Methodology for data collection

The Sustainable UN team within the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP SUN) collects, compiles, processes, and analyses data provided by UN entities around the world. These data present the environmental performance of the UN system, through the Annual Report, the Entity pages and the Environmental Dashboards available through this website.

Over the years of reporting, the availability and collection of data has improved based on a commonly agreed methodology, while coverage has expanded.

To move reporting to the digital age, UNEP SUN partnered with the Global Service Center of the UN Department of Operational Support to develop the Greening the Blue Data Platform. The Data Platform allows personnel through the whole UN system to input environmental performance data from facilities and operations in different duty stations. This 1st year of the pilot operation (2025) of the data platform allowed data collection from 1,071 duty stations and 60 UN entities.

The data platform increased accuracy and therefore accountability on environmental performance. The roll-out of the platform allowed a detailed look into the methodology applied for collection and assessments and ultimately its elaboration and refinement where necessary.

Since 2019, the availability and collection of data has improved based on a commonly agreed methodology, while coverage has expanded. Although 2020, 2021 and to an extend 2022 emission figures are exceptional due to the important reduction of activities, and notably travel, with 2019 as a reference, by now we can reach important conclusions on the progress of the UN system against its environmental sustainability objectives.

The Data Platform has not only accelerated the annual reporting but also enabled knowledge-based action for entities. With the SUN Data Platform Calculation Engine, entities can automatically calculate and view the results of their environmental performance and track its evolution over years.

The Data Platform has come a long way from past practice, yet UNEP SUN and Global Service Center are continuously working on improving and adding more functions to support the reporting. The continued collaboration and support from UN system entities is key in this endavour.

Air travel CO2 calculations with the ICAO Carbon Emissions Calculator 

The ICAO Carbon Emissions Calculator (ICEC) is the official tool for UN entities to quantify their air travel CO2 footprint, in support of their environmental commitments. The use of a common, transparent, impartial, and internationally approved methodology across the UN system facilitates the aggregation of air travel emissions data from different organizations and guarantees integrity and consistency of reported inventories. The ICEC is limited to calculating the direct emissions released into the atmosphere by the aircraft engines during a flight. There is a substantial understanding of the components of aviation climate forcing, particularly. However, important uncertainties remain in quantifying some of the aviation non- climate terms and in the underlying physical processes. As a consequence, there is not yet an international scientific consensus on whether and how to quantify these non-emissions. For additional information on the ICEC, please visit this webpage or contact officeenv@icao.int.