Business Carbon Footprint
There are many tools and guidelines available for establishing the carbon footprint of your business. These are particularly relevant if you want to see where are the hot-spots or vulnerabilities in your business (e.g. should you be focusing effort on production emissions or business transport?)
The Greenhouse Gas Protocol Initiative: http://www.ghgprotocol.org/
"The most widely used international accounting tool for government and business leaders to understand, quantify, and manage greenhouse gas emissions."
It’s a fairly easy to navigate site, with free access to well written background documents/ protocols: http://www.ghgprotocol.org/standards/publications
and spreadsheet tools: http://www.ghgprotocol.org/calculation-tools/all-tools
The spreadsheets for business and commuting travel are relatively easy to use for developing a high level view of this scale of impact. I particularly like their well-referenced emission factors sheets within these tools.
Defra Guidance on How to Measure and Report your Greenhouse Gas Emissions
(Sept 2009 update) http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/business/reporting/
UNEP Guidelines for Calculating GHG Emissions for Businesses and Non-Commercial Organizations: http://www.unep.fr/energy/information/tools/ghg/
Another well put together spreadsheet tool, which is particularly good for doing year on year comparisons.
Spreadsheet: http://www.unep.fr/energy/information/tools/ghg/software.htm (Link to instructions on zipped file installation)
Guidance document: http://www.unep.fr/energy/information/tools/ghg/pdf/GHG_Indicator.pdf
BSi standards (Carbon Footprint Verification) – If you are reporting your carbon footprints publically or passing figures to your customers, it is advisable to have them externally verified. This website can offer some guidance for this: (http://www.bsigroup.co.uk/en/Assessment-and-Certification-services/Management-systems/Standards-and-Schemes/CFV/)
