Challenge: Inconsistent data standards, methodologies, data gaps and boundaries, and limited availability complicate access to emission factors, making it difficult for businesses to select the right factors and ensure accurate, credible carbon accounting.
Climatiq’s Solution: The Climatiq Emission Factor Database unifies emission factor data published by various organizations into a standardized and accessible format for trusted and streamlined carbon estimations. The Climatiq team diligently sources and vets all data, ensuring the database is regularly updated with expert oversight and version control. The database also meets the requirements of GHG Protocol and ISO14067 standards, further enhancing its reliability.
Emission factors (EFs) are key components of greenhouse gas (GHG) emission calculations across all sectors and industries, and are available for a wide range of activities including combustion (e.g. burning fuels), industrial processes (e.g. cement production), and biological processes (e.g. enteric fermentation in cattle). Using the most relevant and credible emission factors is essential for producing accurate carbon estimates and developing a comprehensive understanding of the emissions associated with various activities.
With these insights, businesses can identify opportunities and develop strategies to actively reduce the carbon footprint of their own activities and of their value chains – from raw materials to end consumers.
Emission factors are needed for carbon accounting within diverse regulatory and corporate frameworks, such as the Greenhouse Gas Protocol (GHGP), Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), Canadian Corporate ESG Reporting & Disclosure, and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Developing emission factors involves scientific research, comprehensive data collection, and rigorous statistical analysis.
Emission factors are calculated by combining activity data, such as fuel consumption, with the corresponding amount of emissions produced, resulting in an average emission rate for each unit of activity.
Often it’s not possible to directly measure emissions so emissions are estimated using models based on known parameters. A simple emission factor is the CO2 released per tonne of fuel burned. More complex emission factors combine simple factors with other activities. Taking electricity generation as an example, the emission factor is kg CO2 / kWh electricity produced. This is calculated by measuring the amount of electricity generated (kWh) and the amount of fuel used (tonnes), and combining these with the emission factor for the fuel (tonnes CO2 per tonne fuel).
Emission factors differ significantly depending on the type of activity being measured, so each activity has its own distinct factor. The main sources of emissions are:
In general, the more fossil fuels burned and greenhouse gasses emitted by an activity, the higher the emission factor value, all else being equal.
Emission factors for the same activity differ between emission factor providers for several reasons, including:
The landscape of emission factor providers is diverse, comprising various types of organizations that collect, analyze, and disseminate information on GHG emissions and other pollutants. These providers offer varying levels of data coverage and support for a wide range of sectors, including energy, transportation, manufacturing, consumer goods, agriculture and waste.
Government agencies are some of the primary sources of emission factors. Examples include the EPA in the United States and BEIS / DEFRA in the United Kingdom. The UK's datasets are especially well-regarded and widely used around the world; other providers, such as the EPA and GHG Protocol, often publish emission factors sourced from UK datasets rather than calculating their own.
These agencies typically generate emission factors using standardized methodologies from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a scientific group assembled by the United Nations. Government data are essential for policy-making and regulatory compliance, offering an authoritative basis to shape sustainable practices, such as tracking and reporting greenhouse gas emissions and setting reduction targets at a national and international level.
Additionally, non-profit organizations play an important role in promoting sustainability and transparency by collecting and disseminating emission factor datasets. For example:
Several for-profit companies also provide emission factors, either by offering subscriptions to their data or by disclosing them in their public sustainability reports. In the face of the climate crisis, it's crucial for more companies to acknowledge the broader societal value of their work and proactively share it. Businesses should strive to make their data widely accessible by publishing it in user-friendly formats and ensuring it's available at minimal cost.
With CSRD, over 50,000 companies in the EU will be required to measure and report their supply chain emissions. Failure to comply could result in carbon-related taxes and fines of up to 10 million Euros or 5% of their annual revenue.
Accurate carbon calculations – essential for compliance, as well as effective emission tracking and reduction – depend on consistent and trustworthy emission factors.
Discussing the significance of these calculations, Mark Fischel, Carbon Product Lead at Novata, emphasizes that companies increasingly view emissions measurement and management as essential for business success and attracting funding. “For investors and general partners (GPs), GHG emissions are one of the most important metrics. They are in almost every single data request,” he noted.
Despite the importance of these emission factors, there is no universal standard for how they are collected and made available for use in calculations. This lack of a unified approach leads to inconsistencies, making it difficult to ensure the reliability of emission factors and to compare and select them across multiple sources.
Accessibility is a major hurdle to finding, comparing, and selecting emission factors; sources provide factors in different formats such as XLSX, CSV, and PDF. It is often difficult to extract the data from the files provided – either as a human or using machines. Additionally, while government data is usually publicly available, data from non-profit and for-profit organizations may be proprietary or behind paywalls, limiting broader access. The source documents may also need to be translated from the local language.
Climatiq’s Science and Data team, including PhD-educated scientists, actively seeks out and integrates raw datasets from vetted sources to align with both customer demands and regulatory standards, focusing on scope 1, 2, and 3 activity- and spend-based datasets.
Our sourcing and processing procedure includes the following steps:
This process ensures our schema is inclusive and representative of the best available emission factors.
A significant challenge in working with emission factors is their limited availability for particular regions or activities. This gap is compounded by the lack of standardization in naming conventions, methods, and supporting metadata, making it difficult to select the most appropriate emission factor when a direct match isn't available.
Since emission factors vary in what processes and activities they cover, they are not always defined consistently across providers. Some emission factors only cover direct emissions from a specific activity or process, whereas other factors include indirect emissions from energy use, or even wider supply chain emissions. This inconsistency in documenting boundaries can lead to significant differences in reported emissions for a business, depending on what is included or excluded from the calculations.
For this reason, we organize all data under a unified Climatiq schema, ensuring essential metadata is included for accessibility and quality control. This transparency allows users to fully understand and trust the reliability of our database.
Selecting the correct emission factors for carbon calculations involves mapping each business activity to the relevant factor, taking into account variables like geographic location, industrial processes, and the type of activities being measured. Without standardization, and given the large amount of emissions data to choose from, it’s often a challenge for organizations to compare, select and apply the right emission factors to their calculations. This can lead to errors in emissions reporting, which can undermine carbon management and regulatory compliance.
Once the vetting and normalization process is complete, the emission factors are added to Climatiq’s database. The Emission Factor Database can be accessed through our Data Explorer and Data API along with the relevant metadata, empowering our partners to easily interpret and apply emission factors to their carbon calculations.
“Receiving the context and background information [of emission factors] allows our customers to gain a deeper understanding of emission categories and the origins of the data,” - Janina Bauer, Global Head of Sustainability at Celonis.
Providers use different data collection methods and offer varying levels of transparency in their reporting processes. This leads to differences in data quality, which can impact the accuracy and reliability of the emission factors.
High quality data is also critical for assurance providers, including auditors and governing bodies, to confirm that the emission factors used in greenhouse gas inventories, product carbon footprints, and other reports are credible and can be traced back to their original sources.
“Emission factors have to be of superior quality and detail, ideally supported by a scientific committee or a dedicated team we can engage with to validate the calculations. Additionally, they need to be presented in a manner that is accessible and comprehensible even to our customers,” - Janina Bauer, Global Head of Sustainability at Celonis.
Reporting-ready: All of our data are compliant with the requirements of the GHG Protocol and our Emission Factor Database is ISO 14067 certified.
As we only include data from trusted publishers, emission factors from Climatiq’s database can be used for reporting under local and international regulations and standards that require GHG Protocol compliance, such as CSRD / ESRS, IFRS. We also include factors for region-specific reporting requirements of CBAM (Europe) and NGER (Australia).
We provide a link to the original source for each emission factor in our database, making it easy to verify its origin.
Expert Review & Maintenance: Our methodology and datasets are overseen by the Climatiq Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) of world-renowned scientists.
The database underpinning Climatiq is frequently updated; new emission factors are regularly added and existing factors are modified where needed.
Data Versioning: Climatiq utilizes systematic updating and tracking of changes to emission factor data, allowing users to control and opt into data updates. This ensures consistency and reproducibility in emissions calculations.
This systematic approach ensures the database remains accurate, reliable, and up-to-date.
Carbon is becoming a crucial KPI that businesses of all sizes must consider, particularly those in high-emitting industries like manufacturing, construction, and transport. In order to decrease emissions, organizations require accurate and actionable carbon metrics that can be utilized for better decision-making.
At Climatiq, we are dedicated to providing trusted greenhouse gas emissions insights that enable a deeper understanding and reduction of carbon footprints.
To support these efforts, we offer two solutions:
Climatiq Calculate: Our plug-and-play API automates complex carbon calculations, and has been used by our customers to power over 1.5 billion CO2 estimates.
Climatiq Data (Emission Factor Database): We have developed the largest database of unified and scientifically vetted GHG emission factors, designed to integrate all available data into a single, harmonized source of truth.
We recognize the wider societal value of the database and are committed to making it as accessible as possible, as our database is offered in a user-friendly and convenient format. To further support the crucial efforts in combating climate change, our academic plan is freely available to academics, students, and researchers.
The Climatiq Emission Factor Database offers a novel solution to the challenge of emission factor standardization. By harmonizing scientifically vetted emission factors into a cohesive schema, we provide a trusted and accessible resource which makes it easy to compare emission factors across a variety of sources, sectors, and regions.
This harmonization builds trust among stakeholders and bolsters the credibility of emission calculations, empowering more effective and accurate carbon footprint tracking, confident reporting, and informed choices throughout the value chain.
Our schema is illustrated in the table below using a 2023 ‘LPG tanker’ emission factor provided by BEIS as an example. The first column lists the individual properties of the Climatiq schema.
Visit our Data Explorer to see our data schema in action.
Looking ahead, the benefits of standardized methodologies extend far beyond emission factors. Standardization principles can be applied across a variety of domains to enhance the accuracy, comparability, and usefulness of ESG data.
Supply chain emissions data is a key area for standardization, as the majority of emissions for most companies occur within their value chains. Inconsistent or absent data from suppliers can lead to inaccuracies and gaps, and these are not always flagged by the data providers. While initiatives like the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), a non-profit that manages the global environmental disclosure system, have made strides in providing a common reporting framework, they currently only cover a limited segment of global businesses, and their data can be challenging to access.
Since scope 3 emissions include all indirect emissions within a company's value chain, the scope 1 and 2 emissions of one company become the scope 3 emissions of another. It is therefore essential for all companies to disclose their emissions consistently, openly, and clearly. Adopting standardized methodologies for reporting and verifying emissions data would then facilitate better tracking and reduction of scope 3 emissions.
Standardizing supply chain emissions data would also enhance transparency, enabling companies to identify high-emission suppliers and facilitate more productive supplier discussions to reduce their carbon footprint. Additionally, this approach would aid regulatory compliance and help investors and stakeholders to make better decisions based on reliable emissions information.
Standardizing the calculation of Product Carbon Footprints (PCFs) would bring substantial benefits. PCFs quantify the total greenhouse gas emissions associated with a product throughout its lifecycle, from raw material extraction to disposal. Widespread adoption of unified methodologies for calculating and reporting PCFs, such as those developed by the Greenhouse Gas Protocol's Product Standard or ISO 14067, would provide consistent and reliable data, enabling consumers and businesses to make more sustainable choices about the things they buy and sell. This would also support regulatory compliance and the development of eco-labeling schemes, driving market demand for low-carbon products.
Furthermore, standardized PCFs are crucial for the development of product passports and Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs). Product passports, which provide detailed information about a product’s environmental, social, and economic footprint throughout its lifecycle, rely on standardized data to ensure accuracy and comparability. Similarly, EPDs, which are third-party verified documents that report a product’s environmental impact based on a life cycle assessment (LCA), benefit from consistent PCF methodology to enhance credibility and facilitate global trade.
Comparing, understanding, and accurately applying emission factors to emission calculations is essential for businesses looking to reduce their carbon footprint and meet regulatory standards. By utilizing standardized and trusted emission factors, organizations can make decisions that drive effective emission reduction strategies.
For information on licensing our data or to learn how Climatiq is powering carbon measurement, reporting, and reduction solutions with trusted emission factors, please get in touch.
