ISO 14064-1:2018: documentation and compliance requirements

This is what ISO 14064-1:2018 requires you to have, clause by clause, and what an auditor will ask to see for each of it. It covers 68 requirements across 7 areas.

It is deliberately not a checklist. A checklist asks whether you have something; this says what is required and what counts as evidence, which is the question that matters when you are building a system rather than testing one. If you would rather find out where you stand first, the same ground is covered by our free ISO 14064-1:2018 readiness assessment, which scores you out of 100.

4 The five principles behind a good inventory

Clause 4.

You must have included everything that is relevant to the people who will use your figures.

Evidence: The inventory methodology explaining how relevance was applied.

The must be inventory complete — every source inside your boundary counted, or its exclusion explained.

Evidence: Completeness checks. A list of anything excluded, with the reason.

You must use the same methods and boundaries each year, so the figures can be compared.

Evidence: Evidence of consistency. Any change explained and the old figures restated.

The figures as must be accurate as they reasonably can be, with bias reduced.

Evidence: The accuracy measures taken. Estimated data identified as such.

The must be inventory transparent — could someone else follow what you did and why.

Evidence: The methodology written down clearly enough for someone else to repeat it.

Where two principles pulled against each other, you must have record the judgement you made.

Evidence: Records of decisions where, for example, completeness and accuracy conflicted.

5 Drawing the boundary

Clauses 5.1, 5.2.

You must have chosen how you consolidate — operational control, financial control or equity share — and written down why.

Evidence: The chosen approach with its reasoning.

You must have listed every entity, site, subsidiary, joint venture and leased asset, and said which are in and which are out.

Evidence: The consolidation list. An organisation chart or legal structure diagram.

You must have dealt with anything you bought or sold during the year.

Evidence: Treatment of acquisitions and disposals, with dates.

You must have identified your direct emissions and removals — things you burn or release yourself.

Evidence: Category 1: on-site combustion, owned vehicles, process emissions, refrigerant leaks, fugitive emissions.

You must have identified emissions from the energy you buy in.

Evidence: Category 2: purchased electricity, heat, steam and cooling.

You must have identified emissions from transport.

Evidence: Category 3: business travel, employee commuting, upstream and downstream transport and distribution.

You must have identified emissions from the products and services you buy.

Evidence: Category 4: purchased goods and services, capital goods, waste, and other upstream sources.

You must have identified emissions from what happens to your products after you sell them.

Evidence: Category 5: use of sold products, end-of-life treatment, downstream leased assets, franchises.

You must have considered any other indirect sources.

Evidence: Category 6: anything not covered by the other categories, such as investments.

You must have looked at all six categories, even where you conclude some are not relevant.

Evidence: Evidence every category was considered, with the conclusion recorded for each.

You must have written down how you decided which indirect emissions are significant.

Evidence: The significance criteria — size, how much influence you have, risk or opportunity, sector guidance, outsourcing, stakeholder interest — applied consistently and disclosed.

Every must be excluded source listed with a reason, rather than just left out.

Evidence: An exclusions register. Any threshold used, with its basis. No direct source may be excluded.

6 Working out the numbers

Clauses 6.2, 6.3, 6.4, 6.5, 6.6, 6.7, 6.8.

You must have listed all the sources, sinks and reservoirs inside your boundary.

Evidence: An inventory by site, activity and category. Process or facility diagrams supporting it.

You must have review that list this year, rather than carrying last year's forward.

Evidence: Evidence of review with a date.

For each source, you must have chosen how to quantify it — by calculation, by measurement, or both — and said why.

Evidence: The quantification approach per source, with the reasoning.

Where you model or estimate, the must be method written down.

Evidence: Documentation of any modelling or estimation used.

You must have a written way of collecting activity data — what, from where, how often and by whom.

Evidence: A data collection procedure naming the source and the owner for each dataset.

You must be able to show the activity data is complete for the whole reporting period.

Evidence: Utility invoices, meter readings, fuel purchases, mileage logs, waste transfer notes, refrigerant service records, procurement and travel data. Reconciliation to financial or operational records.

Where data was estimated or filled in, that flagged must be rather than hidden.

Evidence: Estimated data identified in the working and disclosed in the report.

You must have recorded which emission factors you used, and where each came from.

Evidence: An emission factor register with the source, the publication year and the version.

You must have recorded which global warming potentials you used, and from which IPCC report.

Evidence: The GWP dataset named.

The factors must be reviewed and updated each year.

Evidence: Evidence of the annual review. Justification where you developed your own factor.

You must have covered all the relevant greenhouse gases, including refrigerants.

Evidence: The gases covered, and why any were left out.

You must be able to reproduce the calculation from raw data to reported tonnes, for any source picked at random.

Evidence: Calculation workbooks or software with the formulas visible. Unit conversions shown. A clear trail from invoice or meter reading to the reported figure.

The must be calculation checked by someone other than the person who did it.

Evidence: Independent check records with the checker's name and date. Version control on the model.

You must have set a base year, and written down why you chose it.

Evidence: The base year with its reasoning.

The must be base year worked out the same way as the current year, with the evidence still kept.

Evidence: Base year inventory on the same basis. The underlying data retained.

You must have written rules for when you must recalculate the base year.

Evidence: The recalculation policy with the triggers — acquisition, disposal, outsourcing, change of approach, change of method or factor, discovery of a material error — and a significance threshold.

You must have applied those rules when something changed, and disclosed the recalculation.

Evidence: Recalculation records with the before and after figures.

You must have assessed how uncertain the figures are.

Evidence: An uncertainty assessment covering data and model uncertainty, with the method used.

You must know which sources contribute most of the uncertainty.

Evidence: The main contributors identified, and used to decide where to improve data next.

7 Reductions, offsets and removals

Clause 7.

You must have recorded any reduction projects or mitigation actions, and quantified them separately.

Evidence: A register of actions with the period, boundary and method for each.

Those must be reductions kept separate from changes caused by how busy you were.

Evidence: Evidence you have not double counted a reduction that was really a fall in activity.

Where you have bought offsets or credits, they must be documented and retired properly.

Evidence: Instrument type, vintage, registry and retirement evidence.

You must report emissions and offsets separately, rather than netting them into one figure.

Evidence: The report showing gross emissions and offsets as separate lines.

Where you claim removals or carbon storage, the must be method documented and permanence considered.

Evidence: Removal quantification method. Monitoring. How reversal risk is handled. N/A with a reason if you claim none.

8 Managing the information

Clauses 8.1, 8.2.

There must be a written procedure for managing the inventory, with named responsibilities.

Evidence: The procedure. Data owners, preparer and approver named.

The people preparing the inventory must be competent to do it.

Evidence: Their training and experience.

You must be able to answer: Would the inventory survive the departure of the person who currently prepares it?

Evidence: Documentation good enough for someone else to take over.

There must be a named person accountable for the inventory, at a level that can commit resources.

Evidence: The accountable owner. The route by which the inventory reaches the board or executive.

The must be inventory reviewed and approved by that person before it is published.

Evidence: An approval record, signed and dated before publication.

It must be defined what quality checks are applied before the figures are reported, and by whom.

Evidence: A quality control checklist. Completeness checks. Year-on-year variance analysis with explanations. A second-person review with a name and date. A log of errors found and corrected.

The must be supporting information kept, and for how long.

Evidence: A retention schedule for activity data, factors, calculations, assumptions and reports.

The must be base year evidence kept for as long as the base year is used.

Evidence: Retention covering the base year, which may be many years back.

You must be able to retrieve a prior period's evidence if someone asks for it.

Evidence: Storage, access control, backup and a retrieval test.

9 Reporting

Clauses 9.2, 9.3.

There must be a plan for the report — who it is for, what it is for, the period, and whether it will be verified.

Evidence: A report plan or terms of reference agreed before the report was written.

The report must state the boundaries and the consolidation approach.

Evidence: Those sections of the report.

It must give total direct emissions and removals.

Evidence: The Category 1 total.

It must give the indirect emissions separately by category, rather than lumped together.

Evidence: Category totals reported individually.

It must state the period covered, the methods, the factors and the global warming potentials used.

Evidence: The methodology section.

It must list the exclusions and explain them.

Evidence: The exclusions disclosed in the report itself, not just in the working papers.

It must give the base year and compare against it.

Evidence: The base year comparison, with any recalculation disclosed.

It must state the uncertainty.

Evidence: The uncertainty disclosed.

It must state that the report was prepared in accordance with ISO 14064-1.

Evidence: The statement of conformity in the report.

Biogenic carbon dioxide emissions must be reported separately from fossil ones.

Evidence: Biogenic CO2 shown as its own line.

Where you report bought energy on a market basis, you must also give the location-based figure.

Evidence: Both figures, with the contracts or certificates relied on. N/A with a reason if not applicable.

You must be able to answer: Can the figures be compared across years, with any change of method or boundary explained?

Evidence: A multi-year table on a consistent basis. A change log. Restated figures where needed. Explanations that separate a real reduction from a change in activity, boundary or method.

10 Getting the inventory verified

Clause 10.

If the inventory will be verified, you must have agreed the level of assurance, the materiality and the criteria with the verifier.

Evidence: Engagement terms stating whether it is reasonable or limited assurance, the materiality threshold, and the criteria. N/A with a reason if you are not having it verified.

The must be verifier accredited for this work, and independent of you.

Evidence: Evidence of accreditation to ISO 14065 for ISO 14064-1, and of independence.

You must have assembled the evidence pack the verifier will need.

Evidence: An indexed evidence file matched to the report.

You must be able to give the verifier access to the sites, systems and people they need.

Evidence: Access arrangements agreed.

You must be able to answer: Have the findings from the last verification been closed out?

Evidence: Prior verification statement, the findings raised, and evidence each was addressed.

Using this document

Nothing above asks for a manual, a template pack, or a filing system. It asks for decisions that have been taken deliberately and can be shown to have been taken — which is a far smaller job than most organisations expect, and a different one.

Length is not compliance. A procedure nobody follows is worse than no procedure, because an auditor finds the gap between the two. The test we apply is whether the person who has to do the job recognises their own work in what is written down.