An Introduction to Carbon Footprinting

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Engage with quizzes, assessments, real world case studies, and interactive exercises

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Quality & Expertise
Developed by leading carbon and sustainability specialists, ensuring current, industry relevant training

Learn at Your Own Pace
With 12 months of access, pause, rewind, and rewatch at your convenience – anytime, anywhere

Earn a Digital Certificate
Receive a training certificate upon completion to share on LinkedIn to showcase your expertise

No Travel Required
Study remotely with on demand eLearning courses, reducing both costs and your carbon footprint

About eLearning Course: An Introduction to Carbon Footprinting

Duration
0.5 – 0.75 days

Modules/Topics
10 Video Topics
3 Quizzes
1 Final Test

Time to Complete
12 months access

Learning Format
Online, self-paced

Level
Foundation (Beginner, Introductory)

Certificate
Digital proof of completion

This beginner level eLearning course offers a clear and practical introduction to Carbon Footprinting. Whether you’re looking to understand organisational or product carbon footprints, this course is designed to build your confidence and provide a strong foundation in the key standards, methods, and tools used in carbon analysis.

The course is delivered through 10 video access modules, supported by optional exercises and a final test to verify your learning. It’s ideal for professionals and organisations just beginning their sustainability or emissions reporting journey.

The video access modules cover a wide range of relevant topics such as:

  • An introduction to the background and development of carbon footprinting
  • Carbon footprint standards and reporting frameworks, including an introduction to Scope 1, Scope 2, and Scope 3 emissions
  • An essential overview of organisational carbon footprinting
  • An essential overview of product carbon footprinting
  • An overview of key data, tools and resources for carbon footprinting. Resources are abundant, and many of the better ones are free to use
  • The course will explore the key areas of calculating carbon footprints for transport, for energy consumption and for purchased materials and products. These are the 3 main contributors to a carbon footprint
  • Carbon footprinting case studies to demonstrate effective footprinting in action
  • An introduction to carbon footprint reduction strategies

Learning Objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

  • Understand the core principles and purpose of carbon footprinting
  • Recognise the key standards and scopes (1, 2, and 3)
  • Distinguish between organisational and product carbon footprints
  • Identify and access useful data sources and tools
  • Calculate a basic carbon footprint using real-world inputs

Who is this Course For?

This course is suitable for:

  • Beginners or professionals entering sustainability, carbon, and environmental roles
  • Organisations starting to track and manage emissions
  • Sustainability officers, analysts, and advisors
  • Product developers or teams working toward net zero
  • Students and researchers seeking a foundation in carbon footprinting

Looking for a practical tool to get started?
Explore our free Organisational Carbon Footprint Excel-based Tool – designed to help you estimate and track emissions across Scopes 1, 2, and some Scope 3.

What Level is this Course?

Foundation (Beginner, Introductory)

No previous experience in carbon footprinting is required. This course is designed to support first-time learners and those seeking to refresh their understanding of footprinting basics.

Carbon Footprinting: Did You Know?

Carbon footprinting reveals the surprising ways in which everyday choices affect our environmental impact. For example:

Circular Ecology Fact Card: Recycling a single 30 ml aluminium drinks can saves enough energy to power a TV for over 3 hours

The Learning Process

Sign up for an eLearning course

Pick from a selection of sustainability courses

Learn at Your Own Pace

Utilising the array of real world examples, calculations, and videos, learn in your own time

Final Tests

Each course has an end of course test designed to test your knowledge and understanding of the modules

Earn a Certificate

Upon passing the final test, you will be eligible for a digital proof of training certificate

Plant a Tree

Share your certificate on LinkedIn and tag us, and we will plant a tree in your name

What Learners Have to Say About Our eLearning Courses:

“Many thanks for the efforts which went into courses. I was particularly impressed with the ease of which new, detailed content was explained and use of real world examples.”

Joe

“The course has been very worth while and I appreciate the opportunity to download the slides so I can study and use after the course!”

Jake

“I am currently enrolled in your training course on embodied carbon and have found the material highly informative and engaging.”

“Thank you for your assistance and for providing such a valuable course.”

Dilba

“a great course with a good mix of theory & practice which will be very useful to my role.”

Jared

“Very informative.”

Ben

“Thank you for putting your time and creating such an informative LCA course. I would look forward to more courses like this and any updates.”

“I am glad that I have passed. It is going straight on my LinkedIn 😉. “

Umendra

“I want to thank you for such good online training. I watched and listened to it several times as I found it really helpful and interesting.”

Veronika

“Thank you very much again for the course. It was very rewarding for me.”

Marta

“Very useful intro – helped us realise that LCA offers some insights for us, but that actually we need to, for our purposes, learn how to model impacts around individual needs/behaviours and not only around one object’s impacts.”

J. Gunter

“I would like to say that I enjoyed the courses and picked up some valuable information that I can apply to my role in undertaking WLCA's.”

Jacqueline

Our courses have helped learners from 80+ organisations and academic institutions:

Pricing, Contact, and FAQs

Prices: This course is part of the Circular Ecology eLearning Hub, which gives access to all our video training content. We offer discounted rates to non-profits and charities - please contact us for more info.

View our pricing structure and FAQ page for more information.

If you would like more information about our eLearning courses, please contact us at training@circularecology.com.

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