These are the questions an ISO 14064 Lead Verifier Practitioner would tell an Australian SME director or accountant to ask before hiring a carbon service, and what a good answer sounds like. Akshay Dave, co-founder of Aethiro, is an ISO 14064 Lead Verifier Practitioner (TÜV SÜD), an ISO 14001 Lead Auditor (Exemplar Global) and MIEAust. Aethiro prepares greenhouse gas inventories and supports clients while an independent party verifies them.
If you already have one sentence from a tender or a supplier form and you want to know what it is asking, use the carbon question decoder. If you want the explanation of scopes, boundaries and a first inventory, use the carbon accounting guide for Australian SMEs. This page is about the appointment.
Who signs the work, and what are their credentials?
Ask for the name of the person who will sign the methodology and the inventory. A firm name on the cover, with no person accountable for the factors and the boundary, is not enough. Ask what that person is credentialled in, and whether the credential is personal training or an accreditation held by the organisation.
A good answer names a person, states the standard they were trained against, and puts that name on the file. Relevant background for this work is greenhouse gas quantification and verification practice, such as ISO 14064, and environmental management systems, such as ISO 14001. Membership of Engineers Australia (MIEAust) is a professional membership. It is not a licence to issue a verification statement.
A weak answer is “the team is certified”, with no name, or a software brand standing in for a practitioner. Aethiro is a consulting practice, not a software product. The person who signs Aethiro’s technical work is named on the about page. Practitioner training is not the same thing as an organisation being accredited as a verification body.
Can the same firm prepare the inventory and independently verify it?
Separate three roles before you compare proposals. They are often sold as one package. They are not.
| Role | What they do | What they should not claim |
|---|---|---|
| Preparation | Builds the inventory: boundary, activity data, factors, calculations, assumptions, exclusions and gaps. | That the file has been independently verified. |
| Support through verification | Helps the client answer an independent reviewer’s questions about that file. | That they are the verifier. |
| Independent verification | Reaches a conclusion on a greenhouse gas statement under ISO 14064-3. The verifier needs to be free to disagree with the statement. | That they also prepared the inventory they are verifying. |
ISO 14064-1 is the quantification and reporting standard. ISO 14064-3 is the verification and validation standard. The useful test for a buyer is simple: the party who issues a verification statement should not be the party who prepared that inventory. If a proposal says the firm will calculate the numbers and also issue the verification statement, ask who the independent verifier is.
A good answer states which of the three roles is being offered. It does not offer independent verification of its own inventory. Aethiro prepares inventories and supports clients through a third-party verification. Aethiro does not issue an independent verification or assurance statement. ISO 14064 verification support is the preparation review. The independent verifier decides what evidence they need and what conclusion they reach.
Which emission factors and methods will they use in Australia?
Ask which standard sets the boundary, and which factors turn activity data into tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent. For an Australian corporate inventory, a good answer names the GHG Protocol Corporate Standard for the method, and the Australian National Greenhouse Accounts (NGA) factors, published by DCCEEW, for local fuel and grid electricity. It also names the edition year and the table.
NGA factors are updated from time to time. Electricity factors move as the grid changes. The file should say which edition was used, and the figures should be checked against the current DCCEEW workbook before the inventory is finished. You can look up common factors on the NGA emission factors lookup. A factor is one input. It is not the inventory.
NGA factors are the usual source for voluntary Australian inventories, tender responses and supplier reporting. They are not the prescribed factors for reporting under the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act 2007. If the business is an NGER reporter, the answer should say so and keep the two methods apart. Product, spend and some Scope 3 categories need other sources. Those sources should be named too.
A weak answer uses a US or UK factor set for Australian diesel and electricity and cannot say why, or cannot name the edition. “We use international factors” is the start of a question, not the end of one.
How will they treat Scope 3 data quality and estimates?
Scope 3 is the value chain. Most requests to an SME do not need all 15 GHG Protocol categories. They need the categories the customer, the tender or the disclosure actually asks for, at a stated quality.
A good answer separates measured activity data from estimates, names the estimation method, and records the gap. Spend-based figures and average factors are sometimes the honest option when supplier-specific data does not exist. They should be labelled as estimates. An unlabelled estimate that is later treated as a measurement is how files fall over in review.
Supplier-specific data for purchased goods and services usually means cradle-to-gate emissions for the goods or services supplied, not simply the supplier’s organisation-wide Scope 1 and Scope 2 totals. If a customer questionnaire is the job in front of you, supplier data response support is scoped to that request. A complete inventory is a different scope, described under carbon footprint analysis.
A weak answer is a single Scope 3 number with no category, no method and no statement of what was left out.
What do you actually receive?
Ask to see the file, not a picture of a dashboard. A tender-ready or review-ready deliverable is something the business can keep: the organisational boundary, the activity data, the emission factors and edition, the calculations, the assumptions, the exclusions and the data gaps. An accountant, a customer or a verifier should be able to read it without logging into someone else’s product.
A dashboard can help the firm that built it. It does not replace the file. If the engagement ends and the method stays inside a portal, the business does not hold a defensible inventory.
A good answer describes a documented inventory, with the limits written down. Aethiro’s carbon footprint work is that kind of file for Scope 1, Scope 2 and the relevant Scope 3. A narrower tender request may be a focused Scope 1 and 2 package. Neither is a software subscription.
Will the same file answer the next questionnaire?
Customers do not share one form. A mining customer, a supermarket and a government tender will ask in different words. A good answer is that the inventory is built once, to a stated method, and then mapped to the form in front of you. The next request may need a different boundary, a product figure, or another Scope 3 category. The service should say what can be reused and what has to be calculated again, before anyone assumes the first file answers every future request.
The carbon question decoder is for reading one pasted question. The tender carbon readiness checker is a short check of whether the business can answer a tender at all. Neither one chooses the firm. This checklist does that job.
Is this for AASB S2, or for a voluntary framework?
AASB S2 is Australia’s climate disclosure standard for entities that are required to report. It covers governance, strategy, risk management and metrics, and assurance requirements phase in. Group 2 mandatory climate reporting applies to financial years beginning on or after 1 July 2026. SBTi and TCFD are voluntary frameworks. A customer can ask for any of them. They are not interchangeable, and a footprint number does not satisfy all three.
A good answer says which framework the proposal is actually for. AASB S2 support is preparation of emissions information, disclosures and evidence. It is not legal advice, financial advice or independent assurance. An SBTi engagement is a route check, inventory readiness, target preparation and submission evidence. Independent validation is performed by SBTi Services, not by the consultant who prepared the file. A TCFD-style request is about climate-related risk and governance, not only a total in tonnes.
If a proposal uses “net zero”, “science-based” and “AASB S2” as if they were one product, ask which document you will be able to hand to the person who asked.
What happens when the numbers look wrong?
Ask this before you need it. A good service stops on the figure that looks wrong, traces the activity data, the unit, the factor and the boundary, and either corrects the file or writes the limitation down. Common faults are a factor from the wrong country or the wrong year, a mix-up of kilograms and tonnes, a boundary that drops hired plant or refrigerants, and a Scope 3 total that cannot be tied to a category.
You should be able to challenge a number. If a question is treated as a nuisance rather than as part of the work, that is a poor sign. The same habit applies inside the business: when a client’s carbon data looks inaccurate, the practical step is to withhold reliance until the method, the boundary and the source records have been checked. That is professional caution, not a legal opinion. The longer explanation is in why accurate carbon emission accounting matters.
Who supports you through a third-party verification?
If a customer, an auditor or an assurance provider will review the file, ask who will sit with the business for that review. Ask whether that support is inside the agreed scope or a further piece of work. A good answer names the support, the records the reviewer is likely to want, and the limit of the role. The independent verifier reaches their own conclusion.
Aethiro can review an inventory before that handover and can help with reviewer questions inside an agreed scope. Aethiro does not issue the verification statement. Deliverables, records, exclusions, responsibilities, timing and fees are agreed before the work starts. There is no single public price, because the boundary and the records differ from one business to the next. Outcomes that sit with a buyer, a verifier or SBTi Services are not guaranteed.
How to use the answers
Take the proposal you have been given and write the reply next to each question above. A useful proposal can name the signatory, the role (preparation, support, or independent verification), the Australian factors and edition, the Scope 3 categories and any estimates, the file you will keep, and what happens if a figure looks wrong. If those items are missing, ask for them before you appoint anyone.
If you want that read against a live customer request, contact Aethiro in Gladstone, Queensland 4680. Phone (07) 4979 6304. Email solutions@aethiro.com. Monday to Friday, 8 am to 5 pm AEST. You can also book a free call or use the contact page. Send the customer question or the draft scope, and leave confidential and personal information out of the first email.
Common Questions