Industries
Carbon footprint of services when the product is the work.
The footprint of a service adds up travel, energy in the workplaces, equipment, trips and the subcontractors needed to deliver it. Xain calculates it with physical factors and expresses it per project, hour or deliverable. It is one of the sectors included in the LRQA verification.
What is measured
Which blocks go into the footprint of a service?
A service cannot be weighed, but it can be broken down. The unit (project, hour or deliverable) sets what is included.
Travel
Team trips and customer visits.
Workplaces
Office energy and home working, if included.
Equipment and software
Devices and digital services in use.
Subcontractors
Suppliers who provide part of the work.
Consulting, engineering, technology and other professional-services firms receive more and more footprint requests from customers, who need the figure for their Scope 3 or for tenders. A service has no part to weigh, which makes a sector average even less reliable.
How is the footprint of a service calculated?
The same way as a product: the service is broken down into a process tree and each node carries a physical factor. Instead of materials you get travel, workplace energy, equipment and subcontractors, and the unit (project, hour, deliverable) decides what is included. Where data is missing the most conservative factor is applied and noted.
Why is spend not enough?
Because the price of a service reflects the value of knowledge, not its impact. A spend factor assigns more emissions to the firm that charges more, even if it delivers the same service with less travel. We explain it in physical factors versus spend.
What do you receive?
A certificate with the value per unit of service, the calculation boundary, the ISO 14067 standard and a registration number, with traceability. Consulting and services are one of the sectors included in the LRQA verification.
And if you are the one buying services?
The services you hire go into your Scope 3 (Category 1). See how it is measured in procurement Scope 3, and if you are an environmental consultancy, read Xain versus consulting.
What data do you gather to start?
- Description of the service and the unit you sell it in (project, hour, deliverable).
- Number of people and hours, and where it is delivered.
- Team travel and means of transport.
- Subcontractors and the equipment or digital services in use.
Common mistakes
- Measuring the whole company when asked for a service. The customer wants the figure for what they buy.
- Forgetting subcontractors. They can weigh as much as the in-house team.
- Changing the unit between customers. Set one and keep it so you can compare.
Are you being asked for the footprint of a service? Write to us.
Frequently asked questions
What companies usually ask before getting started.
In what unit is the footprint of a service expressed?
It depends on how it is sold: per project, per hour of work or per deliverable. The unit is defined at the start and is the one the certificate uses.
What data is needed?
The description of the service, who delivers it, where, how many hours or people, the travel and the subcontractors. A full company inventory is not required.
Does this replace environmental consulting?
No. It calculates a certified figure for the service; the decarbonisation strategy or the sustainability report remain advisory work. The comparison explains when each is the better fit.
Keep reading
Product footprint
Certify your product’s carbon footprint with an ISO 14067 method verified by LRQA, from your technical documentation, with registration and traceability.
Scope 3 for purchases
Measure purchased-goods Scope 3 (Categories 1 and 2) with physical factors. Xain Insight needs only the ERP spreadsheet: less than 10 minutes.
ISO 14067
ISO 14067 is the standard that sets how to quantify and communicate a product carbon footprint. What it requires, what cradle-to-gate is and how Xain uses it.
Xain versus consulting
When software makes sense and when a consultancy does for calculating product footprint or Scope 3: lead times, repeatability, traceability and scope of each.
Tell us what you want to measure
One product, a catalogue or your purchases. We reply with the next steps.
Contact Xain