In this report, S&P Global Ratings shares the results of its analysis of industry and geographical scopes 1 and 2 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in 2016–2021, using data from S&P Global Sustainable1. This analysis aims to provide insights into the industries that are most exposed to climate transition risks, including risks related to climate policy, and legal, technology, and market changes to address mitigation.

We aim to answer four questions:

• What are the historical trends in GHG emissions and emissions intensity in the period 2016–2021?
• What were the industry and geographic concentrations of GHG emissions in 2021?
• Are GHG emissions related to a company's size?
• Is there a relationship between GHG emissions and economic growth?

The GHG emissions captured in our report represent approximately one-third of the global total and cover more than 13,000 companies since 2016. Details on the dataset are in the data and assumptions section, while definitions and other data tables are in the Appendix (see A1).

Data And Assumptions

Our dataset is part of S&P Global Sustainable1's historical annual data for scope 1 and 2 GHG absolute emissions and GHG emissions intensity. The data coverage increased to more than 17,000 companies in 2021 from more than 13,000 companies in 2016. Using this data, we performed a comparative study of GHG emissions and GHG emissions intensity for those companies from 2016 to 2021, which allowed us to analyze GHG emissions trends for that period. The companies are classified into 24 industry groups using the level-two Global Industry Classification Standard (GICS; see [2] in the endnotes table for a definition) and cover more than 100 geographies.

Our study does not focus on specific companies but rather on industry groups.   For our geographical analysis, we use the location of the company's headquarters, which does not reflect the fact that many companies operate internationally. For this analysis, given that the scope 3 data coverage is incomplete and subject to measurement challenges, we focus on scopes 1 and 2 GHG emissions, which are derived from a company's activities and are easier to measure.

How we define scopes 1, 2, and 3 emissions.   Scope 1 emissions include GHG emissions from burning fossil fuels and from production processes that are owned or controlled by a company. Scope 2 emissions relate to purchased heat and electricity, and our data takes a location-based approach in accounting for these emissions. For some sectors--such as banking and insurance, or those with significant supply chains--scope 3 emissions, also referred to as value-chain emissions, may be more important than scopes 1 and 2 emissions.

Data in the charts.  For the charts where we show historical trends since 2016, we use a representative cohort of 11,704 companies that have annual data available for each year from 2016 through 2021 (see Appendix A2 for a description of the data).

A Deep Dive Into Emissions Trends

1. What are the historical trends in GHG emissions in the period 2016–2021?

Since 2016, total absolute scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions have not reduced in our dataset. Figure 1 shows scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions since 2016 as represented by our dataset, as well as aggregate scope 1 and 2 emissions.

Figure 1

Figure 2 shows historical trends from 2016 to 2021 for the top four industry groups (see [3] in endnotes table) that exhibit the highest scope 1 emissions: utilities, materials, energy, and transportation. For scope 1 emissions, the industry groups that exhibit the highest emissions are also those with the highest emissions intensity. GHG emissions intensity--expressed by metric tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) equivalent per $1 million of revenue--facilitates the comparison between large and small companies.

All four industry groups indicate a downward trend in emissions intensity of various degrees over the period.   However, absolute levels of scope 1 GHG emissions have not decreased for utilities, materials, and energy.

Figure 2

Figure 3 shows a similar analysis of historical trends at the global level for scope 2 GHG emissions and emissions intensity. The industry groups with the highest scope 2 GHG emissions are materials, energy, and capital goods, while the industries with the highest scope 2 GHG emissions intensity are materials, semiconductors and semiconductor equipment, telecommunication services, and consumer services.

We provide more detail in Figure 3 for the industry groups with the highest scope 2 emissions intensity in 2021, since this provides insight into the link between absolute emissions and company growth. Both scope 2 GHG absolute emissions and emissions intensity markedly increase for semiconductors and semiconductor equipment and the telecommunication services industry groups.

Figure 3

We then compare the scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions and emissions intensity for all industry groups to survey the historical trends and variance across them since 2016.

We find that industry groups that exhibit high scope 1 GHG emissions intensity have intensity levels that are distinctly higher than other industries.   In our view, the industries that exhibit higher scope 1 GHG emissions intensity are likely to face greater climate transition risks than industries with lower emissions intensity, all else being equal. Figures 4a and 4b show scope 1 GHG emissions intensity and scope 1 GHG absolute emissions for 2016 through 2021.

The GHG emissions intensity at the industry group level exhibits high variation between the high and low industries. For example, in 2021, the scope 1 GHG emissions intensity for utilities was approximately 100 times higher than that for automobiles and components or pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, and life sciences. Of the 24 industry groups, 21 showed a decline in scope 1 GHG emissions intensity in 2021 when compared to 2016.

Figure 4a

Figure 4b

Figures 5a and 5b show a similar analysis for scope 2. The outcome of our analysis on scope 2 GHG emissions is somewhat different from that for scope 1. Fifteen of the 24 industry groups indicate a decline in scope 2 GHG emissions intensity between 2016 and 2021, while absolute scope 2 GHG emissions decrease for just seven of the industry groups.

For selected industry groups, the increase in absolute emissions is much higher than the decrease that other industries exhibit. For example, the semiconductors, semiconductor equipment, and media and entertainment industries demonstrate an increase of more than 100%, while the telecommunication services, energy, capital goods, and technology hardware and equipment industries show an increase of 50% to 75%.

Figure 5a

Figure 5b

2. What were the industry and geographic concentrations of GHG emissions in 2021?

By industry:   The industry groups with the most scope 1 GHG emissions in 2021 were utilities, materials, energy, and transportation. Together, these industry groups accounted for 90% of total scope 1 emissions. The total scope 2 GHG emissions appear to be 6 times lower than the total scope 1 emissions. In Figure 6, we plot the GHG emissions for 2021 for scopes 1 and 2 for the top 10 industry groups, with the remaining sectors aggregated into a separate "Other" category.

Figure 6

Total scope 1 GHG emissions for the materials and utilities industry groups are close in magnitude. This is partly because the number of covered companies for the materials industry group (1,755 companies) is more than 3 times higher than for the utilities industry group (470 companies). Figure 7 shows each industry group's contribution to total GHG emissions for our dataset in 2021.

Figure 7

To understand the distribution of GHG emissions intensity across industries, we compare the top 10 industry groups for 2021 in Figure 8, based on their weighted average GHG emissions intensity (weighted by revenue). While the utilities and materials industry groups rank highest in absolute terms, the GHG emissions intensity for materials is less than half of the emissions intensity for utilities.

Figure 8

A closer examination of the materials industry group shows that metals and mining companies account for more than 30% of the companies and about half of the total emissions in the group. While the chemicals industry accounts for 40% of the companies in the group, its scope 1 emissions are less than half of those for metals and mining, as shown in Figure 9.

Figure 9

Figure 10 shows a different story for emissions intensity within the materials industry group compared to absolute emissions. The construction materials industry has the highest GHG emissions intensity, mostly due to the cement sector. The metals and mining industry has a lower weighted-average GHG emissions intensity. In our dataset, the average revenue for metals and mining companies is twice the average revenue for construction materials companies, thus contributing to lower emissions intensity.

Figure 10

By geography:   Figures 11a and 11b show the geographical distribution of scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions intensity from 2016 to 2021 for our dataset. As noted for our geographical analysis, we use the location of the company's headquarters, which will not reflect the fact that many companies operate internationally.

Figure 11a

Figure 11b

3. Are GHG emissions related to a company's size?

We find a relatively high correlation between scope 1 and scope 2 GHG emissions and company size (as measured by revenue), meaning that the greater the company size, the higher the scope 1 and scope 2 emissions. We find that the correlation between emissions and company size, for each single year from 2016 to 2021, did not vary significantly.

In Figure 12, we plot for each industry group the yearly revenue (on the horizontal axis) and the corresponding scope 1 and 2 GHG emission levels (on the vertical axis) using a logarithm (log) transformation (see [4] in the endnotes table).

• The blue dots represent scope 1 GHG emissions for a particular company in each year from 2016 through 2021.
• The yellow dots represent scope 2 GHG emissions for a particular company in each year from 2016 through 2021.
• The trend lines indicate an increase in emissions as revenue increases, hence a positive relationship between revenue and emissions. The slope of the trend lines illustrates the co-movement between emissions and revenue for the dataset studied.
• The overall correlation for all industries between GHG emissions and revenue is relatively high, ranging from 0.7 for scope 1, to 0.8 (see [5] in the endnotes table) for scope 2.

Figure 12

The relationship between GHG emissions and the size of individual companies (represented by their revenue) can vary. Companies in fossil-fuel-intensive industries would have higher emissions associated with their operations, but companies that, for example, have invested in renewable energy to replace fossil-fuel-generated energy can reduce their scope 1 emissions even if they are large or become larger. An increase in revenue may be fueled by several factors, such as growth in prices and volumes sold, an expansion of production, or mergers and acquisitions. Absent measures for reducing GHG emissions, other than price growth, these factors may give rise to higher emissions. At the regional level, and aggregating the data of all companies by regions, we find a similar positive relationship for the period 2016–2021 (see Figure 13).

Figure 13

4. Is there a relationship between GHG emissions and economic growth?

Our analysis shows that, generally, the trends of GHG emissions are related to economic activity at a global level. We analyze the relationship between the total of scopes 1 and 2 GHG emissions in our dataset and global real GDP.

Our dataset covers only about one-third of total emissions, which excludes many other economic activities that contribute to GDP or that use or generate energy from fossil fuels. These include, for example, the residential segment; personal transportation; service-based activities, such as retail and education; the agriculture sector; and government activities, which in some jurisdictions could include infrastructure, utilities, and transportation services.

Figures 14a and 14b show a positive relationship between GDP and scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions for the companies in our dataset. The dotted lines show observed trends fitted for scope 1 and 2 emissions since 2016.

Figure 14a

Figure 14b

The positive relationship between economic growth and scope 1 and 2 emissions is not present in all regions. Figures 15a and 15b show historical regional GDP and total scope 1 and 2 emissions at the regional level since 2016 for six regions.

Chart 15a

Chart 15b

Due to global markets' interconnectedness, emissions may shift from one region to another if, for example, a company relocates its production. As noted earlier, this analysis focuses on scope 1 and 2 emissions and uses the location of the company's headquarters to assign a company to a region. Notwithstanding this, the GHG emissions of global supply chains and from imports (which for companies are often classified as scope 3 emissions) are important when assessing GHG emissions in aggregate.

Conclusion

Within the universe of industries we analyzed, scope 1 and 2 GHG emissions are concentrated in a few industries, and decarbonization efforts are most often focused on these sectors by stakeholders, including policymakers, investors, and companies themselves. While the relationship between GHG emissions and economic growth is complex and depends on industry characteristics and individual business models, energy sources and technologies, the data suggests a continuing relatively high correlation between growth and GHG emissions. Furthermore, reduced GHG emissions intensity does not necessarily translate into reduced absolute GHG emissions, notably because increasing economic activity can offset emissions intensity improvements.

Appendix

A1. What are scope 1, 2, and 3 GHG emissions?

The Greenhouse Gas Protocol, which supplies a widely used greenhouse gas accounting standard, classifies the greenhouse gas emissions of a company in three scopes (see Figure 16).

Figure 16

A2. Data description

All GHG emissions in our dataset have been converted into metric tons of CO2 equivalent (tCO2e). Greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, and the conversion to tCO2e makes possible a single final measure that can be used for comparison. When comparing emissions across industries and regions, we aggregate company-level GHG emissions (in tCO2e) at the industry and regional level, based on where a company has its headquarters.

This study covers more than 13,000 unique companies through 2016–2021 and more than 80,000 data points. We divide the geographies into the following 10 regions (see section A3 below for a further geographical breakdown of each region):

• Africa
• Asia-Pacific (East Asia and Pacific, excluding India and China)
• Asia (rest of Asia)
• EU
• Europe (non-EU)
• India
• Mainland China
• Latin America
• United Kingdom
• U.S. and Canada

Figures 17a and 17b show a breakout of the dataset for each year since 2016.   Not all companies consistently reported from 2016 to 2021, so the increasing number of companies in Figure 17a may reflect different companies in different reporting years. Out of this sample of companies, 11,704 have annual data available for each year since 2016.

Figure 17a

Figure 17b

When breaking down the analysis by region, our dataset uses the location of the company's headquarters to assign a company to a region. This assumption may not capture all the regions in which the subsidiaries of a particular company are located and where they generate GHG emissions.

Figure 18 shows the breakdown of our dataset (2021) by size (measured by revenue) for each of the 24 industry groups.  Capital goods is the largest industry group by revenue, followed by materials and energy. Although less than half the size of the capital goods industry, the utilities industry produces the most scope 1 GHG emissions (5.6 billion tCO2e) followed by materials (5 billion tCO2e). For our dataset, total scope 1 absolute emissions add up to 15.5 billion tCO2e and scope 2 emissions add up to 2.5 billion tCO2e.

Figure 18

A.3 The constituents of each region.

Figure 19