State of the art in greenhouse gas accounting and mitigation, including scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions – Final report
The European Green Deal and the European Climate Law set ambitious climate change mitigation targets, and cities play a key role in achieving them. Initiatives such as the EU Covenant of Mayors and the EU Mission ‘Climate-neutral and smart cities’ have brought together thousands of cities committed to reducing their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Through these initiatives, cities have developed GHG inventories to inform action planning and to monitor progress.
City-level GHG accounting frameworks have mostly focused on emissions occurring within territorial boundaries and/or associated with local energy use. However, researchers and practitioners have increasingly acknowledged the importance of GHG emissions occurring beyond city borders. A shift to consumption-based accounting has been observed in recent years, which may be associated with increased complexity, additional challenges in data collection and subjective methodological choices. Limited guidance and data are currently available to support EU cities, which need consistent GHG accounting frameworks and data, aligned with their needs, priorities and resources.
This report provides a review of the state of the art in GHG accounting and action in the EU, including current practices and available methods and data to support more comprehensive accounting. It provides a knowledge base and recommendations towards the development of a flexible accounting framework, combining different methods and approaches, to prepare relevant, comprehensive and consistent GHG inventories at the city level.
BASTOS Joana;
BANJA Manjola;
VITEL Alexandra Elena;
STEEN-OLSEN Kjartan;
BALTRUSZEWICZ Marta;
CAMILLERI Rosalie;
VETTERS Nadja;
2026-02-16
Publications Office of the European Union
JRC145257
978-92-68-36271-6 (online),
1831-9424 (online),
EUR 40614,
OP KJ-01-26-036-EN-N (online),
https://publications.jrc.ec.europa.eu/repository/handle/JRC145257,
10.2760/0893489 (online),
