Abstract:
Global warming is a major issue mainly caused by the emission of greenhouse gases (GHG) due to
anthropogenic activities. Calculating carbon footprint (CFP) is the valuable first step to quantify
GHG emissions. Many organizations, including universities, fire brigades, rescue services, food
manufacturers, hotels, and hospitals, are now estimating their CFP to monitor their impact on
global warming and climate change. However, there is a lack of comparative studies about
variations of organizational CFP in different sectors related to estimated methodologies,
geography and effectiveness of mitigation strategies. This review study examines these variations
among organizations and identifies effective emission reduction strategies to address climate
change. The article screening process was conducted by considering the peer-reviewed, research
articles related to the CFP of organizations published from 2005-2023, highlighting keywords
such as “CFP of “organization”, “reduction”, “strategies”, and “worldwide” using the “Google
Scholar” academic search engine. For the final data analysis, a total of 20 articles were obtained
from the screening process. Results show that many methods exist to analyze CFP such as life
cycle assessment, process-based approach, input-output analysis, and hybrid approach. Those
methods were applied under different scopes (Scope 1: Direct GHG emissions. Scope 2: Indirect
electricity GHG emissions. Scope 3: Other indirect GHG emissions), system boundaries, data
sources, and emission factors. It was found that CFP can vary according to the location, size of
land area, and developing status of the country. Organizational CFP in Asian countries ranges from
70 to 4650 tCO2-e/Yr. In contrast, non-Asian countries, like Italy, Colombia, and USA ranged
between 3500 and 13500 tCO2-e/Yr suggesting that organizational CFP is a lower value in Asian
countries than in European countries. Many studies show that most CFP occurs from indirect
emissions and travel-related emissions dominate in most organizations under Scope 3.
Organizations have taken necessary actions including adopting renewable energy sources,
implementing energy-efficient technologies, green transportation, waste management practices,
carbon capture and storage and carbon offset programs. Informing these effective responses to
climate change will offer vital guidance for those involved in shaping public policy in different
sectors.
