In an effort to ease compliance to the U.K.'s 2008 Climate
Change Act, the country's Department for Transport and Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs published guidance and released a
calculation tool for reporting carbon emissions from government-related
business travel. Corporations also are considering that tool as a means to
report their business travel emissions as Parliament may mandate that such
calculations be included in corporate annual reports.
Released during the same month that U.K.
government departments must begin publishing the full details of their carbon
emissions resulting from business travel, the guidance—which facilitates
measurements for air, car, bus, ferry, rail and motorcycle—serves as a crucial
document, according to Jonathan Green, an associate at JMP Consultants and
former DEFRA lead on sustainable business travel.
"Government has recognized that calculating
emissions from travel and transport is more challenging, so they commissioned
us to develop this guidance to assist organizations to identify where to sort
information relating to work-related travel or business travel and commuting to
and from work as well," Green said.
Calculating emissions from employee commutation
to and from work is not a stipulation of the 2008 Climate Change Act, but could
be the next step, according to Green.
"HM Treasury has committed our central
government departments to include sustainability reporting and carbon
reporting—alongside their financial returns— that includes business travel.
That clearly doesn't
include commuting," Green explained. Work-related travel, including both business
travel and commuting, can account for 50 percent or more of a non-manufacturing
organization's footprint,
according to the government document.
While it is not required to so, the National
Health Service began reporting its commuter carbon footprint in an attempt "to align the
health agenda and the carbon agenda," Green said.
Provided to departments via the DEFRA website,
the calculation tool processes data that "should fall in line with the greenhouse
protocols" mandated by
Parliament, according to Green. "DEFRA and the Department for Energy and Climate
Change are saying that this is the guidance and this is how you should report
your emissions."
The guidance outlines ways in which data can be
sourced to generate consistent carbon reporting, including information from
travel agencies and other travel suppliers. "Information on work-related travel could be
sourced from internal management information and reporting systems, which could
include the finance and accounting system, asset register, travel and
subsistence forms, expense systems and bespoke travel databases, spreadsheets
or files," according to the
document.
It also suggests that "when negotiating
contracts with travel suppliers, request that management information on fuel
consumption and distance traveled is provided."
Some emission-reporting proponents "are
too hung up on getting [business travel carbon emissions] down to the
gram," Green continued, "but we need to better understand the
calculations of emissions to create a footprint and use our procurement in a
smarter way to carry travelers, and I don't think we are doing that."
The guidance excludes hotel emissions
calculations because DEFRA is "not currently in a position to report emissions
from hotels on a per-property basis effectively or distribute that information
effectively," Green noted. "The hotel industry
needs to engage in a better conversation about how it can meet demand for
available room night data. Hotels are not currently in the position to do that,
and those that are may be providing very generic information. The buying
community and the hotel community and the distribution community actually need
to understand what one another wants."
Potential
Implications For Corporations
The independent Committee on Climate Change is
scheduled to deliver by April 2012 to U.K. government officials a set of
recommendations on whether corporations also should be required to report
carbon emissions from business travel, according to Green.
"If the pressure on corporates comes in to
report on carbon-related travel business and commuting, then there is a system
and a structure in place that enables them to do that," Green explained.
"It may not be perfect to do that initially, but at least it provides that
starting point from which to take action and can be refined as you go along.
The Committee on Climate Change will look to make a recommendation on whether
businesses should engage in mandatory carbon reporting from April 6,
2012."
U.K. corporations "have now come to
grips" with reporting
their carbon emissions from energy consumption, Green said, but for business
travel, reporting is "a little bit cloudy."