CC Tools FAQs Page

The Creative Climate Tools are a free set of unique carbon calculators developed by Julie’s Bicycle specifically for the creative industries. Since 2021, over 2,000 organisations across more than 20 countries have used the Tools to measure the impact and inform the environmental action of their cultural buildings, offices, events, tours and productions.

The Tools make it easy to measure your organisation’s key environmental impacts, from the energy use of your buildings, to the waste generated at your festivals, to the travel/material impacts of your touring productions.

The Creative Climate Tools (CC Tools) are free for anyone to use without limits, and anyone with an email address is able to sign up and create footprints.

The CC Tools were created by Julie’s Bicycle to support the entire arts and culture sector in understanding organisational environmental impacts through a freely accessible footprinting tool.

We offer ongoing support through our CC Tools Support Helpdesk to organisations funded by Arts Council England (ACE) or the British Film Institute (BFI), however there are also a wide variety of free resources available throughout the website for anyone to make use of.

Julie’s Bicycle (JB) is a London-based charity that supports the creative community to act on climate change and environmental sustainability. Julie’s Bicycle has been working in partnership with Arts Council England to inspire environmental action across the arts and cultural sector for over a decade.

In order to support organisations further, Julie’s Bicycle delivers an ambitious and inspirational programme of activities as part of the Arts Council Environmental Programme. This programme is aimed at building literacy, skills and capacity in the sector so organisations feel confident to act on climate change and reduce their environmental impacts.

A carbon footprint is the amount of greenhouse gas emissions released into the atmosphere by an individual, organisation or activity over a set period of time, expressed as a single number.

Creating a carbon footprint provides an insight into where your biggest impacts are. This can help you assess the areas of operations that have the highest environmental impact, in order to understand where to focus your efforts to respond to the environmental crises.

It is very important to remember that there are also impacts which are difficult to quantify and may not be reflected in your carbon footprint but are vital in decarbonisation. Beyond Carbon in the CC Tools allows organisations to capture their environmental actions beyond data reporting and provide ideas for further action to be explored.

By adding your data, not only will you gain a better understanding of your environmental impact, but you’ll be contributing to the cultural community’s collective action on climate change. Reporting your carbon footprint and Beyond Carbon data as part of a cross-sectoral effort means that you are contributing to collective storytelling about the environmental impacts of the arts and cultural sector. The more people who contribute to this, the more holistic a narrative we are able to build about the impacts of our work.

We know that environmental and climate action in the creative sector stretches far beyond carbon emissions, so we have created this section to capture more widely your organisation’s ambition and the positive effects and benefits arising in your organisation, the sector and beyond. Your organisation can use Beyond Carbon as a checklist to track your environmental actions beyond data reporting. It is a space for organisations to tell the wider story of their work in response to the climate crisis. By completing this section you are contributing to the art and culture sector’s shared knowledge. It will also inform the support that Julie’s Bicycle provides to the cultural sector.

The Creative Climate Tools launched in April 2023 replacing the Creative Green Tools launched in April 2019 (which replaced the original IG Tools platform). Thanks to feedback we’ve received, we’ve developed our tools so you’ll find them more intuitive and responsive, with better functionality to capture meaningful data and measure your impacts.

Any organisation who held a pre-existing account with the Creative Green Tools can log into the new site with your existing details. You do not need to create a new account. All of your historic data has been migrated to the new site.

You can find the Creative Climate Tools Methodology and Conversion Factor paper on the CC Tools Resources page.

Historically, the conversion factors used in the tools have been predominantly sourced from government-published conversion factors by the Department of Energy Security and Net Zero (previously published by BEIS: the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy). In 2023, the Julie’s Bicycle team worked with leading consultants to update the waste and materials underlying methodology and conversion factors – resulting in a wider range of sources used.

The platform will use the conversion factors applicable to the financial/calendar year submitted by users when creating a report, based on the “Majority approach” from best practice guidance for company reporting issued by the UK Department for Energy Security and Net Zero:

“If you are reporting on an April to March year, the factors from the calendar year in which the greatest portion of your data falls should be applied (for example, the 2024 factors should be applied to data in reporting year 01/04/24 – 31/03/25, the 2020 factors should have been applied to data in reporting year 01/04/20 – 31/03/21). Users that operate a July to June reporting year should apply the newest set of available factors.”

In 2023, the Creative Climate Tools went through a development project to improve the functionality of the Tools, make them more user-friendly and relevant for the sector. Below are some of the updates that were made during this project:

• The Waste and Materials tabs were updated with more accurate conversion factors, a more comprehensive choice of materials and waste treatment types, and more relevant units for the sector.
• New features were added, such as the Forecasting, Carbon Budget Setting, and Return on Investment (ROI) functions.
• The Custom Project footprint was introduced, which allows users to choose which impact areas to include if their activity does not fit into the predetermined formats.
• The Footprint tabs now offer custom emissions fields where organisations can include emissions for impacts/units that they have been able to calculate outside the tools or get directly from their suppliers.
• The business Travel tab underwent a restructuring to make it more simple and clear what data points where needed. The changes also included new vehicles and unit options.
• Beyond Carbon is now its own page accessible through the left hand navigation panel on the Tools. The questions and format have also been updated.
• The Tour footprint underwent significant changes such as the addition of new vehicles, improved freight functionality, the inclusion of the Audience Travel and Materials tabs and the simplification of the show power calculations.

Although this particular development project has now finished, we are constantly reviewing and looking at ways to improve the Tools. For certain areas, methodology and data availability is consistently evolving and will be refined over time. As a result, please be aware that you may notice some changes in your emissions recorded. These changes are made to bring greater accuracy and a more complete picture of your organisation’s impacts.

If you have any questions about any of these changes or require further details, don’t hesitate to get in touch with us.

Julie’s Bicycle works in partnership with organisations and networks to offer paid consultancy, guidance and support to international organisations looking to develop their own tools, using and sharing the learnings gained from our years of experience working in footprint calculation and strategic environmental action.

We also offer custom licences, working collaboratively with you to develop bespoke adaptations of our Tools for you and your communities. We tailor aspects of the Tools to meet your specific needs, from multi-level user accounts, data input and storage, and impact data generation to report creation and support services.

We believe that using carbon calculator and impact measurement tools are just a first step to taking environmental action. Our digital team collaborate with the wider team of cultural and environmental specialists at JB who can support you on this journey.

To get in touch and find out more, contact us by filling out the form.

This certification has now been discontinued however organisations which previously registered can still view their past certifications here. Julie’s Bicycle is no longer accepting registration for new certification applications.

Check out our “Get Started” bitesize video to help you get set up on the Creative Climate Tools. This video will guide you through the different pages and show you how to set up your first report.

For more detailed guidance, our General Navigation user guide illustrates all the different functions within your account, the footprint reports and the platform.

Accounts on the Creative Climate Tools are created at an organisational level. If your organisation has used the CC Tools before, you will need to ask a current user to add you as a new user to the organisational account (refer to the ‘How can I add a new user to my organisation’s account?’ FAQ).

If your organisation is unsure if it has an account, please email us with your organisation’s name and your email address so that we can assist you with gaining access to the correct account.

New users can be added by clicking the name of your organisation in the top right corner of the Tools site, and clicking ‘Organisation Details’ in the dropdown menu and going to the ‘Add New Users’ tab at the top of this page.

On the “Add New Users” page, there will be a box where you can enter the email address of the person you would like to add to your organisation’s account. You can also add multiple email addresses by pressing enter and writing another address on the line below. Once you have entered all of the email address you would like to add, please press the “Add” button.

An invite will then be sent to the new user with instructions on creating a password and how to gain access to the organisation’s account.

From the CC Tools Login page, you can click the ‘Forgotten your password?’ button. You should then receive an email which will give you a link to reset your password. If you are still having trouble resetting your password or accessing your organisation’s account, contact us.

The Creative Climate Tools are optimised for Google Chrome, and this is our primary test environment so it is the browser where technical issues are the least likely to occur. However, the Tools are designed to work across all major browsers, including Edge, Safari, and Firefox.

We recommend using a desktop or laptop with an up-to-date operating system and browser. It is also possible to use the Tools on smaller screens like iPads, but these devices are not optimised or tested regularly by us.

There is no option to delete your account from the user end of the Tools. If you would like to delete your account and/or organisation, please contact us.

For a quick runthrough of how to get set up and start adding data to the CC Tools, check out our “Get Started” bitesize videos. Below maps out the different options you have available for adding data to your account via the Data page:

Option 1: Add data to an existing Building or Project

Use Option 1 to create a new Footprint and add a year of data to your pre-existing Buildings or Projects. Use the filters to select your Building or Project followed by the year of your data entry.

Option 2: Create a new Building/Project

Use Option 2 to create a new Building or Project to report on. Once created you can create a Footprint to your Building/Project using Option 1.

Option 3: Edit an incomplete Footprint

Option 3 lists all the incomplete Footprints you have on your account for your different Buildings or Projects. Use this to quickly view and edit the Footprints you are still working on before you are ready to submit your data.

Option 4: Edit a completed footprint

Use Option 4 to edit any completed footprints for your Buildings or Projects. You can also edit these through the Footprints page.

Option 5: Copy an existing footprint

Use Option 5 to also add data to an existing Building or Project by copying an existing footprint report. You can find the record on the Footprints tab of the Data page, and select the copy button of the footprint which they would like to copy.

Buildings refer to the organisation’s fixed spaces for day-to-day operations. Under Buildings, there are the following footprint journeys available:

• Office: The footprint covers the activities regarding the energy, water and waste consumption of the office building, as well as the employee travel
• Venue/Cultural Building: The footprint covers the activities regarding the energy, water and waste consumption of the building, as well as the employee and audience travel.

Projects refer to organisation’s activities beyond their Buildings. Under Projects, there are the following footprint journeys available:

• Indoor Event: This could exhibitions, screenings, performances, fairs etc. The footprint covers the activities regarding the energy, water and waste consumption of the event, as well as the employee and audience travel.
• Outdoor Event: This could be festivals, open-air shows, installations etc. The footprint covers the activities regarding the energy, water and waste consumption of the event, as well as the audience travel.
• Tour: This could be a theatre tour, music tour etc. The footprint covers show power, materials and the travel involved from moving as part of a tour.
• Custom Project: allows organisations to create a bespoke report where they can select which impact areas are included within their footprint. We would recommend that in the first instance organisations utilise the other set footprint reports where possible and then use the Custom Project footprint if they do not feel the set footprints best suit their project.

Building footprints cover a year of data and Project footprints can be set to a particular time period. If you are a part of a programme where you have been asked to report against a specific period, please make sure this has been correctly inputted on the General tab of your footprint.

Organisations can create as many Buildings and Projects on their account as they wish to – there is no set recommended amount. We would suggest having a look at what data you have available and our user guides for the different footprints available to help you identify which footprint(s) might work best for you.

We encourage you to measure and report on all possible impact areas that are relevant to your type of footprint. You may not be able to report across every area, this is expected especially if this is your first time reporting. Where you cannot report, we encourage you to use the ‘Additional Information’ box at the bottom of each tab to detail why you could not measure and how you plan to improve your data collection in future years.

If you are struggling with a particular bit of data within the Creative Climate Tools, there are little red icons with an “i” above each field that can help you. If you hover over these icons, a black box will appear with useful information on the type of data required to be entered and some tips on where/who to go to collect it.

For information on how to enter information and what data collect for the different impact areas within the Creative Climate Tools, we recommend having a look at our bitesize videos which go into more detail including examples and useful resources for collection.

As an organisation you may not have access to 12 months of data for your current building due to particular circumstances e.g. new building, serviced building etc. You should still report any data that you have available to you. If you can’t collect 12 months of data then we would recommend trying to estimate the missing months based on what you have available.

Option 1) If you have previously reported on the tools, you could use some of your previous year’s data as an estimate for the missing months. For example, if you have all of your gas bills to hand apart from your May or June bills, you could use your consumption from May and June in the previous year to give you an idea of what your consumption this year could have looked like. Please note that if you have made significant changes, such as changing location or switching your system, this may not be the most accurate method for estimation.

Option 2) You could use the data of the months you currently have available for your year of reporting to estimate those missing by extrapolating. For example, if you only had 7 months of your water bills available, you can take the your water consumption for the whole 7 months and divide this by 7. This will then give you your building’s average water consumption for 1 month. To make up the year, we need to estimate 5 months of missing water bill data. Do this by multiplying your average 1 month of water consumption by 5, and adding this number to the 7 months of accurate data you have.

When you are estimating, please make sure to enter information about your assumptions and calculations in the “Additional information” sections at the bottom of each tab, where possible.

There are certain impacts which we have not yet been able to introduce to the Creative Climate Tools at this stage because we do not yet have access to reliable conversion factors for them. This is especially the case for newer types of emissions such as digital footprint and certain types of hybrid vehicles.

If you have calculated your own footprint we encourage you to include it in your reporting. Each impact section has a ‘custom emissions’ section where you can input any other emissions. You can simply input your custom data into the section that feels most relevant to your data. Note that the unit for this is kgCO2e. If your figure is in TCO2e, this will need to be multiplied by 1000 before entering. Please put information about your calculation methods and/or conversion factors wherever possible in the ‘Additional information’ section.

If you are not able to obtain custom emissions figure for your activity from other sources, we would recommend that you still enter whatever data you had regarding the activity that is not yet available in the Tools, in the “”Additional information”” sections at the bottom of each tab. For example if you had travel data on a hybrid vehicle that we aren’t yet able to calculate for you, we would recommend that you still take note of the mileage of the vehicle so that you can report on its emissions after an appropriate carbon conversion factor is released.

We highly encourage accurate data collection where possible, but if data is unavailable, you can estimate. For example:

• You may need to apportion data if you do not have data that is granular enough (e.g. you only have your whole building’s energy bill, but you just want to input your office’s energy use). To do this, refer to our Energy – Buildings and Indoor Events bitesized video for a worked example.
• You may only have data for some months of the year, and you may need to take a monthly average and use that average for periods with missing data (See ‘I don’t have 12 months of data for my organisation’s building. Do I still need to report?’ FAQ).

If you are estimating your data, in the Additional Information section, please write down:

• Why you needed to estimate
• How you estimated (e.g. the method) and what data you estimated
• If possible, how you will improve your data granularity or reduce the need for estimation in the future.

The new Beyond Carbon format is now accessible through the left navigation panel. The survey has 3 pages of multiple choice questions and an opportunity to tell a story about any environmental achievements that took place within the last year. You can to save and return to the survey whenever you like, and then submit. You are also able to edit and resubmit after submitting.

Previously, Beyond Carbon was placed at the end of every footprint, resulting in organisations having to complete multiple surveys across their reporting. We decided it would be more efficient for users to only have to complete one survey per year for the organisation, as this prevents unnecessary data entry for users and also makes survey responses easily accessible all in one place.

Any Beyond Carbon reports submitted in the previous format can still be accessed by going into the record of the existing footprint where it was filled out. However, please note that you will not be able to complete and submit new reports in the previous Beyond Carbon format.

For ACE organisations, refer to our ACE FAQs.

For BFI organisations, refer to our BFI FAQs.

For organisations who are funded by both ACE and BFI, we recommend that you have a look at the respective programme information and FAQs to ensure that you are reporting on the correct information for both.

Please make sure that you have marked on your CCTools account that you are funded by ACE and/or BFI. You can do this by logging onto the tools, clicking your organisation name in the top right hand corner, going to the Organisation Details page in the dropdown and selecting the options under the Funding Portfolios section.

When you have entered all of your data into your Building or Project’s Footprint head to the final tab in the form called “Submit”. Here you can submit your data for review by Julie’s Bicycle and then view your data in the Results pages.

On each tab of a Footprint you will find an option to save at the bottom of the page. You can save and return to your Footprints as you see fit – we don’t expect organisations to fill everything out all at once. Incomplete footprints (unsubmitted) will appear on the “Add data” page until you submit these for review.

On the Data page click on the Footprints subheading. Here you will see all your Buildings and Projects listed with their relevant footprints. You can see an overview of the data on your account and edit any old data.

On the Results pages there are several ways in which you can download the graphs, tables and datasets. For the pie charts and graphs, click on the 3 lines in the right hand corner of the image and then select the format in which you would like to download the image. You can also download the numerical data or overall graphics using the “Download results as CSV” and “Download results as PDF” buttons on the right of the screen.

We have created lots of useful resources to support you on your journey with the Creative Climate Tools.

If you require a walkthrough of the Tools, check out our User Demonstration Video. For more in depth information around the different impact areas, why not have a look at our different bitesize videos. We also have User Guides available for the different functions and footprint options within the Tools.

If you have further queries, we offer ongoing support through our CC Tools Support Helpdesk to organisations funded by Arts Council England (ACE) or the British Film Institute (BFI).