Climate change duties: statutory guidance for public bodies

Annex I: Sectoral guidance: local authorities

This annex contains additional information for local authorities:

• Scottish Climate Intelligence Service
• Additional reporting duties for local authorities.

Scottish Climate Intelligence Service

Local authorities (LAs) have worked in partnership with central government to establish the Scottish Climate Intelligence Service (SCIS). This jointly funded service aims to build capacity within councils to develop and deliver area wide programmes of emission reductions. The SCIS supports a national digital platform to collate area wide emissions data, enabling LAs to build a baseline of emissions and calculate, visualise and report on their area wide emission reduction strategies. The service will, through a network of regional officers, support LAs in building the knowledge and skills to use the data effectively to enable planning, monitoring, reporting and delivery of area wide climate action.

A consistent approach by local authorities to developing climate change plans, covering both corporate and area wide emissions, will be facilitated by the use of a standard template (see Annex D).

Additional reporting duties for local authorities

Scope 3 reporting for local authorities

At the time of publication, Scottish Government is taking forward the actions outlined in the Improvement Plan developed in response to an Improvement Report issued by Environmental Standards Scotland (ESS) concluding investigation IESS.21.012. The investigation looked into the effectiveness of the systems in place to support local authorities in their duty to contribute to the delivery of climate change targets. The Improvement Plan focuses on the recommendation made by ESS that the reporting of scope 3 emissions should be made mandatory for local authorities.

Introducing mandatory reporting of scope 3 emissions will require an amendment to The Climate Change (Duties of Public Bodies: Reporting Requirements) (Scotland) Order 2015. The process will include further consultation with relevant bodies. Where required, further practical reporting guidance will be provided separately in due course.

Area-based reporting for local authorities

As part of the informal resolution process to the ESS investigation noted above, Scottish Government agreed that local authorities will move towards the reporting of area-based emissions. To mandate such reporting would require an amendment to The Climate Change (Duties of Public Bodies: Reporting Requirements) (Scotland) Order 2015.

Further guidance on area-based reporting is provided by the Scottish Climate Intelligence Service (SCIS).