Should work-from-home emissions be counted in Scope 3 Category 7?
Yes, if you count them at all, work-from-home emissions go in Scope 3 Category 7, employee commuting. The GHG Protocol makes them optional. Include them when hybrid work is a large share of your days, or when you report lower commuting from hybrid work, so the saving is not overstated.
Why it is Category 7 and not Scope 2
The GHG Protocol Scope 3 Standard says companies may include emissions from employees teleworking in Category 7. Scope 2 covers electricity the company buys for sites in its own boundary. A home is not in your boundary and the bill is the employee's, so even if you pay a home internet or electricity allowance, the emissions stay in Scope 3.
When to include it
- You report a fall in commuting emissions because staff come in fewer days. Leaving out the home side makes the drop look larger than it is.
- A large share of working days are remote, as in many IT and BPO firms, so Category 7 would be incomplete without it.
- A client, investor or rating questionnaire asks for remote work emissions by name.
- You are setting a target that covers Category 7 and want the boundary fixed from the base year.
When leaving it out is defensible
If few days are remote, or a screening estimate shows the figure is a small fraction of total Scope 3, you can leave it out. Say so in the methodology note: teleworking excluded, the reason, and the screening figure. Apply the same choice every year so the trend stays comparable.
What does not belong here
- Business trips, hotel stays and client visits: Category 6.
- A coworking desk or satellite office the company rents: report it as leased space or a purchased service, not as telework, and state which.
- Laptops and furniture the company buys for home use: Category 1 or 2, depending on how you treat capital goods.
Worked example: one remote day against one office day (assumptions labelled)
- Office day by car, 20 km round trip at 0.154 kg CO2 per km (petrol car at 15 km per litre): 20 x 0.154 = 3.08 kg CO2
- Home day without AC, about 1.16 kWh: 1.16 x 0.710 = 0.82 kg CO2
- Home day with a 1.2 kW AC for 6 hours, 1.16 + 7.2 = 8.36 kWh: 8.36 x 0.710 = 5.94 kg CO2
- Without AC the remote day saves about 2.3 kg; with AC it emits about 2.9 kg more than the drive
The car economy, home load and AC hours are assumptions. The point is that counting only the avoided commute can show a saving that is not there in summer.
What Senseible does here
Senseible records the electricity and fuel bills of your own sites. Home electricity of remote staff is not on your bills, so a teleworking estimate is something you calculate and add to your Scope 3 notes.
- Can we exclude a Scope 3 category
- Estimate work-from-home emissions
- Commuting emissions from a staff survey
- Scope 3 categories for IT services
Sources: GHG Protocol Corporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Standard (2011), Category 7, employee commuting, GHG Protocol Technical Guidance for Calculating Scope 3 Emissions (2013), Category 7, CEA CO2 Baseline Database
Last reviewed 2026-10-17.