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Calculate your organisation’s carbon emissions under the GHG Protocol by fixing the reporting period and organisational boundary, listing every source you will include, and multiplying each activity quantity by an emission factor in the same units. Convert that product to tonnes of carbon-dioxide equivalent (CO2e). Scope 1 is direct emissions from owned or controlled sources. Scope 2 is indirect emissions from purchased or acquired energy. Scope 3 is other indirect emissions in the value chain. The Corporate Standard requires Scope 1 and Scope 2. A Scope 1 and Scope 2 total is not a full value-chain footprint unless you also say how Scope 3 was treated.
Work in this order: boundaries and period, source register, activity data, factors, calculation and unit conversion, Scope 2 method, quality checks against a base-year policy, then a report that shows methods as well as totals. The multiplication is the small part. Consolidation approach, leases, factor choice, and Scope 2 accounting all change the number.
What do you need in place before you calculate?
You need a named organisation, a stated purpose, a stated reporting period, one consolidation approach, a source list with exclusions, activity data with units and source records, emission factors that match those units, and a global-warming-potential basis for expressing gases as CO2e. You also need a base-year policy and the names of the GHG Protocol documents you are applying. Scope 2 and Scope 3 sit in later guidance, so “the GHG Protocol” alone is not a methods note.
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Split the collection by the team that already holds the records. Facilities usually hold fuel, electricity, heat, steam, cooling, and refrigerant logs. Fleet and travel administrators hold fuel and distance. Procurement holds purchased goods, freight, and any supplier data. Finance holds the entity list, equity stakes, joint operations, and leases that decide the boundary. The inventory is the reconciled set of those records, not a single invoice folder.
The official calculation tools are electronic spreadsheets with step-by-step guidance. The GHG Protocol calculation-tools FAQ says the tools provide default emission factors and recommends custom values when a reliable organisation-specific factor is available. Collect the activity data before you open a default factor. A default cannot fill in a missing site.
The calculation sequence is global. The factor set, the gases a programme expects, and any legal duty to file are not. Country, sector, and the rules of a reporting programme can ask for more than the Corporate Standard’s minimum of Scope 1 and Scope 2. This guide does not assign a national factor library or a filing obligation. It sets out the corporate inventory method those programmes usually sit on.
How do you calculate the inventory, step by step?
Start when you can name the organisation, the reporting period, and the consolidation approach, and when you can reach fuel, energy, refrigerant, travel, procurement, and waste records for the operations inside that boundary. Give each later step a stored input. Do not reopen an earlier decision inside a formula cell.
- Write the purpose, the period, and both boundaries. Say whether the inventory supports public reporting, a programme, internal management, or more than one of these. Name the entity. State the start and end of the period. Select equity share, financial control, or operational control, and list the operations that choice includes. Then define the operational boundary: which direct and indirect sources inside those operations you will quantify. Write exclusions next to inclusions.
- Build a source register and assign a scope to every line. Use one line per facility and activity. Typical lines are stationary fuel combustion, fleet fuel, process emissions, refrigerant leakage, purchased electricity, steam, heat, cooling, and the value-chain activities you are including, such as purchased goods, freight, business travel, waste, and employee commuting where they are relevant. Mark Scope 1, Scope 2, or Scope 3. Give joint operations and leased assets their own lines so the boundary decision stays visible.
- Collect activity data and tie every quantity to a record. Take fuel consumed, energy purchased or acquired, refrigerant top-ups or losses, distance travelled, mass of materials, waste by type, and any other measure the source needs. Store the unit and the invoice, statement, manifest, survey, or log that produced the quantity. If a supplier will not provide a physical quantity for a relevant value-chain source, record a secondary or spend-based estimate in words on that line. A blank that later becomes zero understates the source.
- Select a factor and calculate. Match geography, time period, technology or fuel, gas coverage, and units. Multiply activity by the factor. Convert to tonnes of CO2e. If the factor is not already in CO2e, apply the stated global warming potentials and record that basis. Store the factor name, publisher, version, and year. Use an organisation-specific factor when it is appropriate and reliable. Otherwise use a documented default, including a default from a GHG Protocol spreadsheet when that default actually matches the line.
- Account for purchased energy with the Scope 2 methods that apply. From the same quantities of electricity, steam, heat, and cooling, prepare the location-based result and the market-based result. Put a contractual instrument into the market-based result only when it meets the Scope 2 Quality Criteria in the guidance version you are using. File the instruments with the supplier-specific data. Keep the two results in separate fields.
- Lock the base year treatment and run quality checks. If this year is the base year, record why the data are suitable and why the year reflects typical operations. If this is a later year, apply the recalculation policy to structural changes, boundary changes, material errors, and methodology or data-quality improvements. Then look for missing sites, duplicate quantities, unit errors, unfit factors, wrong scope assignments, mixed Scope 2 methods, and large movements you cannot explain. Recalculate a sample of lines from the stored activity and the stored factor.
- Report scoped totals with the methods. Publish Scope 1, Scope 2 by method, and any Scope 3 you included. With those totals, state boundaries, period, base year, profile over time, significant recalculations, gases, specified biogenic CO2, tools, factor sources, and exclusions. Where a programme or law asks for more than the Corporate Standard minimum, add that layer and name the rule.
The finished product is a set of scoped totals plus a file that can rebuild them. Keep that file with the same retention period you use for the financial records the activity data came from.
How do you choose an organisational boundary?
Select one approach for consolidating GHG emissions and apply it consistently to define which businesses and operations constitute the organisation. The Corporate Standard puts that choice first, before operational sources are labelled as Scope 1, Scope 2, or Scope 3.
In setting organizational boundaries, a company selects an approach for consolidating GHG emissions and then consistently applies that approach to define those businesses and operations that constitute the company for the purpose of accounting and reporting GHG emissions.
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GHG Protocol reproduces that Corporate Standard sentence, from page 16, in Inventory and Project Accounting: A Comparative Review. Confirm the wording and page against the edition you apply. The revised edition circulated as the Corporate Standard PDF is the 2004 text, and later amendments sit alongside it.
Identify the entity and the period before you choose the approach. Document facilities, subsidiaries, joint operations, leased assets, and exclusions. The organisational boundary answers “which operations are part of this organisation for GHG accounting?” The operational boundary answers “which sources at those operations are quantified, and in which scope?” Mixing those two questions is how sites appear in the total with no listed owner.
How do equity share, financial control, and operational control change the total?
The Corporate Standard offers three consolidation approaches. They are different questions, so the same group can produce different Scope 1 and Scope 2 totals under each one. Pick the approach that matches the purpose of the inventory, then keep it.
| Approach | What the organisation accounts for | What moves a site in or out of Scope 1 and Scope 2 |
|---|---|---|
| Equity share | Emissions from an operation in proportion to the organisation’s equity share, reflecting its economic interest | A partial stake brings in that share, including where someone else runs the site day to day |
| Financial control | 100 percent of emissions from operations the organisation financially controls: it can direct the financial and operating policies with a view to gaining economic benefits | An ownership interest without financial control stays outside Scope 1 and Scope 2 under this approach |
| Operational control | 100 percent of emissions from operations where the organisation, or a subsidiary, has full authority to introduce and implement operating policies | Operational control can exist without a majority stake, and a majority stake can exist without operational control |
A short illustration shows the arithmetic of the boundary, not a measured inventory. An organisation holds 30 percent equity in a joint operation. Under equity share it accounts for 30 percent of that operation’s emissions. Under operational control, if it does not have operational control, the operation’s direct emissions stay outside its Scope 1, even though the stake exists. If it does have operational control, it accounts for 100 percent, including the portion it does not own. The same logic applies to financial control, using financial control as the test. Whichever approach you reject for Scope 1 and Scope 2 can still matter when you screen the value chain. State that screening choice. Do not leave the stake invisible.
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Apply one approach across the inventory. Using equity share for subsidiaries and operational control for joint operations in the same year, with no explanation, breaks the definition of the company. Using one approach in the base year and another in the current year breaks the trend. A change of approach is a boundary change. The recalculation policy should say how the base year is handled, and the report should explain the change.
Where do leased assets sit?
Do not assign a leased office, vehicle, or item of plant by the word on the contract. Whether the asset is inside the organisational boundary, and which scope its emissions use, depends on the consolidation approach, the arrangement, and the facts of control. Two organisations can lease similar buildings and report the heating fuel and the electricity in different scopes because their consolidation approaches differ. For each material lease, store the approach you applied, the scope you assigned, and a reference to the contract. Revisit that line when the lease is renewed or when control of operations changes hands.
What are Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions?
Scopes describe the organisation’s relationship to the source. They do not describe the gas, the size of the emission, or the quality of the factor. The same tonne of CO2e can move between scopes if ownership or control changes. A different emission factor does not move it.
| Scope | Relationship to the source | Sources teams commonly register | Corporate Standard minimum |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scope 1 | Direct emissions from owned or controlled sources | Stationary fuel combustion, fleet fuel, process emissions, refrigerant leakage | Required |
| Scope 2 | Indirect emissions from purchased or acquired energy | Electricity, steam, heat, and cooling | Required |
| Scope 3 | Other indirect emissions in the value chain | Purchased goods, freight, business travel, employee commuting, and waste, where relevant | Above the minimum. State what you included. A programme or law may require coverage the Corporate Standard does not |
Map the source register to these definitions after the organisational boundary is fixed. Direct emissions from owned or controlled sources go to Scope 1. Purchased or acquired energy goes to Scope 2. Other relevant value-chain sources go to Scope 3. A source you considered and left out belongs on an exclusion list, so a forgotten warehouse is distinguishable from a deliberate omission.
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Scope 3 begins with a screen of the value chain and a decision about which categories are relevant. The GHG Protocol standards and guidance place value-chain accounting in the Scope 3 Standard and its calculation guidance, separate from the Corporate Standard’s minimum. The materials behind this guide establish that purpose. They do not support prescribing one calculation method for every category. Follow the Scope 3 guidance for the category you are quantifying, and write down the method, the data approach, and the categories you screened out.
Say clearly when the published total is Scope 1 and Scope 2 only. Readers, and next year’s compiler, will otherwise treat a partial inventory as the organisation’s complete carbon footprint. Programme rules may require categories the Corporate Standard leaves optional. Meet those rules in addition to the standard, and name them.
What data do you need to calculate emissions?
You need the physical quantities that drive emissions, in units an emission factor can accept, for the same period as the inventory. Every quantity needs a source record. The Corporate Standard does not mandate one software system for that collection. It does require a calculation that someone else can follow, which means the quantity, the unit, and the document have to travel together.
| Source | Quantity | Records to keep with the quantity |
|---|---|---|
| Stationary combustion | Fuel consumed, split by fuel | Fuel statements, delivery notes, tank logs, invoices |
| Fleet | Fuel consumed; distance only when the chosen factor is a distance factor | Fuel-card statements, vehicle logs |
| Process emissions | The process measure the factor expects | Production or process logs |
| Refrigerants | Top-ups or losses, by gas or blend | Service sheets, cylinder records, facility logs |
| Purchased energy | Electricity, steam, heat, and cooling purchased or acquired | Utility invoices and meter reads, with the energy unit visible |
| Business travel and commuting | Distance or fuel, by mode, where the category is included | Travel reports; commuting surveys or documented estimates |
| Purchased goods and freight | Mass or another physical unit; spend only when you are using a spend-based estimate | Procurement extracts, supplier files, carrier records |
| Waste | Mass by waste type and treatment, where the category is included | Waste manifests and contractor reports |
Write the unit on every row before anyone multiplies. Litres and gallons, kilograms and tonnes, and kilowatt-hours and megawatt-hours all produce a number if they are multiplied by the wrong factor. The number is then wrong by a fixed scale that a chart will not reveal. Store the facility name and the period the document covers, because a December delivery ticket can fall outside a reporting year that ends in March, or inside it, depending on the period you stated in step 1.
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How do you calculate emissions from activity data?
For each source line, multiply the activity quantity by an emission factor whose unit matches that quantity. Then convert the product into the mass unit you report, normally tonnes of CO2e. If the factor returns a single gas rather than CO2e, convert that gas with the global-warming-potential basis you have chosen, and record the basis.
Emissions (kilograms or tonnes of CO2e) = activity data × emission factor, followed by unit conversion and, where needed, the warming-potential conversion.
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Match the units before you apply a round-number conversion. Where activity is in kilowatt-hours and the factor is in kilograms of CO2e per kilowatt-hour, tonnes of CO2e equal kilowatt-hours times the factor, divided by 1,000. That division is an illustration of unit conversion. It is not an emissions result and it is not a factor to copy. Where the published factor is already in tonnes per kilowatt-hour, or is quoted per megawatt-hour, dividing by 1,000 again moves the result by three orders of magnitude. Write both units on the row, cancel them on paper once, and only then copy the formula down a column.
Treat global warming potentials as a conversion with a version, not as a second silent multiplication. A factor that already returns CO2e has a warming-potential basis inside it. Applying another set of potentials on top double-counts the conversion. A factor that returns kilograms of one gas, such as methane per unit of activity, still needs the stated potential before it can be added to a CO2 line. A CO2-only factor and a multi-gas CO2e factor cover different gases. Add them only after the gas coverage of each line is written down and the gap is accepted in the methods note.
Organisation-specific factors are appropriate when they represent the real fuel, process, or plant and you can show how they were derived. A generic default is appropriate when it matches geography, year, and technology and you can cite the publisher. The calculation-tools FAQ points users toward custom values when those values are the better representation, while the spreadsheets themselves ship with defaults. Prefer the factor you can explain to a reader of the inventory. An undocumented internal number is not more “specific” than a published factor. It is only harder to review.
What should every calculation line store?
Keep a factor register beside the source register. The two registers can be one table if every line still holds both the activity and the factor citation.
| Field | What to enter |
|---|---|
| Entity and facility | The legal entity and the site, vehicle fleet, or operation |
| Reporting period | Start and end dates that match the inventory period |
| Consolidation approach | Equity share, financial control, or operational control, plus the share if it is equity share |
| Source | The activity, in enough detail to find it next year |
| Scope | Scope 1, Scope 2 location-based, Scope 2 market-based, or Scope 3 with the category you are using |
| Activity | Quantity and unit |
| Activity record | Document or system reference, and the team that owns it |
| Factor | Name, publisher, geography, year, and version |
| Gases and warming-potential basis | Whether the factor is CO2 only or several gases already in CO2e, and which potential basis applies |
| Result | Mass of CO2e after the unit conversion you documented |
| Estimate or exclusion note | Empty when the line is a measured inclusion; otherwise the limitation |
Do not mix factor units, geographies, years, or gas bases without a written reason on the line. A national electricity factor for a different country, or a factor several years older than the reporting period, still produces a tidy total. The total describes the factor’s world, not the organisation’s year.
How should you choose an emission factor?
Choose the factor that matches the activity on geography, time, technology or fuel, gas coverage, and units. Use transparency and data quality to break a tie between two factors that both match. There is no universal factor set inside the Corporate Standard for every organisation. Selecting and citing the factor is part of the calculation.
| Check | A match looks like this | When the check fails |
|---|---|---|
| Geography | The factor describes the country, region, or grid where the activity happened | Disclose any proxy region. Do not leave a foreign grid factor unmarked |
| Time | The factor year is fit for the reporting period | Keep the factor year in the register and update it as a method change, across the lines it affects |
| Technology or fuel | The factor is for that fuel, vehicle, process, refrigerant, or waste treatment | Split the activity. One blended factor hides unlike sources |
| Gas coverage | You know whether the result is CO2 only or several gases in CO2e | State the coverage on the line and in the methods note |
| Units | The activity unit and the factor unit cancel to a mass of emissions | Convert the activity or choose another factor. Do not scale by a guessed constant |
| Quality | Publisher, method, and version can be shown to a reader | Use an organisation-specific factor when it is appropriate and reliable. Otherwise cite a default you have checked against the five matches above |
Record the factor year even when it differs from the reporting year. Many published electricity factors arrive a year or more after the generation they describe. Using last year’s published factor for this year’s consumption can be the right choice. Using it without saying so makes the next update look like a change in consumption. When you replace a default with an organisation-specific factor, keep the default citation in the working file for one cycle so a reviewer can see what moved and why.
What is the difference between location-based and market-based Scope 2?
Purchased or acquired electricity, steam, heat, and cooling are Scope 2, and the Scope 2 Guidance sets two methods for them. Calculate both where the guidance you are applying asks for both. Keep the totals distinguishable. One method does not replace the other, and the two numbers answer different questions about the same energy.
| Question | Location-based method | Market-based method |
|---|---|---|
| What it represents | Emissions associated with the grids and energy supply systems where the energy is consumed | Emissions reflecting contractual instruments and supplier-specific data that meet the guidance |
| Activity data | Quantities of electricity, steam, heat, and cooling purchased or acquired | The same quantities, not a second meter reading |
| What changes the total | Where consumption sits, and which location factor you select | Which instruments qualify, and the emission rate those instruments and supplier data support |
| Evidence | Meters or invoices, plus the factor’s publisher, geography, and year | The same energy evidence, plus instruments and supplier-specific data tested against the Scope 2 Quality Criteria |
| Comparison over time | Keep the method consistent with the location-based base year | Compare market-based totals with market-based totals. Show that series separately from the location-based series |
A contractual instrument belongs in the market-based total only when it meets the Quality Criteria in the Scope 2 Guidance version you cite. Read those criteria in that version. An undated checklist copied forward from an older summary is a weak basis for including an instrument, particularly while revisions to the guidance are being settled. Preserve supplier-specific emission information and the instrument documents in the inventory file so the market-based total can be rebuilt without asking the supplier to resend the pack.
Use the same purchased-energy quantities for both methods. A contractual instrument changes the market-based result when it qualifies. It does not, by itself, rewrite the location-based result. Do not average the two totals into a third “blended Scope 2.” Do not drop the location-based figure because a market-based figure is lower, and do not compare a market-based current year with a location-based base year.
Confirm the guidance text before you lock the method. GHG Protocol’s Scope 2 Guidance page reports that public consultation on revisions ran from 20 October 2025 to 31 January 2026. Instrument eligibility and the required presentation may change. As of 12 November 2026 the sources used here do not establish a finalized replacement text or an effective date for one. Name the edition, publication date, or consultation status you applied, and check the official page again before the next inventory.
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How do you include Scope 3 without overstating the footprint?
Screen the value chain, select the categories that are relevant to the organisation, and calculate the ones you can support. State the categories included, the categories screened out, and the data approach for each included category. Relevance is a documented decision. It is a poor description of a large category that was skipped while the footprint was still called complete.
Category calculation methods live in the Scope 3 Standard and its calculation guidance. Use that guidance for the category in front of you. The comparison below is only about data quality and effort, which is as far as the corporate-inventory sources go before category rules take over.
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|---|---|---|---|
| Supplier-specific or activity-specific | Physical quantities, or factors, from the actual supplier, route, or process | Closer to the purchased good, service, or freight movement | Higher collection effort. A later switch away from this data is a method change and should be explained |
| Secondary or spend-based estimates | Generic factors, or economic spend mapped to an emission factor built for spend | Lower. Suitable for screening and for gaps | Faster to assemble. Replacing it later with physical data can move the total without any operational change |
Label estimates on the source line. A shift from spend-based figures to supplier data is a methodology or data-quality improvement. If your recalculation policy treats that shift as significant, update the base year so the profile over time compares like with like. Leaving a spend-based base year next to a supplier-based current year makes a data upgrade look like a cut in emissions, or like an increase, depending on which estimate was higher.
Include a value-chain category in the headline footprint only after it is in the register. Until then, the honest statement is that the inventory covers Scope 1, Scope 2, and the named Scope 3 categories, with the named exclusions.
How do you choose a base year and a recalculation policy?
Choose a base year for which suitable data exist and which reflects typical operations. A year you can rebuild from invoices and meters is a stronger base than an earlier year that would draw a steeper line and cannot be checked. State the base year in the report and show the profile over time against it. For Scope 2, keep each method consistent inside its own series, and present the location-based comparison separately from the market-based comparison.
Write the recalculation policy before the second inventory. The policy should say what happens when a change would affect comparisons:
- Structural changes, such as acquisitions, divestments, or mergers that change which operations sit inside the boundary
- Other boundary changes, including a change of consolidation approach
- Material errors found in a prior period
- Methodology and data-quality improvements, including a new factor set or a move from spend data to activity data
Define in that policy how large a change must be before you recalculate. Apply the rule the same way each year. Explain every recalculation the rule triggers, and explain significant movements a reader would otherwise misread even when you judge them too small to recalculate. The report’s job is to keep the trend interpretable. A base year without a policy becomes a fixed number that no longer describes the same organisation.
| What changed | How to treat it |
|---|---|
| Acquisition, disposal, or merger | Structural change. Apply the policy so the base year and the current year describe comparable boundaries, and explain the change |
| New consolidation approach | Boundary change. Recalculate under the policy and restate the approach in the methods |
| Updated emission-factor set | Methodology change. Disclose the publisher and year. Recalculate the base year when the policy’s significance rule is met |
| A better invoice for a prior year | Possible error. Correct that year. Recalculate other reported years when the error crosses the policy threshold |
| A new contractual instrument for purchased energy | Market-based Scope 2 input. Keep the location-based total on its own factor. Show the methods separately |
| A Scope 3 category added for the first time | Coverage change. Identify the new category. Do not describe the increase as operational growth alone |
How do you check the inventory before you report?
Reconcile totals to source records before a figure is treated as reportable. The same failures appear in a single office and in a group. The depth of the check scales with the number of sites, the number of joint operations, and the share of the total that sits on estimates.
- Coverage. Every facility inside the organisational boundary is either quantified or named as an exclusion, including sites opened or closed during the period.
- Duplicates. The same fuel invoice, distance record, or megawatt-hour is not entered by two teams.
- Units. Each conversion between litres and gallons, kilograms and tonnes, or kilowatt-hours and megawatt-hours is stated once and sampled.
- Factors. Geography, year, fuel or technology, and gas coverage match the line. Factor year is visible even when it differs from the reporting year.
- Scopes. Leases and joint operations follow the consolidation approach recorded in step 1, not last year’s label.
- Scope 2. Location-based and market-based results are stored separately and built from the same energy quantities. Instruments in the market-based total have a quality-criteria check recorded against them.
- Movements. Large year-on-year changes have a note: a closed line, a new contract, a factor update, a structural change, or a real change in activity.
- Arithmetic. A sample of lines is rebuilt from the stored activity, the stored factor, the unit conversion, and any warming-potential step.
A group needs a facility checklist and a tie-out to the entity list used for the consolidation approach. A single site still needs the unit check, the scope check, and the factor citation. These checks prepare the inventory for reporting. They do not decide whether a programme or law also requires independent assurance. That requirement sits in the programme’s own rules.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How do you fix the calculation when a check fails?
Correct the source line and recalculate from the stored activity and the stored factor. Do not drop the difference into a balancing cell. The balancing cell hides the next error and cannot be tied to an invoice.
- Units do not match. Convert the activity into the factor’s unit, document the conversion, and multiply again. If the record has no physical quantity, keep the line out of a physical-factor total. For a value-chain category you can instead record a spend-based estimate and label it. For Scope 1 or Scope 2, an unlabeled currency figure is not a completed line.
- A facility is missing. Add it under the same consolidation approach as the rest of the group, or add a named exclusion with the reason. Then rebuild the scope totals.
- A contractual instrument fails the Quality Criteria. Leave the energy quantity in the location-based total. Remove the instrument from the market-based total. Keep the rejected instrument in the file with the reason, so the next cycle does not reintroduce it quietly.
- Location-based and market-based results were overwritten. Restore both from the same energy quantities and the factor or instrument that belongs to each method. Re-state any base-year comparison that used the overwritten column.
- A prior-year error is large enough to matter under the policy. Correct the affected year, recalculate the base year when the policy says to, and explain the recalculation in the report. Correcting only the current year leaves the trend broken.
- A factor’s gas basis is unclear. Hold the line out of the published total until the publisher, gas coverage, and warming-potential basis are known. A complete-looking total that mixes unknown gas bases is harder to repair after publication than a gap with an exclusion note.
What has to be in the report besides the total?
Publish the context that makes the total interpretable. The public reporting requirements in the Corporate Standard, revised edition, include the organisational and operational boundaries, the period, scope emissions, the base year and the profile over time, significant recalculations, the methods and tools used, and exclusions. They also call for relevant information on the gases included and for separate reporting of specified biogenic CO2 items.
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Report Scope 1 and Scope 2 as separate totals. That pair is the Corporate Standard minimum. Where Scope 2 guidance calls for both methods, show a location-based total and a market-based total, each labelled. Where you report Scope 3, show it apart from Scope 1 and Scope 2, with categories and data approaches. Keep specified biogenic CO2 identifiable, reported separately as the standard requires, so a reader can see it beside the scoped totals.
Name the tools. Say whether a line uses a default factor from a GHG Protocol spreadsheet or an organisation-specific factor, and cite the publisher and version either way. Name exclusions in operational language: “refrigerant losses at warehouses outside the operational-control boundary,” with the approach stated, rather than “other immaterial items.” The person compiling next year’s inventory should be able to rebuild the boundary from the disclosure without opening last year’s inbox.
The Corporate Standard is an accounting and reporting standard. Meeting its minimum content does not, by itself, settle an organisation’s legal reporting duty. Jurisdiction, sector, and programme rules can add scopes, categories, assurance, and deadlines. List those rules in the same methods note when they apply, so a reader can see which part of the report answers the standard and which part answers another requirement.
Which GHG Protocol text applies in November 2026?
Name the documents in the inventory file. The corporate accounting PDF on the official site is the revised edition from 2004. The Corporate Standard page identifies that standard and lists later amendments and supporting documents. Scope 2 accounting is in the Scope 2 Guidance. Value-chain emissions are in the Scope 3 Standard and its calculation guidance. An inventory that cites only the protocol’s name, with no edition and no supplement, cannot be repeated next year with certainty.
The suite is being updated. In September 2025, GHG Protocol and ISO announced a strategic partnership to work toward unified global standards. That announcement is described on the Corporate Suite update-process page. Public consultation on revisions to the Scope 2 Guidance ran from 20 October 2025 to 31 January 2026. As of 12 November 2026, those pages do not establish a finalized replacement Corporate Standard or an effective date for one. Calculate against the edition and supplements you have identified, say which ones they are, and re-read the update page before you treat a draft revision as the rule.
Use of the protocol among large disclosers has a documented history and a limit. The Corporate Standard page states that 92 percent of Fortune 500 companies responding to CDP in 2016 used the GHG Protocol directly or indirectly through a programme based on it. The figure is about companies that responded to CDP that year. It is not a current share of every Fortune 500 company, and it is not evidence that any one inventory followed the boundary, factor, or Scope 2 rules above.
What usually makes a GHG Protocol total wrong?
Most totals that cannot be defended fail before the multiplication. These are the failures that change the number or that leave a sound number impossible to read.
- The boundary is chosen after the sum. Fuels that happen to be on hand are added up, and a consolidation approach is named afterwards to fit the file. Choose equity share, financial control, or operational control first, and let the entity list follow.
- Leases are labelled in bulk. “All leases are Scope 1” and “all leases are Scope 3” are slogans. The arrangement and the consolidation approach decide the scope, asset by asset where the emissions are material.
- Scope 2 is one column. A market-based result is pasted over the location-based result, while the base year still uses the other method. Keep both results, from the same quantities of electricity, steam, heat, and cooling.
- Instruments are untested. A contractual claim enters the market-based total with no record that it meets the Scope 2 Quality Criteria. Leave it out of that total until the test is in the file.
- Factors do not match the activity. The wrong country, the wrong year, a CO2-only factor added to a multi-gas factor, or a per-litre factor applied to gallons. The factor register is the control for this, but only if someone reads it.
- Defaults, or custom factors, sit unexplained. A tool default remains on a process where a reliable organisation-specific factor exists. Or an internal factor with no method replaces a citable default. Either line needs a sentence in the register.
- Scope 3 is described as everything. A screened subset, or a Scope 1 and Scope 2 inventory, is published as the full organisational footprint. State categories and exclusions in the same place as the total.
- The trend has no policy behind it. An acquisition, a factor update, or a corrected error sits inside the year-on-year movement and is described as operational performance.
- The headline travels alone. A CO2e figure is released without the period, boundaries, base year, gases, biogenic CO2 treatment, tools, and exclusions the Corporate Standard’s reporting provisions call for.
What does a finished GHG Protocol calculation contain?
A finished calculation contains separate totals for Scope 1, for Scope 2 on each method you applied, and for any Scope 3 categories you included, all in tonnes of CO2e for a named period. Beside those totals it contains the consolidation approach, the operational boundary, the base year, the profile over time, significant recalculations, the gases and warming-potential basis, the treatment of specified biogenic CO2, the factor citations, the tools, and the exclusions. The activity quantities and the contracts or invoices behind Scope 2 instruments stay in the working file so the totals can be sampled and rebuilt.
That package is what the Corporate Standard makes comparable from year to year. The 2004 revised edition, read with the Scope 2 Guidance and the Scope 3 Standard where you use them, is the text to identify in the methods note until the Corporate Suite update page shows a finalized replacement and an effective date. Check that page, and the Scope 2 page, again when you open the next period. The sequence does not change: boundary, sources, activity data, factors, conversion, scope and quality checks, then a report that shows its workings.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is there a GHG Protocol materiality percentage for exclusions?
The Corporate Standard requires exclusions to be stated and expects a policy for significant changes, but the materials that describe this calculation do not publish one percentage every organisation must use. Set the threshold in your recalculation policy and apply it the same way each year. A source you skip because it is small still needs an exclusion note, so the gap is visible when someone repeats the inventory.
Do I have to use the official GHG Protocol spreadsheets?
The calculation-tools FAQ presents the official tools as spreadsheets with step-by-step guidance and default factors. It does not describe those files as the only place the arithmetic may be done. A workbook your organisation already controls is fit for the multiplication if each factor’s publisher, geography, year, gas coverage, version, and unit sits on the same line as the activity. Where both a default and a reliable organisation-specific factor exist, that FAQ points you to the custom value.
Why do partners in one joint operation publish different emission totals?
Each partner applies its own consolidation approach when it decides which operations constitute the company and what share to take. Equity share books a percentage of the operation, while financial control or operational control can book all of the direct emissions or none of them in Scope 1 and Scope 2. Read both methods notes before treating the gap as a meter problem.
Can I calculate electricity emissions from the amount charged on the utility bill?
Use the energy quantity printed on the invoice, in kilowatt-hours or the stated steam, heat, or cooling unit. The amount payable can include items other than that energy quantity, so it is the wrong activity figure for a factor quoted per unit of energy. Keep the invoice identifier as the source record and multiply only the energy unit by a factor in that same unit.
Does the GHG Protocol require a calendar year?
You have to state the period the activity data cover and choose a base year with suitable data that reflects typical operations. The Corporate Standard materials discussed here do not require that period to run from 1 January to 31 December. Keep the same period definition whenever you compare years, and say so when one figure is a fiscal period and another is not.
