Scope 3 · Category 6
Scope 3 Category 6 for hotel stays
Spend-based vs distance-based vs supplier-specific — which method to use for hotel nights, what the GHG Protocol actually says, and how to handle long stays, mixed-use rooms and shared rooms.
GHG Protocol gives three calculation methods for Scope 3 Category 6 hotel nights. Supplier-specific is the gold standard but requires per-property data; spend-based is the easy fallback. IMPT booking exports give the metadata needed for either approach plus a separately-disclosed voluntary retirement line.
The three methods compared head-to-head
| Method | Inputs needed | Accuracy | Audit-readiness |
|---|---|---|---|
| Supplier-specific | HCMI per property | Highest | High — if HCMI is third-party verified |
| Distance/quantity | Room-nights × regional EF | Medium | Standard |
| Spend-based | Spend × EEIO factor | Lowest | Acceptable but flagged for material categories |
If your hotel programme spend is material (commonly >5% of Scope 3 total), assurance providers will push for the higher-accuracy methods.
Handling the edge cases
Real bookings throw edge cases at any method. The four most-common:
Multi-night stays. Multiply per-night emission factor by number of occupied room-nights. Do not apply the per-booking offset as if it were per-night.
Shared rooms. If two employees share a room, the emission belongs to whichever entity paid. Do not double-count if both file expense reports.
Cancellations with charges. If the company paid for a cancelled night, it counts as Cat 6. Capture it in your TMC export.
Mixed-use stays (work plus leisure). Pro-rate by business nights only. The personal portion is not corporate Scope 3.
Hotel emission factors that actually defend
The four most-cited factor sources:
- DEFRA UK conversion factors — updated annually, UK-centric but widely cited. ~10-30 kg CO₂e per room-night.
- Cornell Hotel Sustainability Benchmarking (CHSB) — global, by region and star tier. The most granular publicly available dataset.
- Hotel Carbon Measurement Initiative (HCMI) — industry methodology, used by hotel groups that publish per-property data.
- EPA WARM — US-centric, less commonly used for hotels.
A defensible programme picks one primary factor source, documents the choice, and applies it consistently. Switching mid-year requires restatement.
What IMPT exports for Category 6
IMPT's corporate CSV export covers exactly the fields Cat 6 needs: booking ID, traveller cost-centre, hotel name and city, check-in / check-out date, occupied room-nights, room rate, and the IMPT per-booking voluntary retirement reference (with on-chain transaction hash). The retirement reference is the audit-trail backbone — it ties one booking to one credit retirement on a public registry, on a public blockchain, at a known timestamp.
Book ESG-compliant hotels with IMPT
Live availability across 1.7M hotels in 195 countries. Same nightly rate as direct booking. On-chain carbon retirement record per booking — audit-grade evidence for Scope 3 BVCM disclosure.
Search ESG-compliant hotels →Frequently asked
What does scope 3 category 6 for hotel stays mean for a corporate travel programme?
GHG Protocol gives three calculation methods for Scope 3 Category 6 hotel nights. Supplier-specific is the gold standard but requires per-property data; spend-based is the easy fallback. IMPT booking exports give the metadata needed for either approach plus a separately-disclosed voluntary retirement line.
How does IMPT's per-booking retirement actually work?
Every confirmed hotel booking through IMPT triggers the retirement of one tonne of UN-verified CO₂ from a registry-listed project. The retirement is recorded on Ethereum mainnet with a transaction hash tied to the booking ID. The retirement is funded from IMPT's commission, so the guest or company pays the standard nightly rate.
Does the retirement reduce my Scope 3 number?
No. Voluntary credits and retirements are Beyond Value Chain Mitigation (BVCM) under the GHG Protocol, SBTi, and ESRS E1. They are disclosed separately, not netted against Scope 3 gross emissions. This is the conservative treatment that survives external assurance.
What's the evidence trail for an external audit?
For each booking IMPT can produce: the booking ID, the registry-issued credit serial, the registry name and project, the retirement date, and the on-chain transaction hash. The transaction is publicly queryable from any Ethereum block explorer. That dual representation — internal record plus immutable public ledger — is the cleanest evidence pattern available.
Which registries does IMPT use?
IMPT sources credits from UNFCCC CDM and equivalent voluntary registries. The specific project and registry vary per booking based on supply and quality criteria. Project-level breakdown is available on request for corporate accounts.
Is there a corporate dashboard?
Yes — corporate accounts get a monthly CSV export with booking-level data including all the fields needed for Scope 3 Cat 6 reporting and BVCM disclosure. The export is designed to ingest cleanly into Persefoni, Watershed, Salesforce Net Zero Cloud and similar sustainability software.