Skip to main content
Back to Glossary
Definition

Scope 3 Category 11: Use of sold products

Scope 3 Category 11 covers the expected lifetime emissions from customers using goods and services your company sold during the reporting year, including fuel or electricity use and greenhouse gases released from products.

What is Scope 3 Category 11: Use of sold products?

Category 11 is a downstream part of your Scope 3 inventory. Its minimum boundary is the expected lifetime direct use-phase emissions of products sold in the reporting year: energy consumed by sold products, combustion of sold fuels or feedstocks, and GHGs released from products. Indirect use-phase emissions are optional.

Why does Scope 3 Category 11 matter to you?

The GHG Protocol Scope 3 Standard requires you to report Category 11 separately and describe the data sources, method, assumptions, and exclusions. Counting one year of customer use understates durable products; counting the full installed base overstates the sales-year inventory.

How is Scope 3 Category 11 calculated?

Classify each product first. For energy-using products, multiply units sold by expected lifetime uses, energy per use, and a representative factor. For fuels or combusted feedstocks, multiply quantity sold by the combustion factor and exclude upstream fuel emissions. For products containing a GHG, Formula 11.3 multiplies GHG per product by units sold, lifetime release percentage, and global warming potential. Group only products with comparable use profiles.

What mistakes should you avoid?

  • Using annual energy consumption where the method requires expected lifetime use.
  • Adding production, transport, or end-of-life emissions to Category 11.
  • Applying one electricity factor across customer countries without testing geography.
  • Subtracting claimed avoided emissions from the Category 11 total.

Does every sold product create Category 11 emissions?

No. A product with no direct use-phase emissions can have zero emissions in the minimum Category 11 boundary. If indirect use-phase emissions are expected to be significant, GHG Protocol says you should include them using a stated lifetime use profile.

What records support a Category 11 total?

Keep sales quantities for the reporting year, product specifications, customer geography, lifetime and use assumptions, factor files, calculations, and exclusion reasons. Tie each product group back to the sales ledger.

Example

Suppose a chemicals distributor in France sells 25,000 litres of LPG to industrial customers for combustion during 2026.The published Keslio factor is 1.55713 kg CO2e/litre from the UK Government GHG Conversion Factors for Company Reporting 2026, published by DESNZ and DEFRA.

Calculation: 25,000 litres x 1.55713 kg CO2e/litre = 38,928.25 kg CO2e, or 38.92825 metric tonnes CO2e. Formula 11.2 counts combustion, not the fuel's upstream emissions. The distributor records the UK factor as a country-mismatch proxy and replaces it with a representative French combustion factor before external reporting.

Where it comes up

GHG Protocol Category 11 minimum boundary and expected-lifetime treatmentCorporate Value Chain (Scope 3) Standard, Chapter 5, Table 5.4 and Table 5.8Official sourceGHG Protocol Category 11 product classification and direct use-phase formulasTechnical Guidance for Calculating Scope 3 Emissions, Category 11, Table 11.1 and Formulas 11.1-11.3Official source

Related terms

Scope 3 Emissions

Scope 3 emissions are the indirect greenhouse gas emissions from goods, services, transport, product use, investments, and other upstream and downstream activities outside your company's Scope 1 and Scope 2 boundary.

Emission factor

An emission factor converts a measured activity, such as kilowatt-hours of electricity or litres of fuel, into greenhouse gas emissions by stating the emissions released per unit of that activity.

Product carbon footprint (PCF)

A product carbon footprint (PCF) is the greenhouse gas emissions assigned to one product across a stated life-cycle boundary and expressed per declared or functional unit.

Scope 3 Category 10: Processing of sold products

Scope 3 Category 10 covers the greenhouse gas emissions caused when customers or other third parties process your sold intermediate products into usable or final products.

Scope 3 Category 12: End-of-life treatment of sold products

Scope 3 Category 12 covers the expected emissions from disposing of and treating products and packaging sold during the reporting year after customers finish using them.

Sources

  • GHG Protocol

    Category 11 definition, minimum boundary, lifetime treatment, required and optional use-phase emissions, and reporting disclosures

    2026-08-20

  • GHG Protocol

    Category 11 product classification, activity data, factor selection, use profiles, and Formulas 11.1-11.4

    2026-08-20

  • UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero

    The 2026 LPG combustion factor used in the worked example

    2026-08-20

Last verified 2026-08-20

Ready to start?

Tell us what you need.

Bring us the sustainability request, reporting deadline, or strategy question you are facing. We will read it and suggest a practical first step, and the first conversation is free.

Get in touch
Scope 3 Category 11: Use of sold products Definition | Keslio