☁️Carbon Accounting

Carbon accounting is the standard industry term for calculating, inventorying, or measurement greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions using Greenhouse Gas Protocol Corporate Standard. As a starting resource, we recommend reading our overview guide to carbon accounting here.

To perform carbon accounting Brightest, we recommend following these steps:

Step 1 - Familiarize Yourself with GHG Protocol Principles

Carbon accounting is divided into Scope 1 (direct), Scope 2 (purchased), and Scope 3 (value chain) emissions. What that means in practice is inventorying the different sources of emissions from fossil fuels, refrigerants, and other sources your business uses, purchases, leases, or subcontracts:

Scope 1 typical sources:

• Fuel from vehicles your organization owns or operationally controls (ex: gas, diesel)

• Fuel from equipment you own or operationally control (ex: propane, LPG)

• Other fossil fuels burned on-site or on-location that aren't purchased via a 3rd party (like a municipal heating provider or energy utility)

Scope 2 typical sources:

• Electricity purchased from the grid, an energy utility, or your local government

• Heating purchased from an energy utility or your local government

• Steam and/or cooling purchased from third parties

Scope 3 emissions:

• Purchased goods and services

• Fuel- and energy-related activities in your value chain or supply chain

• Capital goods

• Employee business travel

• Employee commuting

• Investments

• Other Scope 3 emissions sources

All the Scope 1, 2 & 3 carbon accounting categories in GHG Protocol

Step 2 - Collect Your Input Data

To calculate your emissions, you're going to need to collect data on all the relevant and applicable sources and activities, such as the ones we've outlined above in Step 1. Make sure to consider:

• Do I have activity data for this information? (ex: kWh of energy used, transportation miles, etc.)

• Do I have spend data for this information? (ex: financial value of money spent per supplier or vendor on purchased goods and services)

• Where does this information live in my organization? And how can I get access to it? (ex: finance systems, databases, purchase records, data requests to specific teammates who are responsible for these areas)

• How accurate, trustworthy, recent, and well-documented is this information? If we were ever audited, would our carbon accounting hold up?

Most organizations will end up using a mix of activity, spend, and placeholder estimates to calculate their emissions. Spend-based data can be particularly helpful when measuring Scope 3 emissions.

Step 3 - Find Relevant Emissions Factors for Your Activity and Spend Data

Emissions factors are used to convert activity and spend information into emissions, specifically CO2e, the common international accounting unit for GHG emissions measurement and reporting.

To find relevant emissions factors, visit your Brightest emissions factor library:

You can also import and upload your own emissions factors using our CSV importer, or customize emissions factors directly in your Brightest sustainability settings.

Step 4 - Enter or Import Your Data in Brightest

Once you've collected your input data and emissions factors, you're ready to calculate your emissions:

For office, site, vehicle, and equipment information (activity-based), enter or upload that in the applicable footprint. See:

👣Uploading Asset Footprint Data

For transportation and travel data, create or import Transit events.

For spend and financial data, create or import Spend items.

From there, our system will calculate and show you your GHG emissions inventory: