Finetuning CO₂‑factors

Via Finetuning > CO₂ Factors, you can adjust CO₂ factors for the entire organization and/or per barometer. You can add CO₂ factors and overwrite default factors for each item that is CO₂‑relevant. CO₂‑relevant means that the item is linked to one of the scopes from the Greenhouse Gas protocol.

The list contains all CO₂‑relevant items that are activated in your subscription.
On the right, you can see the CO₂ factors for the active barometer in the current year.
Click on the CO₂ factor (or the empty grey box) to adjust the CO₂ factor for the item.

Changing CO₂ Factors

In the CO₂ Factors screen, you can change the CO₂ factor at two levels:

• For the entire organization: on the second row, directly below the row with default values.
• Per barometer: in the table below that.

How it works:

• Click on a value you want to change. Type the new value and save it with the green checkmark (or enter).
• This value is now applied for all years until a subsequent modified value.
• A change at the organization level applies to all barometers unless it is overridden at the barometer level.
• Black numbers are adjusted values. Grey ones are ‘automatic’ values.
• To remove an adjustment, delete the entered value; the number will then turn grey. Confirm this with the green checkmark. The number will remain grey.

Tips:

• Make sure your CO₂ value matches the unit of measurement (at the top of the screen), for example, kg CO₂/kWh and not tons CO₂/kWh.
• If you have many barometers and/or many years: you can limit the number of barometers and years displayed using the ‘label filter’ and the ‘time window’ in the green top bar.
• Note: if you have hidden the oldest years with the time window and you adjust the CO₂ factor for the oldest year in your screen, that change will not apply to the older (hidden) years.
• Waste has no default CO₂ factors in the Envirometer (because the factor is highly dependent on what is in the waste and what happens to the waste). If you have suitable CO₂ factors for your waste streams, you can provide waste with CO₂ factors and include it as a scope-3 emission.

How it works if you sum barometers/years with different CO₂ factors
If an item has the same CO₂ factor in all barometers and years, summing is easy. However, if the CO₂ factor varies (for example, between Dutch and German electricity), the question arises as to what happens. There are two ways of summing in the barometer: summing individual years or using a sumbarometer.

• With the sum years function, you paste the sum into an (existing) barometer. The summed year thus uses the CO₂ factors of the barometer and year into which it is pasted.
• An (automatic) sumbarometer calculates average CO₂ factors. It sums the CO₂ emissions and sums the amount per item. With these two numbers, the average CO₂ factor is calculated. For instance: if the total electricity consumption in the sumbarometer is 3,000 kWh and the emissions thereof are 1,500 kg CO₂, the caculated CO₂ factor in the CO₂ footprint is 0.5 kg CO₂/kWh.