About the Corporate Standard

The GHG Protocol Corporate Accounting and Reporting Standard provides requirements and guidance for companies and other organizations preparing a GHG emissions inventory. It was designed with the following objectives in mind:

• To help companies prepare a GHG inventory that represents a true and fair account of their emissions through the use of standardized approaches and principles
• To simplify and reduce the costs of compiling a GHG inventory
• To provide business with information that can be used to build an effective strategy to manage and reduce GHG emissions
• To increase consistency and transparency in GHG accounting and reporting among various companies and GHG programs

The module builds on the experience and knowledge of over 350 leading experts drawn from businesses, NGOs, governments and accounting associations. It has been road-tested by over 30 companies in nine countries. 

Who Can Use the Corporate Standard?

This standard is written primarily from the perspective of a business developing a GHG inventory. However, it applies equally to other types of organizations with operations that give rise to GHG emissions, e.g., NGOs, government agencies, and universities. It should not be used to quantify the reductions associated with GHG mitigation projects for use as offsets or credits; the GHG Protocol for Project Accounting provides requirements and guidance for this purpose. Policy makers and architects of GHG programs can also use relevant parts of this standard as a basis for their own accounting and reporting requirements.

Compatibility with Other GHG Programs

The GHG Protocol Corporate Standard has been designed to be program or policy neutral. However, it is compatible with most existing GHG programs and their own accounting and reporting requirements. It is important to distinguish between the GHG Protocol Corporate Standard from other GHG programs. This standard focuses only on the accounting and reporting of emissions, but does not require emissions information to be reported to WRI or WBCSD. In addition, while this standard is designed to develop a verifiable inventory, it does not provide a standard for how the verification process should be conducted.

Calculation Tools

To complement the standard and guidance provided here, a number of cross-sector and sector-specific calculation tools are available. These tools provide step-by-step guidance and electronic worksheets to help users calculate GHG emissions from specific sources or industries.