# How do I calculate the carbon footprint of a notebook or exercise book?

Canonical: https://senseible.earth/answers/notebook-carbon-footprint-per-unit

Weigh the inner paper and the cover, multiply each by the paper or board mill's footprint per kg, and add printing, binding and the plant's electricity per notebook. Divide by notebooks packed. Paper usually makes up most of the figure, so the mill's data and the paper's GSM matter most.

## Bill of materials

- Inner paper: sheets x sheet area x GSM, or simply weigh a sample of finished notebooks without the cover.
- Cover board and lamination film.
- Binding: staple wire, thread or glue; spiral wire for spiral notebooks.
- Printing inks for ruling and covers.
- Shrink wrap and cartons.

## Paper mill data

Indian paper mills differ a lot in fuel, from coal to black liquor and biomass, and in fibre, from wood to agro residues and recycled paper. Ask your mill for kg CO2e per tonne for the grade you buy. If you cannot get it, use a published dataset and cite it, and say whether the paper is virgin or recycled.

## Plant energy

Ruling, printing, cutting, stitching and binding machines run on electricity. Divide the month's kWh by notebooks made. Paper waste from trimming is part of the paper you bought, so use paper issued, not paper in the finished notebook, for the material line.

## Thinner paper, lower footprint

Moving from 70 GSM to 58 GSM paper cuts paper weight per page by about 17%, if the product still meets the buyer's requirement. It is often the biggest lever a notebook maker has.

## Worked example: plant electricity per notebook (one month)

- Electricity: 12,000 kWh x 0.710 = 8,520 kg CO2
- Notebooks made: 300,000
- Plant electricity: 8,520 / 300,000 = 0.028 kg, about 28 g CO2 per notebook
- Paper: for example 0.2 kg per notebook x the mill's factor per kg gives the larger part

Inputs are illustrative; use your own bills and production records.

## What Senseible does here

Senseible reads the plant's electricity bills (CEA grid factor 0.710 kg CO2 per kWh, CO2 Baseline Database version 21.0) and fuel invoices (IPCC 2006 defaults) into a fingerprinted Scope 1 and 2 record, the plant-level input to a per-unit figure. Bought-in materials go to the supplier evidence trail; product reports are self-declared drafts.

- [Paper mill footprint per tonne](https://senseible.earth/answers/paper-mill-carbon-footprint-per-tonne)
- [Offset printing footprint per tonne](https://senseible.earth/answers/offset-printing-carbon-footprint-per-tonne-of-print)
- [Product carbon footprint calculator](https://senseible.earth/calculators/product-carbon-footprint)

Sources: [GHG Protocol Product Standard](https://ghgprotocol.org/standards), [ISO 14067:2018, Carbon footprint of products (iso.org)](https://www.iso.org), [CEA CO2 Baseline Database, version 21.0](https://cea.nic.in/cdm-co2-baseline-database/?lang=en)

Last reviewed 2026-10-20.