Your CO2 footprint and entry documents for the CO2-Prestatieladder

The ask

The CO2-Prestatieladder is the Dutch CO2 management certification scheme, owned by SKAO and used by more than 300 contracting authorities in the Netherlands and Belgium. Its pull is concrete: in tenders that apply it, a certified bidder is granted a fictitious discount on the bid price during evaluation. Your bid is compared as if it were cheaper, and the higher your certification level, the larger the discount. If your competitors are certified and you are not, you are structurally more expensive in every such tender.

Entry starts with your own organisation: a correct Scope 1 and 2 CO2 emission inventory (under Handbook 3.1, business travel counts too at the entry levels), reduction targets, and documented communication and participation. The scheme is mid-transition: Handbook 4.0 launched on 14 January 2025, audits can run on it since July 2025, and from 14 January 2027 every audit must use 4.0. Both versions are live in 2026, which is exactly the kind of detail that trips up a first certification.

Who this applies to

Companies bidding on Dutch (and increasingly Belgian) public tenders where the CO2-Prestatieladder is an award criterion: construction and infrastructure above all, but also transport, installation, consulting and services. Over two-thirds of certified organisations are SMEs, so this is not a scheme for large contractors only.

It fits you if a tender you want names the ladder, or your sector’s tenders keep naming it, and you have no emission inventory yet, or one that would not survive an audit. If you are already certified and need this year’s footprint update, the same deliverable applies at a smaller scope.

What you need to have ready

This list doubles as our intake. Whatever is missing becomes the gap list.

• Gas and electricity invoices or meter data for your locations, covering a full year
• Fuel data for company and lease vehicles: fuel cards, lease reports or invoices
• Your fleet list: vehicles, fuel types, and who drives what
• Refrigerant service logs for cooling and air-conditioning installations, if any
• Business travel records: air travel and business kilometres driven in private cars
• A list of your locations and organisational boundaries: which entities count as your organisation
• Any existing energy reports, footprints or certificates
• The tender text naming the CO2-Prestatieladder, if there is one, so we prepare for the right level and handbook version

What Humboldt delivers

The entry pack: your Scope 1 and 2 CO2 footprint calculated per the applicable handbook from your own invoices, meter data and fleet records, and the surrounding document set an entry-level certification needs, from the emission inventory report to reduction targets and the communication and participation evidence. These are not blank formats we hand you: we write them for you, ready for your review and adoption, because most teams entering the ladder have never produced them before. Every figure traces to a source document, in a file structure an auditor can walk through without you improvising answers.

Small holes in your data do not restart the clock. Where a piece is missing and the handbook’s accuracy rules allow it, say one month of meter readings in an otherwise complete year, we bridge it with a conservative, clearly labelled estimate and state the method. What cannot be defensibly estimated goes on the gap list with exactly what to collect.

A senior specialist reviews the pack and signs off before you get it. From there, you contract an accredited certifying body for the audit; we can hand over cleanly, and the pack is built to be examined.