Annex 5 - Specificities for local authorities and associations

What are the specific features of the Bilan Carbone® for local authorities and associations?

Why a dedicated annex for associations?

Annex 5.1 - Specificities for associations

The association sector must combine two imperatives: reducing the carbon impact of its activities while pursuing its essential social utility in a low-carbon world. Although associations, like companies, generate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, it is sometimes difficult for these actors, often engaged on ecological or social issues, to know their own carbon footprint.

Reducing emissions does not necessarily mean reducing association activity, but rather optimising practices to reduce environmental impact, reduce dependencies on carbon-intensive activities, and thereby minimise vulnerabilities and sustain association activities.

The motivations of associations for initiating a carbon accounting approach can be grouped into four main categories:

1

To respond to stakeholder expectations

Whether internal (responding to internal aspirations of employees, volunteers, members or administrators), or external (differentiating with the association's partners and beneficiaries, responding to transparency needs with private or public funders, feeding into the environmental reporting of actors in the association's value chain).

2

To anticipate risks

Identifying vulnerabilities linked to the carbon footprint (dependence on fossil fuels, physical impacts), as well as risks and opportunities linked to the transition towards a low-carbon world (regulations, subsidies, reputation, etc.)

3

For a need for consistency with the association's values

The Bilan Carbone® makes it possible to strengthen the association's raison d'être and its alignment with its convictions, and the feeling of "doing one's part" at its own level for the ecological transition.

4

To benefit from a key indicator for a global assessment

The carbon indicator makes it possible to measure and guide action, to complement social and environmental assessment approaches, and to reconcile social impact and respect for planetary boundaries.

These motivations reflect a quest for coherence, responsibility, and resilience, common to other types of organisations, but adapted to the specific features of associations.

The specificities of associations make it essential to adapt the Bilan Carbone® approach to their operational and organisational realities:

• Limited resources: Associations often operate with restricted funding, which limits their capacity to invest in complex tools or training. The implementation of a carbon accounting approach therefore raises questions about the mobilisation of internal resources, whether time, budget or skills. The small size of many associations further accentuates this challenge.

• Structuring of skills: The dynamics of associations, which mix volunteers and employees, generates specific challenges around the steering of the approach, the implementation of actions, and the transfer of skills. This situation raises the question of the association's progression in its maturity journey.

• Boundaries and flow mapping: Mapping the activities of all actors (employees, volunteers, beneficiaries) is one of the specificities in the carbon accounting of associations.

• Diversity of activities: The activities of associations vary considerably, ranging from the organisation of local events to the management of international projects, with specific issues around access to data or the identification of emission sources. Furthermore, the sectors of intervention of associations are varied (culture, sport, humanitarian, health, environment, education, etc.) and sometimes require cross-referencing information from corresponding sectoral guides.

• Diversity of profiles: Some small associations operate primarily thanks to volunteers (possible difficulties related to skills turnover, informal governance or lack of means to assess their impact). Others, consisting mainly of employees, resemble classic companies (variable involvement of Boards of Directors). Associations structured around a very specific project sometimes face a lack of emission factors, while large national associations must manage a multiplicity of emission sources. Finally, network heads and advocacy associations must address specific issues linked to their indirect impact.

• Social and environmental actions: The quantification of these positive contributions remains complex, and does not subtract from induced emissions.

• Data collection: Certain cases are relatively specific: donation, recovery and reuse practices (monetary or material) are less traceable than classic purchases, beneficiaries are more difficult to question (health, social or humanitarian sectors), etc.

This annex is the result of reflections conducted with a Working Group on the carbon footprint of associations, created specifically by the ABC (Association pour la transition Bas Carbone) and the Mouvement Tilt. This Working Group brings together experts from the association sphere, association witnesses, carbon accounting experts and institutions.

The annex makes it possible to adapt the steering of a Bilan Carbone® approach within an association. Its ambition is to strengthen the transition to climate action in the association sector by drawing on an adapted and accessible methodology, collectively designed to address the specific challenges of this sector. It constitutes a methodological reference for practical tools aligned with the realities and specificities of this sector. Furthermore, a sectoral approach of the Plan Carbone Général makes it possible to specify the accounting phase by providing practical and concrete advice for quantifying the carbon emissions of an association.

These methodological deliverables are addressed to associations governed by the French law of 1901 and declared in France. If other general-interest structures (such as foundations) or non-French associations wish to use the sectoral approach, they may do so, without any guarantee that this approach will suit them fully.

Why a dedicated annex for local authorities?

Annex 5.2 - Specificities for local authorities