Scope 2

Indirect emissions from the electricity, heat and steam a company buys.

Scope 2 covers energy produced elsewhere and consumed by you. The activity data is straightforward — kilowatt-hours from invoices and meters — so the difficulty lies entirely in the factor applied to it.

There are two accepted methods. Location-based uses the average intensity of the grid you sit on. Market-based uses the intensity of the electricity you contracted for, including certificates. They can produce very different numbers for the same consumption, and the GHG Protocol expects both to be reported.

A Scope 2 figure without its method stated is ambiguous by construction.

Scope 1 Direct emissions from sources a company owns or controls — its own combustion, its own vehicles, its own process emissions.
Scope 3 All other indirect emissions across the value chain — purchased goods, transport, use of sold products, end of life.
Emission factor The coefficient that converts an activity — a kWh, a kilogram, a tonne-kilometre — into greenhouse gas emissions.