February 2026 | From Targets to Action: Exploring the Time Value of Carbon in Portfolios, Programmes and Projects with Stuart Thorp

Climate change is often discussed at a global level — in terms of carbon budgets, temperature thresholds, and international agreements. Yet the outcomes ultimately depend on decisions made much closer to home: within organisational portfolios, programmes, and individual projects.

This webinar introduces the Time Value of Carbon (TVC) as a practical way for project professionals to bridge that gap. Building on familiar financial concepts such as Net Present Value (NPV) and Internal Rate of Return (IRR), TVC applies the same time-sensitive logic to carbon emissions and reductions. The core insight is simple: the timing of emissions reductions matters as much as their magnitude.

The session begins by showing how the global climate challenge cascades downwards — from the remaining carbon budget implied by the Paris Agreement, through national and corporate commitments, into portfolios, programmes, and projects. This framing helps project managers see where their work fits within the bigger picture, and why choices about sequencing, phasing, and delivery speed can materially affect climate outcomes.

Rather than presenting TVC as a finished methodology, this webinar deliberately treats it as work in progress. It will briefly show early examples emerging from the TVC Working Circle (a group set up from attendees of previous PMI event sessions) — illustrating how carbon NPV and “carbon IRR” can be used to compare alternative project pathways — while being open about the assumptions, challenges, and open questions that remain.

The session also positions TVC as complementary to existing initiatives, including Project Management Institute sustainability efforts, Green Project Management, and the Science Based Targets initiative. The aim is not to create a competing framework, but to provide a shared, time-aware lens that can help translate high-level commitments into actionable project decisions.

Crucially, this is an engagement session. Attendees will be invited to contribute ideas for potential case studies and — for those willing — to take ownership of developing case studies within their own organisations, at project, programme, or portfolio level. The long-term ambition is a practitioner-led body of evidence that strengthens the role of project management in delivering real, measurable climate outcomes.