Week 1 · GHG accounting — ClimateFluent

Drivers, boundaries, Scope 1 and 2, Scope 3, data quality and the inventory report — ending with a timed manual build that becomes your Week 2 benchmark.

Two live sessions of three hours, Thursday and Sunday, plus a take-home between them. The Sunday closes with a timed manual exercise — your benchmark for next week.

Thu · Day 1 · Foundation · Aayush Anand

GHG Accounting I — Drivers, Boundaries, Scope 1 and Scope 2

By the end of this session you can

Map the global demand for emissions data — regulatory, market and financial — and identify which requesters reach a given company and through what route
Apply the three organisational boundary approaches and defend a choice in writing
Identify and classify Scope 1 and Scope 2 sources across a multi-site manufacturing operation
Calculate location-based and market-based Scope 2 across two national grids, and explain when the two methods diverge

Three-hour agenda

00:00–00:20	Orientation	How the six weeks work; the two-week rhythm and why it is built that way; introduction to Meridian Textiles; ground rules for AI use, including what must never be uploaded.
00:20–00:55	The demand map	Who is asking for emissions data and why: the ISSB baseline adopted or planned in ~40 jurisdictions, national regimes layered on top (Australia, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Korea, UK, India, Brazil, California), compliance carbon markets, border measures for exporters — and, for most companies, customers, lenders and insurers.
00:55–01:20	The GHG Protocol architecture	Corporate Standard, Scope 2 Guidance, Scope 3 Standard, Project Protocol, and how ISO 14064-1 relates. Why one accounting standard under a dozen reporting regimes is what lets one dataset serve everybody. What is moving: the GHG Protocol–ISO consolidation, the Scope 2 and Scope 3 revisions.
01:20–01:30	Break
01:30–02:05	Boundaries	Equity share, financial control, operational control. Worked on Meridian: the 40% effluent JV, the leased warehouse, the Vietnam subsidiary, a contract-manufactured line. Groups decide, then defend against challenge.
02:05–02:45	Scope 1 in practice	Stationary and mobile combustion, process emissions, fugitives from refrigerants and effluent treatment. Activity data sources and their reliability. AR5 vs AR6 — and why consistency beats currency.
02:45–03:00	Scope 1 and 2 arithmetic	Emission factor hierarchy; grid factors across two countries reconciled against IEA; what to do when no factor exists or two disagree; location vs market-based; residual mix; rooftop solar, the wind PPA, I-RECs and RECs.

Exercise

Group boundary memo: one page recommending an organisational boundary for Meridian, with the JV, the leased warehouse and the contract manufacturer justified in writing. Presented and challenged in the next session.

Take-home

Classify 30 line items from Meridian's utility and procurement ledger into scope and category, by hand. Bring the disagreements — they are the teaching material for Day 2.

Sun · Day 2 · Foundation · Aayush Anand

GHG Accounting II — Scope 3, Data Quality and the Inventory Report

By the end of this session you can

Screen the 15 Scope 3 categories for relevance and document the screening
Select and justify a calculation method for each material category
Assess data quality and handle uncertainty, gaps and estimation transparently
Structure an inventory report and an inventory management plan that will survive third-party assurance

Three-hour agenda

00:00–00:15	Take-home review	Where the class disagreed on classification, and why those line items are hard: leased assets, commuting vs business travel, waste, the upstream/downstream transport split.
00:15–00:55	The 15 categories	Relevance screening for a textile manufacturer: purchased goods, upstream transport, fuel- and energy-related, waste, use of sold products (and why it is usually not applicable), end-of-life. Documenting exclusions defensibly.
00:55–01:25	Calculation methods	Supplier-specific, hybrid, average-data, spend-based. Deep dive on purchased goods — cotton, polyester, dyes, chemicals. Why spend-based data flatters a company that negotiates well.
01:25–01:35	Break
01:35–02:05	What is changing in Scope 3	The revision in progress: a proposed 95% coverage threshold, mandatory disaggregation by data tier, a proposed Category 16, Category 15 for all companies. What to build now so the change is cheap later.
02:05–02:35	Base year, targets and carbon pricing	Base year and recalculation policy, intensity metrics, how the inventory feeds SBTi targets. Where a compliance carbon market applies — India's CCTS for textiles — the same Scope 1 figure carries a direct financial consequence.
02:35–03:00	Timed manual build	Calculate Meridian's Scope 1 and 2 from the raw data pack in Excel, by hand, against the clock. Times go on the whiteboard. This is the benchmark for Week 2.

Exercise

Timed hand-calculation of Scope 1 and location- and market-based Scope 2 from the raw Meridian data pack, with a written note of every assumption. Individual times recorded publicly.

Take-home

Draft the relevance screening table for all 15 Scope 3 categories: relevant yes/no, magnitude estimate, data availability, proposed method, one-line justification.