Calculate emissions for business activities
After reading this guide, you will be able to:
- Run a first CO2e estimate for a single business activity: freight, energy, travel, procurement, fuel or something else
- Choose the Climatiq product that fits your workflow, data volumes, and technical resources
- Know what input data each activity type needs and what results Climatiq returns
- Scale from one estimate to automated, high-volume calculations
Start with one activity
You don’t need a complete carbon footprint to start measuring. Many teams begin with the single activity that matters most to their business or their customers, freight shipments, electricity consumption, business travel, or purchased goods, and expand from there.
Building a complete annual inventory across all scopes instead? See Estimate a Corporate Carbon Footprint (CCF). This guide is its single-activity counterpart.
Choose how you want to calculate
The tool you pick shapes everything that follows: how you structure your data, how the activity guides below apply to you, and how far you can scale. Every activity type is available through every tool, so the choice comes down to your team, your data volumes, and your workflow, but not to what you’re calculating.
| Tool | Strengths | Trade-offs | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Data Studio Bulk Calculators | No coding required. Guided, category-specific upload templates make this the fastest path to a first result. | Upload-based workflow, built for periodic batches, not continuous or automated calculation. | Sustainability teams running one-off or periodic reporting |
| Excel Add-in / Google Sheets Extension | Works directly in your existing Excel or Google Sheets files. If your activity data already lives in a spreadsheet, this is the most natural way to calculate without changing your workflow. | Bounded by spreadsheet performance, very large datasets become impractical, and refreshes are manual. | Analysts and consultants managing activity data in spreadsheets |
| Climatiq API | The only option for very large volumes, continuous data flows, and embedding calculations into your own product or pipelines. Batch endpoints send up to 100 calculations in a single request, and new capabilities land here first. | Requires developer resources and you build the surrounding workflow (data ingestion, aggregation, reporting) yourself. | Developers and product teams automating at scale |
If you are unsure which product best fits your use case, you don’t have to commit now. The data each activity requires is the same in every tool, only the access mode differs, so you can start in a spreadsheet today and graduate to the API when volumes grow.
What are you calculating?
Now pick your activity. Each section below covers what data you need, what you get back, and links to the tool-specific guides where the step-by-step instructions live.
| Activity | Covers | GHG Protocol scopes |
|---|---|---|
| Freight and shipping | Transported goods across road, rail, air, and sea | 3.4, 3.9 |
| Energy and electricity | Purchased electricity, heating, cooling, steam | 2, 3.3 |
| Travel | Flights, rail, car trips, hotel stays | 3.6, 3.7 |
| Procurement and spend | Purchased goods and services from financial data | 3.1, 3.2 |
| Fuel and direct combustion | Natural gas, diesel, petrol, LPG burned on site or in vehicles | 1 |
| Everything else | Waste, fugitive emissions, leased assets, and any other activity | 1, 3.5, 3.8, 3.10–3.15 |
Freight and shipping
Calculate door-to-door emissions for shipped goods across air, road, rail, and sea, including complex intermodal journeys. Climatiq resolves routes automatically, identifies transit hubs, and handles pre- and post-leg segments, in conformance with ISO 14083:2023 and the GLEC Framework.
Data you need: cargo weight, origin, and destination. Transport mode is optional: if omitted, Climatiq selects a plausible route automatically. Vehicle or vessel details improve accuracy when provided.
What you get back: Total CO2e with a per-leg breakdown, the distances used, and the emission factors applied (everything needed for an ISO 14083-conformant report). For example, a 20-tonne shipment from Shanghai to Hamburg by container ship then Munich by truck returns 3746 kg CO2e.
GHG Protocol scopes: 3.4 (upstream transport and distribution), 3.9 (downstream transport and distribution).
Ready to calculate? All practical instructions for running freight calculations live in your tool’s guide: Excel · Google Sheets · Data Studio · Freight API.
Energy and electricity
This section covers Scope 2 purchased energy (electricity, heat, and steam bought from an external provider). For Scope 1 fuel combustion from sources you own or control, see Fuel and direct combustion.
Report emissions from purchased electricity, district heating, cooling, and steam. Choose between location-based (grid average) and market-based approaches for Scope 2, and add upstream fuel- and energy-related emissions (FERA) for Scope 3.3.
Data you need: consumption in kWh or MWh, the country or grid region, and, for market-based accounting, your supplier or contract details.
What you get back: Total CO2e under your chosen approach, with the grid factor, its source, and the reference year documented for audit. For example, 10,000 kWh of grid electricity in Germany returns 4300 kg CO2e under the location-based method.
GHG Protocol scopes: 2 (purchased energy), 3.3 (fuel- and energy-related activities).
Ready to calculate? All practical instructions for running energy calculations live in your tool’s guide: Excel · Google Sheets · Data Studio · Energy API.
Location-based vs market-based Scope 2 accounting: how to choose the right approach and apply it with the Energy endpoint.
Upstream Scope 3.3 emissions arising from purchased electricity, heat, steam, and cooling, covering well-to-tank and transmission and distribution (T&D) losses.
Travel
Calculate emissions from flights, rail journeys, car trips, and hotel stays. Climatiq supports fuel-based, distance-based, and spend-based methods depending on the data you have, aligned with GHG Protocol methodology.
Data you need: origin and destination (or distance), travel mode and class, or simply the amount spent if that’s all you have.
What you get back: Total CO2e with the calculated distance, methodology, and factor source. For example, a round-trip economy flight from Munich to London returns 139 kg CO2e.
GHG Protocol scopes: 3.6 (business travel), 3.7 (employee commuting).
Ready to calculate? All practical instructions for running travel calculations live in your tool’s guide: Excel · Google Sheets · Data Studio · Travel API.
Procurement and spend
Estimate emissions from purchased goods and services using financial data you already have. Climatiq uses EEIO-based emission factors from EPA, BEIS, and EXIOBASE, supporting multi-currency spend inputs across 44 countries and 183 product sectors.
Data you need: spend amount, currency, year, and either a product or service description or a classification code (NAICS, NACE, etc.).
If your data is free text (invoice lines, supplier names, purchase descriptions), Mapping Agent matches each line to the right emission factor automatically. If your data already has structured classification codes, the Procurement API provides direct, deterministic matching.
What you get back: Total CO2e via the matched sector factor, with the classification, source, and any inflation or currency adjustments. For example, €100,000 spent on office furniture in Germany in 2025 returns 3601 kg CO2e.
GHG Protocol scopes: 3.1 (purchased goods and services), 3.2 (capital goods).
Ready to calculate? All practical instructions for running spend-based calculations live in your tool’s guide: Excel · Google Sheets · Data Studio · Procurement API.
Fuel and direct combustion
This section covers Scope 1 direct emissions.
Calculate emissions from fuel burned in sources you own or control: natural gas in boilers, diesel and petrol in company vehicles, LPG, and more. Climatiq’s normalized fuel activity IDs work consistently across datasets and regions.
Data you need: fuel type and quantity (liters, m³, kWh, or kg).
What you get back: Total CO2e for the combustion, with the option to retrieve the well-to-tank component separately for Scope 3.3 reporting. For example, 5,000 liters of diesel in company vehicles returns 16433 kg CO2e.
GHG Protocol scopes: 1 (direct emissions from owned or controlled sources).
Ready to calculate? All practical instructions for running Scope 1 fuel calculations live in your tool’s guide: Excel · Google Sheets · Data Studio · Energy API.
Everything else
Activities without a dedicated endpoint, i.e. fugitive emissions (Scope 1), waste (3.5), leased assets (3.8, 3.13), downstream product activities (3.10–3.12), franchises and investments (3.14–3.15), follow the same formula with one extra step: find the right emission factor first.
How it works: browse the Data Explorer to identify the right emission factor for your activity, then run the calculation in your chosen tool (its guide covers the concrete steps). If your activity descriptions are unstructured, Mapping Agent matches them to factors automatically.
Ready to calculate? All practical instructions live in your tool’s guide: Excel · Google Sheets · Data Studio · Estimate API.
From first estimate to production
Explore before you commit
Browse emission factors in the Data Explorer . No account needed. Or try the Excel Add-in for free with a small data sample.
Run one estimate and validate it
Open the guide for your chosen tool: the API docs, the Excel or Google Sheets guide, or the Data Studio guide. Calculate a single record for your activity, double check the result, and inspect the returned emission factor, its source, and the audit trail. Every Climatiq result documents exactly how it was calculated.
Scale across your dataset
Once one record looks right, scale up: upload your full dataset to a Bulk Calculator, or fill formulas down your spreadsheet.
Make it repeatable
Pin a data version for year-on-year comparability, add private emission factors where you hold supplier-specific data, and revisit calculations when activity data changes or new data releases ship.
Supporting resources
Step-by-step guide to building a full annual inventory across Scope 1, 2, and 3 once you are ready to scale beyond a single activity.
What Mapping Agent does, how it works, and when to use it over dedicated calculation methods.
How to search, compare, and select the most appropriate emission factors using the Data Explorer, Mapping Agent, and Search API.
A practical framework for selecting, validating, and documenting the right emission factor for your activity and reporting context.
How Climatiq uses data versions to let you choose between stability and recency of results for year-on-year comparability.
Overview of all data source types, core vs premium sources, and best practices for selecting the right database for your use case.