Carbon management tools & resources

How will you start your carbon management journey? Creative Carbon Scotland has a number of tools and resources to help you measure, monitor and reduce your carbon emissions.


Carbon management tools

We have four spreadsheet-based tools to allow you to integrate your emissions recording and planning work. These tools are for your internal use only and will not be used for submitting CMPs or reports on emissions to funders. 

All our tools are based on the most up to date carbon emissions conversion factors as provided by the UK Government (BEIS) in 2023. They provide you with a carbon footprint output unit of kgCO2e (all greenhouse gases calculated as carbon dioxide equivalent), so are in line with all UK planning and reporting requirements. 

  1. The carbon management planning tool allows you to integrate your existing recording with new planning work to help you identify and assess reduction projects, while keeping track of your emissions. 
  2. The quick carbon management calculator allows you to quickly calculate the emissions of specific actions to reduce your consumption of energy, travel, waste and water. It can help you decide on the lowest carbon action to take or measure a snapshot of your existing practice. It also includes a guide to typical equipment usage.
  3. The CMP summary tool can be used to collate costs and emissions savings resulting from your reduction projects over the three years of your CMP. 
  4. The carbon budgeting tool enables you to use your organisation’s current carbon footprint and net-zero target to forecast and budget your carbon emissions in line with your net-zero trajectory. Please note this is an advanced tool and should only be used once you have calculated your/your organisation’s carbon footprint, understood all your sources of emissions, and set a net zero target year. You can find the complete guidance for this tool here. If you would prefer to watch a video on how to use the tool, this can be found here.

We are always pleased to hear from users. If you have any questions or problems please contact  Matthew Belsey.  

For reporting organisations, these tools can be used to discuss and explain the impacts of your plan with your green teams, to ensure board approval and to work with your lead officer in the implementation of your CMP as part of your funding conditions.

Quick carbon conversion guide - image

Quick carbon conversion guide

This page provides the most up to date carbon conversion factors from the UK government for a selection of the most common sources for Scottish cultural organisations.

If you require conversion factors for other sources or from previous years, please refer to the UK government site.

Carbon management resources

An introduction to carbon management video tutorial

Creative Carbon Scotland’s Green Arts Manager Caro Overy gives an overview of carbon management for cultural organisations.

This tutorial is targeted towards organisations required to report on their emissions and carbon management plans, but may be of interest more widely.

An audio transcript of the content is available here

Estimate your commuting emissions

Use our commuting tool to estimate your organisation’s emissions from commuting. The tool allows you to either input data manually or use a pre-built survey to collect the data.

Depending on the size of your workforce, staff location and how often staff work on premises, commuting can represent a significant proportion of your emissions. Understanding the size of these emissions can help inform your sustainability policies.

Emissions from commuting are classed as Scope 3 emissions under the Greenhouse Gas Protocol. If you would like to understand more about emissions classification, you can find further information here.

Record your travel emissions with claimexpenses.com

Measuring travel is one of the biggest challenges facing artists and cultural organisations when it comes to better understanding their environmental impact. For organisations this is often due to large quantities of data coming from multiple sources. Travel is also often the largest source of emissions for individuals and organisations, so we thought it was important to find a way of making measuring travel an easier process for individuals and organisations. This online tool was especially commissioned by Creative Carbon Scotland to help arts organisations simplify their travel recording. Read more and sign up to claimexpenses.com.

Estimate your office energy with the Tenant Energy Toolbox and understand emissions from home working

Use our Energy Toolbox to help calculate estimates of your office space’s energy consumption.

For anyone who rents a studio or office space where heat, light and power are included in the rent, this spreadsheet tool provides a way of calculating an estimate of the carbon footprint of their accommodation. By supplying just the floor area of your office and the number of people working in your organisation, you can use the tool to provide information for your annual reporting or for your employees and audiences. You can also use it for a more in-depth analysis to help you recognise your best energy saving opportunities.

We have updated the toolbox in February 2021 to include a ‘working from home’ tab for organisations who are switching to a home working model for a significant part of their operations. Please refer to our Guide to Measuring Emissions from Home Working to determine whether your organisation needs to use this and to find generic figures if you’re just working from home for a short time.

Note: We would always recommend asking your landlord for information on fuel bills if available.

Green Arts Portal

Our Green Arts Portal is a unique resource designed to provide you with support in measuring and reducing your environmental impact. You can access a range of guides in areas including data gathering, building and office energy usage, waste, travel and policies on our Green Arts Portal pages.

How to use action lists on Green Arts Portal
When you first visit the Green Arts Portal we recommend that you look through the action lists down the left hand side of your dashboard – these will help to guide your green work. You can consult the resources and links attached to each action to help you complete them. The action lists are ordered from easiest to most difficult, to give you an idea of where to start.

Carbon management plus

Help to answer some of the more complex questions that might arise when you’re working with carbon emissions, including how carbon emissions are calculated, how offsetting works, and what plastic means for carbon management. Upgrade your knowledge of carbon management.

About Creative Carbon Scotland

We believe cultural and creative organisations have a significant influencing power to help shape a sustainable Scotland for the 21st century.

[email protected]

+44 (0)131 243 2760

Supported by

Creative Scotland logo City of Edinburgh Council logo

A project initiated by Edinburgh’s Festivals with key partners the Federation of Scottish Theatre and Scottish Contemporary Art Network

Edinburgh Festival City logo Federation of Scottish Theatre logo Scottish Contemporary Art Network logo

Accreditations

Scottish Living Wage Accreditation