Scope 3 emissions · fifteen categories, five UK answers
Scope 3 emissions:
UK reporting
Scope 3 emissions are the indirect emissions in a company’s value chain — at its suppliers and its customers — in the fifteen categories of the GHG Protocol Scope 3 Standard.
UK rules ask for very different parts of it: one slice under SECR, five categories in a Carbon Reduction Plan, and all fifteen considered under UK SRS S2.
For listed companies the FCA’s final rules put Scope 3 on comply or explain from 2027, after a one-year relief that has to be stated.
Definition
Scope 3 is the value chain, defined by the GHG Protocol
Scope 3 is every indirect emission a company causes that is not the generation of energy it buys.
Read the provisions and qualifications
It is defined by the Corporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Accounting and Reporting Standard, published in 2011 and amended in 2013, not by any UK instrument.
UK SRS S2 adopts the taxonomy rather than inventing one: ¶29(a)(vi)(1) pins the categories to the 2011 Scope 3 Standard.
Which categories are large depends on the business model.
For manufacturers and retailers category 1 usually leads; for makers of energy-using goods category 11 can dominate; for a bank or asset manager category 15, financed emissions, outweighs the rest.
The GHG Protocol asks companies to cite the standard by section and table, never by page, because page numbers differ between its printed and electronic versions.
For how Scope 3 relates to the other two scopes, see Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions.
Value-chain emissions
Definition
Value-chain emissions
2011 standard
Value-chain emissions
UK taxonomy
Value-chain emissions
Business model
Tables and tools
Your Scope 1 and Scope 2 are your customers’ Scope 3.
Their Scope 1 and 2 are your Scope 3.
For a construction customer, the materials you sell become part of the embodied carbon of what it builds, explained on embodied carbon.
The categories are built to be mutually exclusive inside one inventory.
Source: GHG Protocol Scope 3 Standard
Supply chain
What are scope 3 supply chain emissions?
The upstream part of Scope 3: the emissions behind what a company buys, counted in categories 1 to 8, with supplier data first and a spend-based estimate where it is missing.
| The question | The answer | Where it is set |
|---|---|---|
| Which categories? | All eight upstream categories, 1 to 8. The supply chain proper sits chiefly in purchased goods and services (1), capital goods (2) and upstream transportation and distribution (4). | Scope 3 Standard, Table 5.4 |
| Whose data? | The supplier’s own, where it can be had: supplier-specific data first, then a mix with industry averages, then average data alone. | Technical Guidance, categories 1 and 2 |
| When it is missing? | Spend-based: money spent multiplied by an average emissions-per-pound factor. DESNZ says to use it where there is not enough data for activity-based methods, and to report which method was used. | Technical Guidance; DESNZ conversion factors page |
A company’s suppliers’ Scope 1 and 2 are its Scope 3, which is why supply chain data is the hardest part of an inventory to get and the part most often estimated.
UK SRS S2 prefers primary data “with all else being equal” (¶B47) and presumes Scope 3 can be estimated reliably from secondary data and industry averages (¶B57), and asks for the approach, inputs and assumptions to be disclosed (¶29(a)(iii)).
The catch is in the method: a spend-based figure cannot tell an efficient supplier from an inefficient one, so it finds the big categories and does not show a supplier’s reduction.
The methods table gives the method for every category, and the spend-based screen works the arithmetic on one ledger.
Terms such as upstream, downstream and spend-based are defined in the carbon and emissions glossary.
All fifteen
The fifteen categories, with an example of each
| # | Category | An example |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Purchased goods and services | The steel, packaging and components a manufacturer buys; the cleaning and IT services an office buys |
| 2 | Capital goods | A new production line, a delivery van or a building bought as a long-life asset |
| 3 | Fuel- and energy-related activities | Extracting and refining the diesel you burn; electricity lost on the grid before it reaches you |
| 4 | Upstream transportation and distribution | A haulier you pay to bring materials in, or to move goods between your sites |
| 5 | Waste generated in operations | Landfill, incineration or recycling of waste from your own sites |
| 6 | Business travel | Flights, trains, hotels, hire cars, and staff cars on business mileage |
| 7 | Employee commuting | Staff travelling between home and work; homeworking, where you count it |
| 8 | Upstream leased assets | A warehouse you lease where the landlord controls the boiler and meter |
| 9 | Downstream transportation and distribution | A courier taking sold goods to the customer, not paid for by you |
| 10 | Processing of sold products | A bakery processing the flour a miller sells it |
| 11 | Use of sold products | The electricity customers use running the appliances you sell |
| 12 | End-of-life treatment of sold products | Your products being landfilled, burned or recycled after use |
| 13 | Downstream leased assets | Units a property owner leases to tenants |
| 14 | Franchises | The Scope 1 and 2 of franchisees trading under your brand |
| 15 | Investments | A bank’s share of the emissions of the companies and projects it finances |
Two boundary points account for most double counting.
Category 3 holds the upstream share of energy — extracting and refining fuels, and grid losses — while the generation of purchased electricity stays in Scope 2; the government publishes the losses as a separate factor.
Categories 4 and 9 turn on who pays: transport you pay for is upstream, even after the sale; transport your customer pays for is downstream.
Leased assets follow the consolidation approach the company chose, which is why the same building can be Scope 1 and 2 for one company and category 8 for another.
Category boundaries
Double counting
Category boundaries
Upstream energy
Category boundaries
Transport payer
Category boundaries
Leased assets
Required or optional
No category is optional — but three instruments, three answers
| Reporting under | Scope 3 status | Where it says so |
|---|---|---|
| GHG Protocol Corporate Standard (2004) alone | Optional in full: a minimum of Scope 1 and Scope 2 is required | Ch 4, Ch 9, Table 1.1 |
| Corporate Standard plus the Scope 3 Standard (2011) | All fifteen accounted for; exclusions disclosed and justified | §6.2, Table 1.1 |
| UK SRS S2 | Gross Scope 3; all fifteen considered; the included categories disclosed; an untimed ¶C4 relief | ¶¶29(a)(i)(3), B32, B33, C4 |
There is no list of required and optional categories in the Scope 3 Standard, whatever widely repeated versions say.
§6.2 says companies “shall account for all scope 3 emissions … and disclose and justify any exclusions”; the word optional attaches to activities inside a category beyond its minimum boundary, never to a category.
A category the company does not have is reported as zero or not applicable, not left out.
One sub-rule is genuine and narrow: a company selling intermediate products may disclose and justify excluding downstream categories 9, 10, 11 and 12, but should not exclude some of the four selectively.
UK SRS S2 is a third thing again: ¶B32 requires an entity to consider its entire value chain and all fifteen categories, then to disclose which are included, and ¶B33 requires that disclosure whatever the method.
It is wrong to write that UK SRS S2 requires all fifteen to be reported.
Screening every category is how the material ones are found; it is not how the rest are dropped.
Inclusions and exclusions
No optional list
Inclusions and exclusions
Standard obligation
Inclusions and exclusions
Not applicable
Inclusions and exclusions
Intermediate products
How to measure it
Methods, ranked by specificity, and what UK SRS S2 asks of them
| Category | Methods in the Technical Guidance |
|---|---|
| 1 and 2 | Supplier-specific · hybrid · average-data · spend-based |
| 3 | Supplier-specific · average-data |
| 4 and 9 | Fuel-based · distance-based · spend-based (transport); site-specific · average-data (distribution) |
| 5 | Supplier-specific · waste-type-specific · average-data |
| 6 | Fuel-based · distance-based · spend-based |
| 7 | Fuel-based · distance-based · average-data |
| 8 and 13 | Asset-specific · lessor-specific · average-data (the two do not differ) |
| 10 | Site-specific · average-data |
| 11 | Direct and indirect use-phase methods |
| 12 | Waste-type-specific |
| 14 | Franchise-specific · average-data |
| 15 | Investment-specific · project-specific · average-data; PCAF for financed emissions |
The Technical Guidance ranks methods “from most to least specific to a company’s actual activities”, and adds that companies “need not always use the most specific method as a first preference”.
Spend-based multiplies money spent by an average emissions-per-pound factor; it is fast across a whole ledger and cannot tell an efficient supplier from an inefficient one.
Average-data multiplies physical quantities — tonnes, tonne-kilometres, kWh — by industry-average factors; supplier-specific uses the supplier’s own product-level data.
UK SRS S2 sets a measurement framework in ¶¶B38–B57 that prescribes no method and no factor (¶B29: use the factors that best represent the activity).
Inputs are prioritised by four characteristics “in no particular order”: direct measurement, value-chain specificity, timeliness and fit to the jurisdiction and technology, and verification (¶B40).
Primary data is preferred “with all else being equal” (¶B47), and ¶B57 sets a presumption that Scope 3 can be estimated reliably from secondary data and industry averages.
What gets disclosed is not a data-quality tier but the extent to which Scope 3 rests on inputs from specific activities and on verified inputs (¶B56), with the approach, inputs and assumptions and any changes to them (¶29(a)(iii)).
And ¶B34 makes a significant event — a supplier change, an acquisition, a new emissions rule — a trigger to reassess which categories and entities are included; it is not a base-year recalculation rule.
One drafting slip to know: ¶B41 still refers to a relief “in paragraph C4(a)”, an IFRS number carried over; in UK SRS S2 the method relief it means is ¶C3.
Measurement methods
Specificity
Measurement methods
Spend-based
Measurement methods
Activity-based
Measurement methods
S2 framework
Category 15
Investments, financed emissions and PCAF
For an asset manager, bank or insurer, UK SRS S2 ¶29(a)(vi)(2) asks for additional information on financed emissions within category 15.
Read the provisions and qualifications
The December 2025 amendments to IFRS S2, carried into the UK text as ¶¶29A–29C, permit an entity to limit category 15 to its financed emissions — loans, project finance, bonds, equity and undrawn loan commitments, and for asset managers assets under management — and to exclude emissions attributable to derivatives.
An entity using the limitation explains what it treated as a derivative and which activities it excluded (¶29B), and gives the category 15 total and the financed-emissions subtotal (¶29C).
The attribution method most financial institutions use is PCAF, whose Part A third edition was published in December 2025.
PCAF’s own page notes that only six of its asset-class methods carry the GHG Protocol’s “Built on GHG Protocol” mark, because that review service has closed.
The family’s dedicated reference is Scope 3 category 15 financed emissions on uksrs.finance.
Financed emissions
Financial activities
Financed emissions
Permitted limitation
Financed emissions
Explain exclusions
Financed emissions
PCAF
Worked example
A spend-based screen, with the arithmetic shown
A manufacturer’s FY2026 purchase ledger, category 1 lines only: £3,000,000 of steel, £1,200,000 of packaging and £80,000 of software licences — illustrative figures.
In the UK the spend-based factors come from Defra, not from the conversion factors most companies know.
The 2026 methodology paper says so at ¶1.6: its factors “differ from the spend-based emissions multipliers currently published by” Defra, which can give “an initial assessment of a user’s full supply-chain emissions”.
Defra publishes them as spend-based emissions multipliers, 1997 to 2023, refreshed on 30 June 2026.
Map each ledger line to its product group in that table, read off the multiplier in kgCO2e per pound, and multiply: emissions in tonnes = spend × multiplier ÷ 1,000.
The arithmetic carries a lesson before any factor is looked up: the software line is one thirty-seventh and a half of the steel line, so it would need a multiplier 37.5 times steel’s just to match it.
Rank the results, move the top lines to activity data or supplier figures, and leave the tail on spend.
The paper adds that users “should ensure they report the methods used”, and UK SRS S2 ¶29(a)(iii) asks for the same.
The activity-based factors are on GHG conversion factors; whether a platform records which method produced each category is a test in carbon accounting software.
Spend-based screen · category 1
| Ledger line | Spend, £ | Multiplier, kgCO2e per £ |
|---|---|---|
Enter a multiplier for each line from Defra’s spend-based multiplier table.
Before you do, note that the software line would need a multiplier 37.5 times steel’s just to match it.
Two suppliers charging the same price get the same figure however efficiently they work: a screen says where to spend measurement effort, not what anyone emits.
Arithmetic: spend × multiplier ÷ 1,000.
Method: DESNZ 2026 Methodology Paper ¶1.6; GHG Protocol Scope 3 Technical Guidance (spend-based method).
Report the method and the multiplier year.
Nothing you enter is stored or sent.
Pitfalls
Four Scope 3 mistakes and what good looks like
| Mistake | Why it matters | What good looks like |
|---|---|---|
| A spend-based figure presented without saying so | UK SRS S2 ¶29(a)(iii) asks for the approach, inputs and assumptions; DESNZ ¶1.6 asks users to report methods | Per category: spend-based, average-data or supplier-specific, with the factor source and year |
| The multiplier year treated as the spend year | Defra’s table runs to 2023, so a 2026 ledger is multiplied by an earlier year’s factors | State the factor year beside the spend year, and revisit when Defra updates |
| Purchased electricity counted in category 3 | Generation is Scope 2; category 3 holds upstream fuel and grid losses | Take generation from the Scope 2 calculation; put only the upstream and loss factors in category 3 |
| A category dropped because it screened small | The Scope 3 Standard requires exclusions to be disclosed and justified; UK SRS S2 ¶B32 requires all fifteen to be considered | Report it at its screened value, or as not applicable with the reason |
Scope 3 under UK rules
What UK law and policy actually ask for
SECR, quoted company. No Scope 3 limb: the quoted-company paragraphs cover fuel combustion, facilities and purchased energy, so any Scope 3 in a quoted company’s directors’ report is there by choice.
Read the provisions and qualifications
SECR, unquoted company or LLP. One narrow limb: ¶20D(1)(b) asks for emissions from “the consumption of fuel for the purposes of transport”, and the March 2019 guidelines read that as covering personal and hire cars on business use, including reimbursed mileage — part of category 6.
The test is who buys the fuel, not who owns the car; no other category appears anywhere in Part 7A.
UK SRS S2, voluntary use. ¶C4 says an entity “is not required to disclose its Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions” and names no period; ¶C5 requires it to disclose its use of the relief beside its statement of compliance.
The method relief beside it, ¶C3, is limited to the first annual reporting period; the Scope 3 relief is not, and ¶C6 leaves both subject to rules made by the FCA, the Companies Act or another regulator.
UK SRS S1 ¶73A adds that using the reliefs does not stop an entity asserting compliance with S2, provided it discloses the use.
Listed companies under PS26/19. The FCA’s final rules apply UK SRS on a comply-or-explain basis to companies listed in UKLR 6, 14, 15, 16 and 22 for accounting periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027.
For a UKLR 6 company, UKLR TP 16.4R(2)(a) says it need not disclose Scope 3 for periods beginning in 2027, and may use ¶C4, provided its annual financial report states that it relies on that provision and on ¶C4; TP 16.6G adds that no comparatives are needed for the first period.
From periods beginning on or after 1 January 2028 Scope 3 is disclosed or its omission explained, with the reasons and the steps planned.
The consultation, CP26/5, had proposed mandatory S2 with Scope 3 on comply or explain (¶4.8), and estimated around 600 listed companies would be affected; the final rules give no count.
Carbon Reduction Plans. The PPN 006 Technical Standard asks for Scope 1 and 2 in full and categories 4, 5, 6, 7 and 9 only, so a plan’s footprint is not a Scope 3 inventory; the Carbon Reduction Plan reference has the rest.
The listed-company detail — reliefs by listing category, data quality, financed emissions — is in UK SRS Scope 3 reporting, and the standard itself in UK SRS S2.
Separate disclosure rules
Quoted SECR
Separate disclosure rules
Unquoted SECR
Separate disclosure rules
Transport fuel
Separate disclosure rules
Voluntary S2 relief
Tables and tools
Which categories does each rule reach?
Five categories: 4, 5, 6, 7 and 9, beside Scope 1 and 2 in full.
Category 1, usually the largest, is not asked for, so a plan’s Scope 3 figure is not a Scope 3 inventory.
- 01 · not askedPurchased goods and services
- 02 · not askedCapital goods
- 03 · not askedFuel- and energy-related activities
- 04 · requiredUpstream transportation and distribution
- 05 · requiredWaste generated in operations
- 06 · requiredBusiness travel
- 07 · requiredEmployee commuting
- 08 · not askedUpstream leased assets
- 09 · requiredDownstream transportation and distribution
- 10 · not askedProcessing of sold products
- 11 · not askedUse of sold products
- 12 · not askedEnd-of-life treatment of sold products
- 13 · not askedDownstream leased assets
- 14 · not askedFranchises
- 15 · not askedInvestments
PPN 006 Technical Standard.
Nothing you choose is stored or sent.
One company, four questions
Which Scope 3 figure answers which question
| Where it is asked | What goes in | Provision |
|---|---|---|
| Directors’ report (SECR, unquoted) | Transport fuel the company buys for business travel — a slice of category 6 | Sch 7 ¶20D(1)(b) |
| A central government tender | Categories 4, 5, 6, 7 and 9, beside full Scope 1 and 2 | PPN 006 Technical Standard |
| A UK SRS S2 report | All fifteen considered; included categories disclosed — or the ¶C4 relief stated | UK SRS S2 ¶¶B32–B33, C4–C5 |
| A listed company’s 2027 annual report | Scope 3, or a statement relying on UKLR TP 16.4R(2) and ¶C4 | FCA PS26/19; UKLR TP 16.4R |
| A customer questionnaire | Whatever the customer asks — usually your Scope 1 and 2, which are its Scope 3 | The contract, not a statute |
A supplier that publishes a Carbon Reduction Plan and then answers a customer’s “total Scope 3” question with the same figure has understated it, because the plan leaves out category 1.
Label each reused figure with the boundary it was built on.
Customer requests usually arrive as a supplier form, and there are limits to what a customer can require; the ESG questionnaire page deals with them.
Public sector Scope 3
Scope 3 and the public sector, from both sides
A public body measuring its own footprint has Scope 3 like anyone else.
The Corporate Standard is written from a business perspective but says it applies equally to other organisations, government agencies and universities among them.
For most public bodies the suppliers they buy from are category 1, which is why procurement is where public sector Scope 3 is fought.
On the buying side, central government departments, their executive agencies and non-departmental public bodies ask bidders for contracts above £5 million a year, including VAT, for a Carbon Reduction Plan that covers five Scope 3 categories.
NHS England runs its own version, which accepts a plan built to PPN 006 and asks for a lighter net zero commitment below the threshold.
Suppliers who bid regularly tend to keep their emissions answers in the same library as the rest of their public sector tender responses, because the request now arrives in the sales cycle rather than once a year.
The commercial side of that shift is covered by sustainability in go-to-market.
The government asked about Scope 3 reporting once, in a call for evidence from 19 October to 14 December 2023 that drew 184 responses.
Its summary, published on 21 November 2024, records demand for Scope 3 reporting and concern about primary data and methodology, and describes Scope 3 under SECR as “largely voluntary”.
It proposed no new duty; it is evidence, not law.
Reducing Scope 3
Where the leverage sits, and how targets treat it
Most Scope 3 happens in other organisations, so the levers are mostly theirs: lower-carbon suppliers and materials for category 1, more efficient products for category 11, design for repair and recycling for category 12, less or lower-carbon travel for category 6.
Supplier engagement — asking for primary data, setting supplier-facing targets, helping smaller suppliers measure — improves the data and the emissions at the same time.
Product-level footprints are their own discipline, covered in life cycle assessment and product standards.
Targets follow their own rules.
Under the SBTi’s Near-Term Criteria V5.3.1, a company whose relevant Scope 3 is 40% or more of its total sets a Scope 3 target, and its targets cover at least 67% of Scope 3.
The SBTi’s Corporate Net-Zero Standard V2.0, published on 11 June 2026, opens for validations on 1 February 2027 and set out to strengthen the approach to Scope 3; until then V1.3.1 is the operative net-zero text.
The science-based targets reference and how to set science-based targets cover both.
Software with supplier data-collection workflows makes the engagement manageable at scale; see carbon reporting software.
Building a first Scope 3 inventory is often bought in, and the guide to carbon footprint consultancy sets out what a carbon footprint consultant does.
What is changing
The Scope 3 Standard is being folded into one
On 29 July 2026 GHG Protocol announced that it and ISO would bring the Corporate Standard, Scope 2 Guidance, Scope 3 Standard and ISO 14064-1 into a single corporate standard.
Read the provisions and qualifications
Its Standard Development Plan estimates a consultation on the consolidated draft in Q2 2027 and publication in Q4 2028, with guidance later.
The 2011 Scope 3 Standard remains the one in force, and UK SRS S2 points at it by date.
The GHG Protocol site and our GHG Protocol reference track the programme.
Assurance over Scope 3 is not required by UK law; the FCA asks a listed company whether it obtained assurance and, if so, from whom and to which standard — see sustainability assurance.
Secondary commentary on how the FCA’s consultation framed Scope 3 includes KPMG’s note on CP26/5; the figures on this page come from the FCA’s own documents.
Standards programme
Consolidation
Standards programme
Estimated dates
Standards programme
2011 remains
Standards programme
Owner programme
Test yourself
Six Scope 3 claims, true or false
All six circulate widely, and five of them are false.
The pattern is the same each time: a rule from one instrument carried into another, or a proposal read as a final rule.
Each answer names the paragraph that settles it.
A step-by-step inventory build is in our sister site’s Scope 3 emissions reporting guide, and the SECR reporting guide covers the one slice SECR asks for; the SECR overview covers who files.
The UK SRS standards as documents are in UK SRS S1 and S2.
Scope 3: true or false?
Some of the 15 Scope 3 categories are optional under the GHG Protocol Scope 3 Standard.
SECR requires a quoted company to report its Scope 3 emissions.
UK SRS S2 requires all 15 Scope 3 categories to be reported.
The UK SRS S2 Scope 3 relief in ¶C4 runs out after the first annual reporting period.
A PPN 006 Carbon Reduction Plan must include category 1, purchased goods and services.
The FCA’s final rules make Scope 3 reporting mandatory for listed companies from 2027.
0 of 6 answered.
Nothing you choose is stored or sent.
A reading and preparation sequence
scope 3 emissions: from the question to the evidence
- Step 0101
Value-chain emissions
Scope 3 is every indirect emission a company causes that is not the generation of energy it buys.Read the detail. - Step 0202
Category boundaries
Two boundary points account for most double counting.Read the detail. - Step 0303
Inclusions and exclusions
There is no list of required and optional categories in the Scope 3 Standard, whatever widely repeated versions say.Read the detail. - Step 0404
Measurement methods
The Technical Guidance ranks methods “from most to least specific to a company’s actual activities”, and adds that companies “need not always use the most specific method as a first preference”.Read the detail. - Step 0505
Financed emissions
For an asset manager, bank or insurer, UK SRS S2 ¶29(a)(vi)(2) asks for additional information on financed emissions within category 15.Read the detail. - Step 0606
Separate disclosure rules
SECR, quoted company.No Scope 3 limb: the quoted-company paragraphs cover fuel combustion, facilities and purchased energy, so any Scope 3 in a quoted company’s directors’ report is there by choice.Read the detail. - Step 0707
Standards programme
On 29 July 2026 GHG Protocol announcedthat it and ISO would bring the Corporate Standard, Scope 2 Guidance, Scope 3 Standard and ISO 14064-1 into a single corporate standard.Read the detail.
Dates, with their status
The relevant dates, drawn in order
- 200401
Revised Corporate Standard
The accounting standard fixes the organisational boundary, principles and reporting method. A disclosure framework can specify an edition. - 201102
Scope 3 Standard
The corporate value-chain standard supplies the fifteen-category taxonomy. UK SRS S2 references this edition. - January 201503
Scope 2 Guidance
The guidance adds contractual-instrument quality criteria and the location-based and market-based reporting rules. - 29 July 202604
Consolidated development plan
The owner sets out the GHG Protocol–ISO development programme. This plan does not itself replace the operative standards. - Q2 2027 · estimated05
Draft consultation
The plan estimates consultation on a consolidated draft in Q2 2027. This is an estimated programme date, not an effective date. - Q4 2028 · estimated06
Revised standard publication
Publication is estimated for Q4 2028. Pilot testing could extend the timetable; supporting guidance is expected later on a separate timetable.
Continue your research
Related reporting guides, one question at a time
Frequently asked
Scope 3 emissions, answered
What are Scope 3 emissions?
Scope 3 emissions are the indirect greenhouse gas emissions in a company’s value chain that are not Scope 2 — upstream at its suppliers and downstream at its customers.
The GHG Protocol’s Corporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Standard defines fifteen categories, from purchased goods and services to investments.
What are the 15 categories of Scope 3 emissions?
(1) Purchased goods and services, (2) capital goods, (3) fuel- and energy-related activities, (4) upstream transportation and distribution, (5) waste generated in operations, (6) business travel, (7) employee commuting, (8) upstream leased assets, (9) downstream transportation and distribution, (10) processing of sold products, (11) use of sold products, (12) end-of-life treatment of sold products, (13) downstream leased assets, (14) franchises and (15) investments.
Categories 1 to 8 are upstream; 9 to 15 downstream.
Is Scope 3 reporting mandatory in the UK?
Not as a general duty.
SECR asks large unquoted companies and LLPs for one slice — fuel they buy for business travel — and quoted companies for none.
Listed companies in five UK Listing Rules categories report against UK SRS S2, Scope 3 included, on a comply-or-explain basis for periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027, after a one-year Scope 3 relief that must be stated.
Bidders for central government contracts above £5 million a year provide five Scope 3 categories in a Carbon Reduction Plan.
Are any Scope 3 categories optional?
No category is optional under the GHG Protocol Scope 3 Standard: a company “shall account for all scope 3 emissions” and disclose and justify any exclusion.
The word optional in §6.2 attaches to activities within a category beyond its minimum boundary.
A category that does not apply is reported as zero or not applicable.
Does UK SRS S2 require all 15 Scope 3 categories?
It requires an entity to consider all fifteen and to disclose which are included (¶¶B32–B33).
Considering fifteen is not reporting fifteen.
And under ¶C4 an entity applying the standard voluntarily need not disclose Scope 3 at all, for as long as it likes, provided it says so beside its statement of compliance.
How do you measure Scope 3 emissions?
The GHG Protocol’s Technical Guidance ranks methods from most to least specific to the company’s own activities: for purchased goods, supplier-specific, hybrid, average-data and spend-based.
Companies need not always use the most specific method first.
UK SRS S2 asks for inputs prioritised by direct measurement, value-chain specificity, timeliness and verification, and presumes Scope 3 can be estimated from secondary data.
How should regulators expect companies to disclose scope 3 categories such as capital goods and investments?
Under UK SRS S2, by naming the categories included whatever method was used (¶B33), describing the measurement approach, inputs and assumptions (¶29(a)(iii)), and saying how far the figures rest on specific and verified inputs (¶B56).
For investments, an asset manager, bank or insurer gives financed emissions, and may limit category 15 to them and exclude derivatives under ¶29A, explaining what it treated as a derivative.
Does a Carbon Reduction Plan need Scope 3?
Partly.
The PPN 006 Technical Standard asks for Scope 1 and 2 in full and five Scope 3 categories: upstream transportation and distribution, waste generated in operations, business travel, employee commuting and downstream transportation and distribution.
Purchased goods and services, usually the largest, is not among them.
What does public sector Scope 3 mean?
Two things.
A public body measuring its own footprint has Scope 3 like any organisation — the GHG Protocol Corporate Standard applies to government agencies too — and its suppliers’ emissions are its category 1.
And central government buys with a Scope 3 condition attached: PPN 006 asks bidders above £5 million a year for a Carbon Reduction Plan covering five Scope 3 categories, and NHS England runs its own version.
What is the difference between Scope 3 and Scope 1 or 2?
Scope 1 is emissions from sources the company owns or controls; Scope 2 is the generation of the energy it buys.
Scope 3 is everything else it causes but does not control — at suppliers, logistics providers, franchisees and customers.
A company’s Scope 1 and 2 are its customers’ Scope 3.
How can a company reduce Scope 3 emissions?
Screen all fifteen categories to find the large ones, then work with the suppliers and customers behind them: lower-carbon materials for category 1, more efficient products for category 11, design for reuse and recycling for category 12, and less or lower-carbon travel for category 6.
Because most of it sits in other organisations, engagement does more than internal efficiency.
Sources
Primary sources
Every figure, date and status on this page traces to the instrument’s owner.
Secondary commentary is never the source for a number.
- GHG ProtocolCorporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Accounting and Reporting Standard (2011), §6.2, Table 1.1, Table 5.4
The fifteen categories; all accounted for, exclusions disclosed and justified.
- GHG ProtocolTechnical Guidance for Calculating Scope 3 Emissions
Calculation methods by category, ranked by specificity; a companion, not a source of requirements.
- GHG ProtocolCorporate Accounting and Reporting Standard
Scope 3 optional under the Corporate Standard alone; applies to government agencies as well as companies.
- GHG ProtocolGHG Protocol
The standard-setter.
- GHG ProtocolConsolidated Corporate Standard — Standard Development Plan v2.0 (29 July 2026)
Scope 3 to be folded into one standard with ISO; consultation estimated Q2 2027.
- GHG ProtocolGHG Protocol announces key standard development updates (29 July 2026)
The ISO partnership.
- Department for Business and TradeUK SRS S2, ¶¶29(a), 29A–29C, B29, B32–B33, B38–B57, C3–C6
Consider all fifteen, disclose the included; the measurement framework; the untimed ¶C4 relief.
- Department for Business and TradeUK SRS S1, ¶73A
Using the reliefs does not prevent a statement of compliance with S2, provided their use is disclosed.
- Department for Business and TradeUK SRS S1 and UK SRS S2 (25 February 2026)
The standards, voluntary for any entity.
- Department for Business and TradeDepartment for Business and Trade
The department that published UK SRS.
- Financial Conduct AuthorityPS26/19 (PDF), ¶3.14 and Appendix 1, UKLR TP 16.4R and TP 16.6G
One year’s Scope 3 relief, stated; no comparatives in the first period.
- Financial Conduct AuthorityCP26/5 (PDF), ¶¶4.8, 8.6 and Annex 2 ¶43
What the consultation proposed, and its estimate of about 600 affected companies.
- Financial Conduct AuthorityCP26/5 landing page
The consultation PS26/19 finalised.
- Financial Conduct AuthorityFCA
The regulator.
- legislation.gov.ukSI 2008/410 Schedule 7, Part 7A, ¶20D(1)(b) and ¶20K
SECR’s transport-fuel limb for unquoted companies and LLPs.
- legislation.gov.ukSI 2008/410 Schedule 7
The quoted-company paragraphs, with no Scope 3 limb.
- GOV.UK (DESNZ, Defra, BEIS)Environmental Reporting Guidelines, including SECR requirements
The business-mileage reading of the transport limb.
- DESNZ (GOV.UK)UK greenhouse gas emissions reporting: Scope 3 emissions (call for evidence and outcome)
19 October to 14 December 2023; 184 responses; “Scope 3 emissions remain largely voluntary”.
- DESNZ2026 conversion factors methodology paper, ¶1.6
The government factors are activity-based; Defra’s spend-based multipliers are a separate product.
- DESNZ (GOV.UK)Greenhouse gas reporting: conversion factors 2026
Travel, freight, waste and water factors for several categories.
- Defra (GOV.UK)UK’s carbon footprint — spend-based emissions multipliers, 1997 to 2023
Annual update 30 June 2026.
- Cabinet Office (GOV.UK)PPN 006: Taking account of Carbon Reduction Plans
The procurement condition of participation.
- Cabinet Office (GOV.UK)PPN 006 Technical Standard
Scope 3 categories 4, 5, 6, 7 and 9.
- IFRS FoundationAmendments to Greenhouse Gas Emissions Disclosures (Amendments to IFRS S2), December 2025, ¶¶29A–29C
The category 15 financed-emissions limitation and the derivatives exclusion.
- PCAFGlobal GHG Accounting and Reporting Standard, Part A, third edition (December 2025)
Financed emissions methodology for category 15.
- PCAFPartnership for Carbon Accounting Financials
The standard’s parts and editions.
- Science Based Targets initiativeCorporate Net-Zero Standard V2.0
Published 11 June 2026; validations from 1 February 2027.
- KPMGFCA CP26/5 — from TCFD to UK SRS (26 February 2026)
Secondary commentary on the consultation; no figure on this page rests on it.
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