IEA CADv2025 - methods and changes
The updates described in this article will go live on Dec 11, 2025.
Summary
| Publisher | International Energy Agency |
| Full name | International Energy Agency Greenhouse Gas emissions from Energy |
| Description | Data published by the International Energy Agency in the 'Greenhouse gas emissions from energy' publications. |
| Version nr. | CADv2025 |
Source documents
IEA Life Cycle Upstream Emission Factors 2024
IEA Life Cycle Upstream Emission Factors 2025
Note that the data is behind a licence login.
Methodology readout notes
General Methodology
Direct Combustion Emission Factor data was sourced from IEA Emission Factors 2024 and 2025 for each individual country. Values were extracted specifically from entries where Product = Total and Flow = Emissions per kWh of electricity, for the greenhouse gas categories CO₂, CH₄, and N₂O. These emissions were mapped to the Combustion stage of the electricity lifecycle.
Complementary lifecycle emissions were obtained from IEA Life Cycle Upstream Emission Factors 2024 and 2025. Within this dataset, “Life cycle greenhouse emissions associated with transmission and distribution losses per kWh of electricity” was mapped to the Transmission and Distribution stage, while “Fuel-cycle greenhouse emissions per kWh of electricity” was mapped to the Generation stage.
All source data was provided in gCO₂e/kWh. Appropriate unit conversions were applied to derive emission factors in the other relevant units used across the dataset.
Approach to base years
As of this CADv2025, Carbon+Alt+Delete has updated the application period definition for the IEA Electricity database. We now consider electricity emission factors released in year Y valid for application in year Y itself, pinning the application year to publication date rather than the base data year.
This approach eliminates the need for retrospective electricity corrections (year Y-1 and year Y-2), aligns us with databases that have less explicit methodological delays, and reduces inventory impact during annual updates.
In practice, we use the Y-2 factor values from the year Y publication. For example, values in the [2023] column from the 2025 publication are considered valid for reporting period 2025.
Before this December 2025 change, factors for reporting years 2023-2025 all used the IEA 2024[2023 Provisional] values. After the change, reporting year 2025 now uses IEA 2025[2023] values, while earlier reporting years 2023 and 2024 stay with the IEA 2024[2023 Provisional] values. This is a transition effect in this base-year definition shift.
To put in other words. Between version CADv2024 and CADv2025, only values for reporting year 2025 change this year; during next year's update only values for reporting year 2026 will change.
Update cadence
Expected update dates will be added later.
Data considerations and notes
General content notes
- IEA is a non-public licensed source, which may limit your ability to share factors publicly. Please check the Terms & Conditions of your licence.
- IEA factors show high fluctuations between publications, especially for provisional factors and even after finalization. To provide stable, reliable factors, C+A+D uses the Y-2 factor in year Y (see Approach to base years). Consider the temporal representativeness uncertainty involved.
- The IEA dataset reflects average grid emissions and contains no residual mix information. Avoid using these factors for non-green electricity contracts, as this may lead to double-counting of renewable energy credits and misrepresented market-based emissions.
- This dataset does not contain information about biogenic CO₂ produced by electricity generated from biofuels.
- Use aggregated regional factors (e.g., European Union, ASEAN) with caution, as they represent aggregations of data collected by different entities using different processes.
Emission factor value flags
Country average mix factors for Iceland and Ethiopia are zero or near-zero for all years (2017-2025) due to their high share of renewable energies.
The keyword "China" in C+A+D refers to People's Republic of China in the IEA source documentation.
What's new in CADv2025
Important keyword changes
No changes compared to previous versions.
Important methodological changes
New approach to base years, see Approach to base years.
Factors for reporting years 2024 and earlier are unchanged in this update. They continue to use factors from the IEA 2024 publication with a Y-2 shift.
Factor changes with CADv2025
Sizeable value changes for reporting year 2025 are
- European Union: +19.6%
- Sweden: -14.5%
- Mexico: +11%
- Denmark: -6.0%
- Japan: +3.5%
- Spain: +2.2%
- Netherlands: +1.8%
- Poland: -1.5%
- Belgium: +1.4%
And various other annual movements in the -10% to +10% range for various other regions.
Other changes
In-app GWP value will now correctly show IPCC AR6 for all factors.
External links
IEA 2024 Database documentation
IEA 2024 Upstream Emission Factors Documentation