Scope 4: what is it and how to measure

When talking about emissions your probably heard about scopes 1, 2 and 3. But have you heard about Scope 4 ?

Scope 4 emissions is an emerging term for categorizing emission reduction enabled by the company.

Scope 4 emissions are the avoided emissions happening outside of a product's life cycle or value chain.

Scope 4 emissions are driven by efficiency improvements or reductions in carbon-emitting activities.

Challenge is the ability to measure them. They emerge as the new disclosure frontier for investors to ponder.

What about related quality of bank credit given ? Or for real estate organizations, their efforts towards efficiency improvements within buildings ? Measures taken to work from home, and avoid commuting ? Efforts undertaken to develop beneficial climate-related new technologies and products ? A fast track for related patents ?

Decisions and attitudes ? Attention with the greenwashing ?

As indicated in an article by ESG Clarity, "Scope 4 is not an official category of the GHG protocol and does not count towards a company’s overall Scopes 1, 2 and 3 emissions reductions. Rather, Scope 4 is a theoretical calculation that is measured through a reference scenario, usually comparing products to the average market solution, a solution previously in place, and/or a previous generation of a product." And they conclude "For investors, taking into account Scope 4 disclosures therefore not only makes sense from a sustainability point of view, but can also make financial sense as it shows the true added value a company is making to the ESG agenda".

All in all, mind also Scope 4 emissions ... sometimes referred to as Scope X.

Click on the image below (Reuters Events) to read the full article (in English) at ESGClarity.