Carbon footprint consultancy UK

The total is the small part of what you are buying.

The part that lasts is the calculation file: the boundary decisions, the emission factors, the data trail and the written method that a verifier will work back through.

That file is reused every year, by a SECR disclosure, by UK SRS S2 climate metrics, by a CDP response and by any target you set.

A boundary or factor choice made badly in year one therefore resurfaces as a restatement later.

This is also why the question “what do we own at the end?” matters more than the price of the first year.

If the file stays in a provider’s system, you have bought a subscription rather than an inventory.

Measurement is one discipline in a wider market: the carbon consultancy guide covers reduction and compliance work, and the net zero consultancy guide covers targets and transition plans.

A company that used 40,000 kWh of energy or less may leave the figures out, but only by saying in the report that this is why.

The SECR reporting guide covers the disclosure in full, and SECR covers who is in scope.

For listed companies, the FCA’s final rules in PS26/19 require reporting against UK SRS on a comply-or-explain basis for accounting periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027, with first reports in 2028.

They replace the consultation, CP26/5, which had proposed UK SRS S2 as mandatory; the final rules put all of UK SRS on comply or explain.

UK SRS S2 ¶29(a) asks for absolute gross Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions, measured in accordance with the GHG Protocol Corporate Standard.

In the first year a company may use the Scope 3 relief, and if it does it says so and need explain no further.

Whether a company is caught at all depends on its listing category, not its size, as UK SRS thresholds explains; the two standards are set out on UK SRS S1 and S2.

Government procurement asks for a third shape: PPN 006 asks bidders for in-scope contracts worth more than £5 million a year for a Carbon Reduction Plan covering Scope 1 and 2 and five named Scope 3 categories.

That is a condition of participation set by the contracting authority, not a legal duty on the company.

ESOS is about energy rather than carbon, but it runs on the same meter data; the ESOS Phase 4 guide and ESOS compliance guidance cover it.

What can be accredited is a body: in the UK, UKAS accredits validation and verification bodies against ISO/IEC 17029, with ISO 14065 as the greenhouse gas scheme.

Bodies accredited only to the old ISO 14065:2013 route had to move to ISO/IEC 17029 by 30 June 2024.

So “ISO 14064 accredited” means one of three things: the firm builds inventories to ISO 14064-1, which is a method and not a credential; an accredited body verified a client’s statement, which is the client’s credential; or nothing at all.

The check takes a minute: ask for the verification body’s UKAS schedule number, look it up, and read what the schedule covers.

A schedule names its standards and scope, and a body accredited for corporate inventories is not thereby accredited for product footprints.

The same discipline applies to badges: a CDP Accredited Solutions Provider is accredited by CDP for its own programme, and SBTi Services, which validates targets, says it does not offer consultation services.

The 2026 post-implementation review puts the mean ongoing cost at £7,100 a year, internal and external together.

The underlying evaluation report records about 94 hours of internal staff time, roughly £2,500, and that 56% of compliers incur external costs.

The 2018 impact assessment had forecast £2,300, and the review attributes part of the gap to an error in that assessment’s own costing.

It also found 19,900 organisations in scope against a forecast of 11,300; the review document sets out both.

SECR is not the whole of a carbon footprint, but it is the one measurement of what UK companies pay that does not come from someone selling the service.

Public bodies can buy through the Government Commercial Agency’s Management Consultancy Framework Four, whose Lot 9 covers environment and sustainability and runs to 28 July 2027; its rates are visible to buyers only, so none are repeated here.

When comparing quotes, ask for days by grade and the year-two price in the same proposal.

It binds RICS members as a professional obligation; there is no legal requirement in England to assess or limit the whole-life carbon of a building, and the industry’s “Part Z” is a proposal, not law.

The product data underneath is an environmental product declaration built to BS EN 15804, the core rules for construction products.

This work is usually bought from a building consultancy or a construction life cycle specialist rather than from a corporate inventory provider.

The FCA’s product-level rules changed on 25 September 2026: FCA 2026/59 removed the product report’s five metrics, including weighted average carbon intensity, from ESG 2.3.

In-scope asset managers and owners keep the entity-level TCFD report and must now provide Scope 1, 2 and 3 data on request under ESG 2.3.5AR, once a year per product.

Portfolio carbon intensity is therefore reported by the firm itself, if at all, rather than bought from a footprint consultant.

Which conversion factor release, for which year of activity data?

Which of the fifteen Scope 3 categories, and why are any left out?

Who verifies, under whose accreditation, or is no verification included?

What do we own at the end, and in what format?

What does year two cost, in this proposal?

The panel turns your answers into a draft brief you can copy, and the guide to choosing a consultant covers the rest of the process.

If the driver is ESOS, the lead assessor is a separately registered role; the ESOS consultants and assessors guide explains how to check one.

Forward-looking work — targets, transition plans and capital allocation — takes the footprint as an input and does not produce one.

Many firms sell both, which can be convenient, but price the footprint separately: it is the one part of the programme with an objective standard behind it.

If you are not sure you have to report at all, start with UK SRS thresholds and SECR before you pay anyone to measure.

To talk the question through, you can book a free 15-minute call.