Greenhouse gas emissions, the return

Remember, the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions report had to be drawn up by December 31, 2012, and sent electronically to the prefect of the region in which the company's head office or principal place of business was located. As this report must be made public and updated at least every three years, the second edition must be published no later than... December 31, 2015.

This second publication takes on a special resonance in 2015, when France, host of COP 21 (Paris Climate 2015), is setting an example. With this in mind, the Comité 21, together with the Club France Développement durable, has taken the initiative of creating "Solutions Cop 21", which will showcase the concrete actions of companies and their solutions for the climate.

Greenhouse gas emissions report

Companies are called upon to play an active role in the fight against climate change by reducing their environmental impact, and more specifically their greenhouse gas emissions.

In this context, Decree no. 2011-829 of July 11, 2011 on greenhouse gas emissions and territorial climate-energy plans describes the companies concerned by the preparation of a GHG balance sheet:

legal entities under private law (*) employing more than 500 people (250 in the French overseas territories),
regions, départements, metropolises, urban communities, conurbation communities and communes or communities of communes with more than 50,000 inhabitants,
public corporations with more than 250 employees, the French State.

It also defines the content of GHG emission balances and the two perimeters that the balance must cover:

direct emissions and,
indirect emissions from the use of electricity, heat or steam.

The decree also specifies the procedures for making GHG balances available and publicizing them. It establishes a national coordinating body that will define the scope of emissions and the main methodological choices required to draw up the reports. Any entity, private or public, not subject to the regulatory BEGES requirement can of course carry out a voluntary BEGES, as encouraged by Corporate Social Responsibility(CSR) and Organizational Social Responsibility (OSR), in order to reduce their environmental impact while improving their social and societal impacts.

(*): The GHG balance sheet for private legal entities must be drawn up according to the legal entity's organizational perimeter: financial control (the organization consolidates 100% of the emissions of the facilities for which it exercises financial control) or operational control (the organization consolidates 100% of the emissions of the facilities for which it exercises operational control).