Emissions

The Commission plays an active part in societal changes. It is thus logic that with the Communication it commits to continue to explore options for further GHG emission reductions and to ensure that it takes into account all new operations linked to its way of working.

Overall Commission summary

The Commission has developed its approach to evaluating the carbon footprint gradually, with the scope expanding to incorporate expert advice provided during annual internal reviews. A significant development occurred in 2018 when, to deliver a better life cycle approach, several additional categories of (Scope 3) emissions were introduced including i) embodied (fixed asset) emissions for buildings and IT equipment, ii) for service contracts (for example catering, security, cleaning etc) and for iii) waste disposal. Emissions from experts' travel were introduced in 2021 reporting along with those from teleworking. Moreover in 2023 embodied emissions for furniture and for additional food categories (e.g. lamb, veal, fruits, vegetables...) were added. The additional categories substantially increase the data requirements for reporting, and the carbon footprint.

Since the Greening Communication established 2019 as a baseline for targets to achieve a 38% reduction in emissions at the 8 main EMAS sites by 2030, for consistency any new categories introduced to the carbon footprint (or procedural modifications) are calculated and applied back to 2019 where possible. Headline categories are shown in the figure below, navigate to evolution of the Commission's carbon footprint (headline categories), (tonnes CO₂e) on this tab,.

In 2023 the Commission was advised to change its approach to calculating emissions for fixed assets (other than buildings) to be consistent with the Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Protocol, as this has become the dominant approach to carbon footprinting. The change mainly applies to IT and furniture and means that emissions are allocated in the year of acquisition rather than being amortised over a fixed period. For buildings the Commission continues to apply amortisation and uses the ADEME (now known as France's Agence de la transition écologique) Bilan Carbone methodology.

The coefficients used to calculate emissions in the Commission's carbon footprint are largely from the ADEME database. However other public sources are used where considered appropriate, for example DEFRA (UK government's Department for Energy, Food and Rural Affairs) for professional air travel (see Section Conversion factors used for calculating emissions).

The figure below traces the evolution of the carbon footprint since 2019. It shows a 31% reduction in emissions in 2024 compared to 2019 (against a target of 38% reduction by 2030).

Evolution of the Commission's carbon footprint (headline categories), (tonnes CO₂e)

This is mainly due to a reduction in emissions from missions and from buildings' energy consumption, the latter partly due to the Commission's goal of a 15% reduction in energy consumption in the winter of 2022-23 and which remained in place for the winter of 2023-24, in line with the EU voluntary target for Member States to reduce their natural gas consumption by 15% between 1 April 2023 and 31 March 2024.

The Commission reduced emissions from fuel for heating its buildings by 43% since 2019. This is due to a combination of measures including closing buildings where possible over low occupancy periods, and managing 'comfort' hours more efficiently across the sites.

While emissions from staff and expert missions along with staff commuting reduced drastically with Covid in 2020 and 2021, there has since been a rebound in all three and this was strongest for staff missions, for which the Greening communication objective of a 50% reduction in 2019-24 was not met.

The increase in the coefficients used to calculate emissions from air travel, applied in 2024 contributed to the increase in estimated missions emissions. This is discussed further in under Mobility.

Main components of the Commission's carbon footprint in 2024 (%)

Scope of the EC carbon footprint

In the current carbon footprint calculations, only the environmental impacts from the Commission's daily operations are considered. This focuses on emissions necessary to "run" the organisation. Consequently, some aspects are excluded as they pertain to the Commission's core business, where we have less influence.

The following are excluded from the calculations:

• Emissions associated with service contracts related to the core business (i.e.studies and policies), rather than operational contracts.
• Travel for experts that is funded through operational rather than the administrative budget.
• Emissions from other sites that are not EMAS registered, such as Representations (except for the seven Representations that are EMAS registered) and EC Delegations (other than emissions from EC staff missions)

The Commission reduced mobility emissions (staff commuting, staff professional travel and experts' travel) by around 40% since 2019. In this period, emissions from staff commuting halved, experts' travel emissions reduced by almost 60%, and those from staff professional travel by air reduced by 23%. In 2019 these categories represented 45% of the carbon footprint, reducing to 40% in 2024.

The figure below shows the main components of the carbon footprint. Buildings related emissions account for roughly half with those from buildings energy use and refrigerant loss equivalent to those generated from construction (fixed assets). The embodied emissions from buildings' construction has decreased by 12% since 2019 but should reduce further under the Commission's real-estate policy.

Detailed carbon footprint, and site specifics

The table Emissions at the EMAS sites in 2024 below shows the categories of the carbon footprint by scope, providing more detail than the figure Evolution of the Commission's carbon footprint, navigate to this section on this tab, above. The totals clearly reflect different site characteristics and patterns of energy usage. For example:

Overall, Scope 1 emissions account for around 15% of the Commission carbon footprint while Scope 3 account for more than 80%. The situation at site level varies considerably (at Ispra due to the trigeneration plant, scope 1 represents 50% of emissions), and reflects to some degree, for Scope 1, the greater local reliance on fossil fuels for energy supply.

The evolution of performance of individual sites to 2024 is as follows:

The evolution of the total carbon footprint at the individual EMAS sites is presented in Annex 10 and gives rise to the following observations, open in this tab,

Commission carbon footprint and greening action plan

The table below shows the distribution of expected emissions reductions for 2019-30 by category under the Greening Communication action plan, resulting in an overall reduction of 38%. While there is some site specificity, for several categories the quantities are Commission wide.

The scope of the carbon footprint when the Communication was published has since expanded. Teleworking was not included and generates additional emissions, but consequently commuting emissions are reduced. Although not introduced until reporting for 2021, it has been estimated for the baseline year 2019 and for the following years.

In 2024, the carbon footprint of the seven EMAS-registered representations was included, along with the emissions from Commission staff travels originating from non-EMAS registered sites.

Progress against Greening Commission targets (2019-2030)

Conversion factors for calculating emissions

Too many conversion factors were used to prepare this report to list here. However, as in previous years, the majority were provided under the Bilan Carbone methodology that was originally established by ADEME, and available to the public: https://bilans-ges.ademe.fr, open in a new tab.

This was complemented by multiple other sources including, but not exclusively:

• DEFRA, the UK Government Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, used for commercial aviation emissions, and carbon trust for calorific values of liquid fuels
• IEA, the International Energy Agency, used for the emissions factors for national electricity networks
• FEBIAC, the Belgian federation of automobiles and motorcycling, for emissions of national vehicle fleet
• EUROSTAT and https://www.odyssee-mure. eu , open in a new tab, projects for factors relating to domestic space heating and cooling data in EU Member States
• Internal operational data for vehicle fleets
• IPPC for refrigerant Global Warming Potential (GWP) values according to the Greenhouse Gas Protocol (GHG)
• Commercial sources for global warming potential for some refrigerants

The Commission's approach to the carbon footprint is reviewed annually by experts who recommend updates to the methodology, coefficients and sources when required. This year the methodology to calculate scope 3 emissions results in some small changes, as stated in Overall Commission summary, navigate to the section on this tab,.

Monitoring and mitigating emissions from other sources

Fixed asset (embodied energy) for IT fixed assets

Several actions encompass the IT domain, and a new digital strategy was created in 2022. The emissions associated with IT fixed assets are calculated using the annual inventory for 17 categories of IT equipment (see Circularity Chapter). Following a switch to accounting all emissions for IT equipment in the year of purchase according to the GHG protocol, the resulting Commission level emissions reduced.

The reasons for this include a reduction in the number of larger equipment items such as laptops, desktop printers as well as in some coefficients used in the calculations. The site level breakdown is included in Annex 3, navigate to the section on this tab,.

Teleworking

Teleworking emissions were introduced in the 2021 reporting exercise. Estimations are compiled from publicly available national data sets for energy use, combined with Commission staff survey and aggregate HR data on presence at the sites. While 2021 reporting benefitted from a small number of questions on teleworking in the Staff Environmental Awareness Survey that was addressed to a selection of staff, a more extensive dedicated teleworking survey 2023 was sent to all staff.

The breakdown in the components of teleworking emissions in 2024 is presented in the figure below for all the sites. The largest components were space heating (55%) and equipment electricity use (30%).

Components of total teleworking emissions in 2024

The distribution of teleworking emissions between the sites is shown in the figure below.

Teleworking emissions at EMAS sites in 2024 (kgCO₂e/person)

While climate plays a role, Seville has very little heating emissions, the national energy mix is also important. The evolution of total teleworking emissions is shown below compiled with data from Annex 8, open in this tab,.

Evolution of teleworking emissions, tonnes CO₂e

Teleworkers were 6% of staff in 2018, 7% in 2019 and 8% in 2020 before the lockdown. The percentage of teleworkers during the pandemic varied between 50% and 100% from site to site.

Greater emissions were observed in 2021 than in 2020 because staff were encouraged to telework for the whole year.

The Commission adopted the Working Time and Hybrid Working Decision in 2022 after which teleworking accounted for 40% to 60% of working time across the sites. Therefore, benefitting from more flexible working arrangements, most staff spend more time working at home than they did in 2019, but not as much as during the Covid pandemic.

Service contracts

Emissions generated by service contracts are shown in the figure below. Categories include security, cleaning and, following a harmonisation exercise by all sites three further categories identified with different emission factors: iii) 'hard' service contracts: printing, advertising, architecture and engineering, multi-technical building maintenance, iv) 'soft' service contracts: service/insurance, banking services, advice, and fees and v) other heavy service contracts. The data in Annex 5 suggest that hard service contracts are the largest contributors for most of the sites.

Generally higher emissions in recent years are likely in part due to more complete reporting. The reporting of emissions relating to service contracts concerning nuclear activities is under review.

Emissions from service contracts (tCO₂e)

Other sources of emissions

Other sources of emissions are displayed in the specific sections:

• Buildings , Open in this tab.
• Mobility , Open in this tab.
• Waste , Open in this tab.
• Paper , Open in this tab.