We sell steel or aluminium scrap to recyclers. What goes in our Scope 3 Category 5 line for it?

Scrap you sell to a recycler still sits in Category 5, but under the GHG Protocol's recycled content method your line covers only moving the scrap to the recycler, and only if you include waste transport. Recycling process emissions are zero in your inventory because they belong to whoever uses the recycled metal.

What your Category 5 line contains

Selling scrap for money does not move it out of Category 5. The category covers waste from your operations sent for treatment, and recycling is one treatment route.

• Recycling process emissions: zero in your inventory. The Scope 3 Technical Guidance assigns them to the user of the recycled material under the recycled content method.
• Transport of the scrap to the dealer or recycler: include it if you pay for it. Transport of waste is an optional part of Category 5 in the Scope 3 Standard, so say whether you included it.
• If the buyer collects the scrap in its own trucks, that trip is the buyer's emission, and your line can be close to zero.

Where the recycling benefit goes

It goes to the company that buys the recycled steel or aluminium, through a lower factor on recycled input in its own Category 1 or product footprint. Your line stays at transport only and takes no deduction; why selling scrap earns no carbon credit is covered on the linked page.

Category 1 does not shrink for metal that becomes scrap

You bought the full coil, sheet or billet, so Category 1 counts all of it, including the offcuts and swarf you later sell. Scrap revenue does not reduce it either. The way to lower these emissions is to buy less metal per good part, which shows up in Category 1 the next year.

Records to keep for each scrap sale

1. Weighbridge slip and scrap sale invoice with tonnes and grade.
2. Freight invoice or trip log if you paid for the transport, with distance and vehicle type, or the litres of diesel used.
3. A note of the method: recycled content method, transport included or excluded.

Worked example: a fabricator's yearly steel scrap

• Scrap sold: 600 t in 30 truck trips of 20 t, 40 km each way, freight paid by you
• Distance: 30 trips x 80 km round trip = 2,400 km
• Diesel at an assumed 4 km per litre: 2,400 / 4 = 600 litres
• Transport emissions: 600 x 2.68 kg CO2 per litre (IPCC 2006 default for diesel) = 1,608 kg, about 1.6 t CO2
• Recycling process emissions in your inventory: 0
• Category 5 line for scrap: about 1.6 t CO2, plus a note that the recycled content method was used

The fuel economy is an assumption; use the transporter's actual litres if you can get them.

What Senseible does here

Senseible reads freight records for the trips that carry your scrap and keeps those lines in the Scope 3 evidence trail with the source file behind each figure, so the transport part of your Category 5 line can be traced to each trip.

• Carbon credit for selling scrap?
• Recycled content in a product footprint
• Waste emissions in Category 5
• Scope 3 supplier evidence

Sources: GHG Protocol Technical Guidance for Calculating Scope 3 Emissions (2013), Category 5, GHG Protocol Corporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Standard, IPCC 2006 Guidelines, Volume 2 Energy

Last reviewed 2026-10-17.