Why Is This KPI Important?

Reporting Scope 3 carbon emissions for business travel is fundamental for organisations seeking to manage and reduce their environmental impact. It provides a clear metric for tracking the indirect emissions generated by employee travel—a category that’s often significant, yet overlooked. This KPI helps track progress against sustainability targets, benchmark performance, and demonstrate a commitment to responsible business to clients, investors, and employees.

Increasingly, we’re seeing that the customers of our clients are requesting more detailed emissions data to support their supply chain reporting and net-zero goals. This is no longer just a “nice to have”—in many jurisdictions, Scope 3 reporting is now a regulatory and audit requirement. For example, the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) mandates Scope 3 disclosure for all large organisations, and similar rules are being implemented or strengthened in the US, UK, and other major economies. Internal audits and external assurance are becoming standard practice under these new compliance frameworks.

Strengths of This KPI

Comparative Power: The real strength lies in comparison. This KPI lets you see if emissions are rising or falling year-on-year, and whether one travel mode (like a flight) is more carbon-intensive than another (like a train). It’s not about the absolute number, but whether you’re moving in the right direction.

Industry Standardisation: Most organisations use DEFRA metrics, so you can reliably benchmark your data against peers and industry norms. This consistency is invaluable for global organisations.

Actionable in Many Sectors: For many companies, especially outside heavy manufacturing, business travel is a major source of emissions. Even so, I remember talking to a sustainability team once at a manufacturing client. We initially thought our travel emissions savings were tiny, but they were actually very happy! Why? Because reducing travel emissions by 10% was far more achievable for them than squeezing another 1% from their factory operations, where efficiency improvements are incredibly difficult. It really highlights the importance of business travel as an area for change.

Challenges of This KPI

Difficult to Relate To: “Tonnes of CO2” is an abstract concept. Most people can’t picture what it looks like, or what it means for them or the business. It’s like those internet memes about the difference between a million and a billion, big numbers just don't compute on an intuitive level.

Limited Context: Without context, it’s hard to judge if a number is “big” or “small.” The same figure can feel overwhelming or trivial, depending on your perspective. And honestly, I get turned off by equivalencies that are also equally difficult to understand. Saying "so many tonnes of CO2 is equivalent to driving to the moon" doesn't really help me because both concepts are inconceivable. How does that make it any clearer?

Blunt Instrument: This KPI does one thing well—measuring total emissions—but lacks nuance. It doesn’t explain why emissions are high or low, or what specific actions will make the biggest difference.

Taking It to the Next Level

Make It Personal: Share emissions data widely—business leaders, cost centre owners, and even individual travellers should see how their decisions affect the company’s carbon footprint. When people realise it’s not just a “somewhere else” problem, but a “me” problem, engagement grows.

Layered Communication: Use the “What–So What–Now What” framework:

• What: Here’s your number—maybe it’s two shipping containers of hot dogs worth of CO2.
• So What: That’s X% of your department’s annual target, or enough to power your office for a month.
• Now What: Here’s how you can make a difference—choose rail over air, combine trips, or skip unnecessary travel.

AI Visualisation: Don’t just talk about the numbers—show them. Use AI-generated images to visualise what a tonne of CO2 looks like, or what a million hot dogs really means. It’s a powerful way to make the abstract tangible and spark meaningful conversations.

Should You Use This KPI?

Absolutely—if business travel is a part of your operations, then you need to measure it.

But remember: you manage what you measure. This KPI is a starting point, not the whole story.

Use it to drive awareness and action, but supplement it with more nuanced insights and recommendations. With supply chain partners and customers increasingly demanding this data for their own reporting, and with audit requirements now in force in many regions, robust Scope 3 travel emissions data is becoming a business necessity, not just a sustainability nice-to-have.

Rating: 2.5/5

Conclusion

Scope 3 travel emissions reporting is a vital tool for sustainability, but its real value comes from how you communicate and contextualise the numbers. By layering in relatable stories, sharing data widely, and using AI to bring the numbers to life, you help everyone in your organisation see that reducing emissions isn’t just a corporate goal—it’s something each of us can influence, one decision at a time. And as customer, supply chain, and regulatory expectations rise, this KPI is quickly moving from optional to essential.

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