Carbon reporting

Cardiff University’s commitment to reducing our carbon emissions as much as possible is supported by transparency about our emissions, both current and historical.

We have calculated our carbon emissions for the latest complete reporting year (1 August 2022 to 31 July 2023), using two separate frameworks: the Welsh Government’s Public Sector Net Zero Reporting Framework; and the EAUC’s (Environmental Association for Universities and Colleges)​ Standardised Carbon Emissions Framework (SCEF)​.  The below chart shows our baseline emissions, and our emissions for the 2022/23 year according to both reporting approaches.

*The baseline years are set individually by theme, as follows: 2005/06 (gas and electricity); 2014/15 (fleet); 2021/22 (anaesthetic gas, F gas, water, fuel and energy used to transport to the institution, waste and homeworking) and 2022/23 (business travel, staff commuting, procurement and student travel).

As can be seen in the table, the EAUC methodology captures more of the carbon emissions generated by University activities. Emissions from procurement in 2022/23 were 114% higher than those measured using the Welsh Government methodology. Unlike staff commuting, student commuting is not included within the scope of the Welsh Government guidance.

We have adopted the EAUC framework because it facilitates benchmarking across the higher education sector, and because in key areas, particularly procurement, its categorisation reflects the University’s carbon emissions more accurately. We will now use this framework for our primary carbon accounting, while continuing to monitor our carbon footprint per the Welsh Government methodology and report this annually.

As we have developed our data collection methods since the 2021/22 year, we have captured the carbon emissions associated with our travel and procurement in greater detail. We have therefore reset our baseline emissions for business travel, commuting (including student commuting) and procurement using the 2022/23 totals as captured under the EAUC methodology. We note that as we continue to improve our data quality, emissions from business travel, commuting and waste may continue to appear to increase from 2023/24 onwards.

We have analysed our Scope 1 and 2 emissions from gas and electricity since the 2005/06 academic year utilising our Estate Management Report tool, as well as emissions from fleet since 2014/15. By also measuring the development of the University estate over the same period, we have been able to analyse our Scope 1 and 2 emissions relative to estate size. Our Scope 1 and 2 emissions have decreased by 22% since the 2005/06 baseline, despite our estate growing by 34% over the same period.

We will update this page to include the data for the 2023/24 year in early 2025.