumption in the tender easier. Manufacturers are used to providing energy consumption figures, and the Energy Star label is a recognised basic requirement for all devices.

Paradigm Brussels decided to take it a step further. “The most effective way to incentivise lower energy consumption – since our goal is to use devices that are as energy-efficient as possible – was to integrate energy consumption into the total cost calculation,” explains Mathieu.

Based on a consumption scenario, bidders provided energy usage data allowing Paradigm to reward the most energy-efficient devices by factoring their consumption into the total cost of the equipment over its lifespan.

This approach also helps increase the total cost score, as cost generally carries the highest weighting. “By incorporating energy consumption into this calculation, we preserve the remaining 10% for other sustainability criteria,” says Chappe.

This criterion is widely accepted, whereas others, such as sustainable logistics, which can add costs, or certification requirements, are more challenging to get all stakeholders to agree on. “Any public administration can immediately see the benefit of having more energy-efficient equipment, as it will ultimately bear part of the cost of its use,” Chappe insists.

More durable equals more sustainable

Another key area of action that Paradigm believes has the biggest potential to make a difference is the repairability and durability of IT equipment. “The main challenge we face as an administration, and where we have the most influence, is maximising the lifespan of our equipment,” says Chappe.

For example, the team has set the objective of extending the lifespan of their laptops from four to six years. “The priority is to ensure our laptops are more durable and repairable so that we can meet this objective,” says Mathieu. So, together with their procurement team, they have implemented a set of criteria to assess durability.

For Paradigm, durable means, first and foremost, that the equipment must be repairable and easy to disassemble. “Many IT devices are either not designed to be taken apart, for instance because components are glued together, or are very difficult to disassemble,” emphasises Mathieu.

For example, the amount of time required for IT support to take apart a device or the cost of a spare part are crucial factors. “As a result, even when there is a willingness to repair, people often don’t do it because it’s not financially viable,” stresses Mathieu.

As a solution, Paradigm has included a series of criteria linked to durability in their tender. “For instance, we ask suppliers to provide a cost breakdown of spare parts to ensure that replacing a component is economically interesting,” Mathieu explains.

Paradigm has also included the Ingress Protection (IP) rating, a recognised European standard assessing a device’s protection against water and dust. “For certain devices, we required a minimum IP score and awarded additional points for higher protection ratings,” says Mathieu.

The team was also inspired by France’s repairability index, which provides consumers with a simple score out of 10 indicating the repairability of a consumer IT equipment such as laptops, smartphones and monitors.

“For this tender, we couldn’t use the exact same index, though a similar index, limited to laptops, will be introduced in Belgium, but we examined the criteria used to calculate it and incorporated them into our selection process through targeted questions,” says Mathieu.

Balancing intention with practical application

One of the major difficulties Paradigm faced was that many sustainability recommendations are generic. When it comes to applying them to a tender and, more importantly, comparing bids, there comes the real challenge. “At every stage, we faced unexpectedly complex issues. All the criteria in this tender are the result of over a year of discussions,” states Chappe.

For example, the team wanted to integrate a carbon footprint calculation using footprint assessment tools for IT equipment. But when they tried to implement it, they realised that the methodologies were never going to be comparable. “At first, we thought it was a great idea. But once we got into the practical application, we saw that it would be unmanageable, so we decided not to include it in the tender,” says Mathieu.

“In public procurement, we must ensure that competition remains free and fair, which means we need clear and easily comparable criteria,” stresses Mathieu. This meant the team had to carefully consider what they asked from bidders.

“Before working in public procurement, I assumed we could simply ask, for example, what measures a bidder had implemented in terms of quality management. But that type of question leads to long, declarative reports – 500 pages that are impossible to compare with each other,” shares Mathieu.

“You end up in a situation where it is difficult to assign scores, and there is a risk of legal challenges if one bidder receives more points than another.” What works in practice, is asking closed questions, questions that obtain quantifiable figures, and setting clear, comparable criteria.

Engaging with the market while ensuring credibility

Beyond procurement criteria, a broader shift in organisational culture is necessary. “We need to shift the mindset so that when a single key on a keyboard is broken, they don’t replace the entire device just because it’s cheaper,” says Mathieu.

Procurement teams also need to break away from the sole focus on cost reduction. “Changing organisational culture, implementing preventive maintenance, and fostering a repair-and-reuse mindset is where we can have the greatest impact,” believes Chappe.

In exchange, procurement and IT teams need to be reassured that they will receive the equipment they need. On one hand, this means ensuring their needs are correctly identified so that users don’t get unnecessarily over-performing devices.

“We often push back against having dual screens everywhere in offices, as they are only useful and used in some jobs. Similarly, giant interactive touchscreens replacing projectors have a significant energy impact. So, it is necessary to challenge their usage,” says Chappe.

On the other hand, it means that users should receive high-quality equipment and that procurement teams must ensure the market can respond to their requirements with solutions that are both economically viable for public administrations and meet their technical performance standards.

“We conducted benchmarks to check whether, when imposing stricter requirements, there were still enough bidders, manufacturers, and available equipment to ensure a competitive process,” says Mathieu.

Paradigm Brussels also organised dialogue sessions with suppliers asking for any sustainability measures they may have put in place. This sent a clear signal that sustainability is a priority for the administration and will directly impact their evaluation score in the tender.

“Their reactions were telling. When we asked specific questions, they set up follow-up meetings with 10 people just to provide an answer. If a supplier is willing to mobilise that many people to address our queries, it shows they take this seriously,” says Mathieu. “We may be a small player, but the more actors that move in the same direction, the stronger our collective influence. This helps ensure that sustainability efforts are meaningful and not just greenwashing.”

Tips for making your public procurement more sustainable

In view of building this small but engaged group of actors, Paradigm Brussels is working on reviewing their guide to share key learnings. The first version of the guide resulted from a working group between different administrations of the Brussels region, which summarised existing guides and procurement practices.

However, once the team at Paradigm used this guide as a reference when developing their tender, they realised its shortcomings. “As a result, we are working on a version of the guide that is more closely aligned with practical realities,” shared Mathieu. “The goal is to create a concise, practical document that we can share across our administrations and beyond – a summary of what we did, how we drafted the tender and lessons learned.”

“Keep things as simple as possible, as it’s easy to get lost in overly complex processes,” suggests Chappe. “It’s better to stick to existing criteria, maximise the overall score, as this is the main discussion point with both suppliers and internal teams, and streamline the approach.”

One way to do so is being able to discuss with others who have faced the same challenges. For example, Paradigm shared ideas on key principles with a procurement team at Bruxelles Environnement that focuses on sustainability.

“This helped us verify several aspects of our approach” says Mathieu. “Working within an ecosystem and sharing experiences is incredibly valuable to move faster.”

Another one of Paradigm’s key learnings is that precise wording is crucial for passing legal reviews. Having clearly defined criteria, with short, explicit descriptions, streamlines the process significantly when compared to having broad, vague requirements.

“By sharing our final wording in the updated guide, we believe we can help smaller administrations, particularly those that don’t have a dedicated procurement team like Paradigm does,” says Mathieu.

Sustainable public procurement doesn’t end with awarding a tender

The work towards more sustainable public procurement practices goes beyond drafting tender criteria. “The real work happens after the contract is signed, so it’s crucial to stay engaged and ensure commitments are followed through,” says Chappe.

A key responsibility is monitoring the contract. Once a supplier wins a contract, procurement teams tend to step back. “But once the contract is in place, it’s essential to show the supplier that we are actively engaged and that sustainability remains a priority,” insists Chappe.

For example, as contracts last five years, and technology evolves rapidly, having control points is vital to prevent suppliers from lowering environmental standards over time. “Build in checkpoints, otherwise, the process won’t work,” adds Chappe.

Engaging with stakeholders and users is also fundamental to cement the work. “If what we do isn’t properly understood within the organisation, it can be met with resistance or circumvented – meaning people might find other ways to purchase equipment simply because they didn’t fully understand the intention behind the procurement decisions,” stresses Mathieu.

“This is something we will actively do when awarding the contract – explaining what we’ve done, raising awareness, and encouraging others to follow suit.”

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Paradigm Brussels is a member of the Big Buyers Working Together (BBWT) Community of Practice on Sustainability in ICT. They have recently participated in a training session organised by the BBWT project.

Big Buyers Working Together, is an EU-funded project that fosters collaboration between public buyers to enhance sustainable procurement practices.
Join Big Buyers Working Together and the Community of Practice on Sustainability in ICT.