ABSTRACT

The key measurement standard used by the private sector to measure the carbon emission impact of an organization is the corporate carbon footprint. Known as the GHG Protocol, this standard was created in 2001 through a multi-stakeholder collaboration and is now used by thousands of companies globally. This article discusses the origins of the Protocol to better illuminate the politics surrounding the counting and measuring of carbon emissions as environmental intangibles that serve as a critical first step towards corporate climate action. Using archival research and interviews with key stakeholders, I underscore the actors involved and their motivations, which combined led to the development of certain internal accounting technologies, namely the practice of scoping. Scoping was proposed as a way to categorize emissions according to levels of legal ownership and control and avoid ‘double-counting’. Using Chiapello and Engels’ suggesting that integrating scoping was an effort to forge a compatibility between economic growth and climate protection and protect the financial interests of businesses by narrowly enclosing climate mitigation responsibility. To conclude, I discuss the lasting implications to measuring carbon with the corporate carbon footprint for meaningful climate action.

摘要

私营部门用来衡量组织碳排放影响的关键衡量标准是企业碳足迹。该标准被称为 GHG 协议，于 2001 年通过多方利益相关者的合作创建，现在已被全球数千家公司使用。本文讨论了该协议的起源，以更好地阐明围绕碳排放计算和衡量作为环境无形资产的政治，这是迈向企业气候行动的关键第一步。通过档案研究和与主要利益相关者的访谈，我强调了所涉及的参与者及其动机，这些因素共同导致了某些内部会计技术的发展，即范围界定的实践。范围界定被提议作为一种根据合法所有权和控制水平对排放进行分类并避免“重复计算”的方法。使用 Chiapello 和 Engels 的建议，整合范围界定是为了在经济增长与气候保护之间建立兼容性，并通过狭义地包含气候减缓责任来保护企业的财务利益。最后，我讨论了用企业碳足迹来衡量碳对有意义的气候行动的持久影响。