Standardising offshore wind carbon footprinting, supplier data guidance and a shared supplier ambition statement

The SUSJIP offshore wind programme has created a range resources to support greater consistency and transparency across the industry, combining a standardised methodology for calculating product carbon footprints, practical guidance for supplier data collection, and a shared industry ambition for improving carbon data availability and quality.

Offshore wind industry product carbon footprinting guidance

Overview

Previously no industry guidance on calculating a full carbon footprint for an offshore wind farm existed. This has left the industry open to interpret existing standards, which are not entirely applicable for offshore wind. Consequently, comparing carbon footprints of different development projects could be meaningless. 

The Sustainability JIP has tackled this problem by developing the Offshore Wind Industry Product Carbon Footprinting (PCF) Guidance. This guidance is a freely available methodology document and advises users on how to accurately calculate emissions using an inventory of offshore wind activity data and emission factors.

Aims of the Offshore Wind PCF guidance

The primary aim of the methodology document is to produce a standardised set of guidelines for assessing the product-level carbon footprint of an offshore wind development. This seeks to harmonise the approach across the industry. To achieve this aim, a series of objectives have been defined: 

  1. Provide offshore wind sector specific guidance on the application of existing standards for PCF.  
  2. Provide guidance for harmonising the calculation approach within the industry, improving comparability and transparency of PCF for offshore wind developments, enabling stakeholders to understand the impact of different designs and technologies.
  3. Provide a framework for developers to calculate and report different emissions metrics for their developments.
  4. Develop a framework to improve data quality and enable data exchange between partners in the offshore wind supply chain. 

     

Methodology update

In March 2026, the methodology has been revised to improve the guidance’s clarity and align it with current industry best practices.  Use cases are given on how to apply the PCF methodology, and updated templates for reporting and disclosure and improved guidance for assessing data quality, sensitivity and uncertainty are provided. In June 2026, the Offshore Wind Supplier Data Guidance was published as a companion to the primary PCF guidance, translating the data requirements into clear logical steps for suppliers to act on.
 

Case studies

Real-world examples of the SUSJIP methodology in action
 

Developer-partner position statement  

In March 2026, SUSJIP partners published a position paper advocating for a unified and harmonised methodology to calculate carbon footprints. 

Read the Developer-partner position statement
 

Guidance resources

Offshore wind PCF guidance - technical summary

Offshore wind industry PCF guidance FAQs


Webinar 

The Carbon Trust, together with several SUSJIP partners, hosted a webinar on 3 October 2024 dedicated to explaining the methodology, the key takeaways, what it means for the industry, and how it can be used. This webinar also offered attendees the opportunity to engage with industry leaders on the topic of carbon footprinting.

Watch here
 

Supplier data guidance and a shared supplier ambition statement

To improve carbon emission data and monitoring practices by addressing common challenges with developers and suppliers in data gathering. A supplier guidance annex has been added to the carbon footprint methodology.
Additionally, a shared ambition statement has been developed in collaboration with the SUSJIP partners. This is a shared, non-binding ambition designed to provide key suppliers with a clear and consistent signal on developers’ expectations. It sets out the minimum expectations for 2028, and the outcomes developers would like suppliers to work towards from 2030 onwards, with the longer-term ambition of enabling supplier carbon data to be used to inform procurement decisions and drive decarbonisation across the supply chain.

SUSJIP supplier data guidance

Ambition statement
 

Offshore wind footprinting tool

A free offshore wind PCF calculator tool has been developed and is available for users of the Offshore Wind Industry Product Carbon Footprinting (PCF) Guidance. The tool can be optionally used when applying the guidance to help calculate the emissions of OSW developments.

Download the tool (.xlsm)

 

Tool training videos

Part 1: Downloading and navigating the tool

Part 2: Project summary and information tabs

Part 3: Emissions factor database

Part 4: Calculation tabs

Part 5: Interpreting results

 

Discover more about the Offshore Wind Sustainability JIP

Discover more about offshore wind

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