Sustainability specialist Thrust Carbon has launched a new "behavioural-change tool" designed to reach travellers as they are making travel decisions and guide them towards more sustainable and economic travel options.
Thrust's EngageAI “agentic” platform uses travellers' itineraries and local travel knowledge to message travellers through a variety of channels, including point-of-sale booking tools, Microsoft Teams, WhatsApp and email, at decision points during their planning and journey. The company started to introduce “nudge” notifications for travellers last year.
For example, the tool can use itinerary, flight, safety and immigration queue data to message travellers when they walk through an arrivals gate at an airport to encourage them to use trains to get to their destination when they are a faster and lower-cost option.
At its launch, EngageAI is available "with all major [travel management companies] supported," and work is underway for "deep integrations" with TMC apps, according to Thrust Carbon.
The tool focuses on companies' most frequent travellers, as the company noted that changing their behaviour can have the biggest impact on emissions and savings.
“As the data source of $100 billion of annual travel spend, we're able to reliably predict who will emit and what is needed to change their behaviour,” said Kit Aspen, Thrust Carbon’s founder and CEO.
“Most emissions don't come from one-off journeys. They are shaped by repeated decisions, and if you can influence those decisions, you change how the whole programme performs.”
Jill Smit, global sustainability manager at Amsterdam-based design and engineering firm Arcadis, which is a Thrust Carbon client, added: “It's important to make choices easier for travellers by providing them directly with the best options. This way, the traveller does not have to question if they made the right choice, fostering confidence and reducing uncertainty in their travel decisions.”
Arcadis won BTN's award for Achievement in Sustainability – Managed Travel Programme at the in 2024, and was awarded .
For more about Arcadis' efforts to reduce carbon emissions from business travel, read BTN Europe's recent case study.