Energy Footprint Tool FAQs

You will need your utility bills for the year before; electricity, gas, oil, or whichever other fuel you use. If you are completing it in 2026, you need your 2025 bills.  If you have solar panels, information on their generation over the preceding year.

If you want to include a separate church hall or other building, then you need the bills for this too.  If you want to exclude an area which is permanently rented out to tenants and sub-metered, you will want this information to hand.

If your Parish owns housing then you may need to report this building (check the Building Scope Checker Tool)

 If you do need to report your Parish-owned housing, then you only need to provide the building’s postcode and street address: you do not need to tell us about the housing’s energy use. 

Completing the EFT might take you an hour the first time you complete it, but if you have all your information to hand and have completed it before it take you as little as 20 to 30 minutes.

If you find you don’t have everything you need, you can save your progress and return to complete and submit the EFT at a later point. 

Each Church building in your parish should be entered separately. You can enter the EFT survey through any church in your Parish. On the first page of the EFT survey, you will see a list of all the churches in your Parish as well as any other church buildings (for example Church Halls) that have been reported by members of your Parish. From this page, you can select which buildings you want to enter data for. If surveys have already been submitted for buildings in your Parish, you will be able to view the data submitted from this page too.  

1. Enter the EFT survey from the Church in your parish for which you would like to enter information about a separate Church Hall. To do this: Select the Church in your parish for which you would like to enter information about the Church Hall.
2. Under the Energy Footprint Tool 2025 Section, click on <View Report/Submit Data>. 
3. On the first page of the survey you will see two buildings tables. The first is a table contains details Church buildings that are part of your Parish (if you are a one-church Parish, then you will only see one building in this first list). The second table contains the details of any other buildings that belong to your Parish, such as Church Halls or Parish-owned housing. If your Church Hall has previously been reported on, you can select the building in the Other Buildings table and enter its EFT data. 
4. If the Church Hall hasn’t previously been reported on, you can add the Church Hall to the Other Buildings table, by selecting ‘Add a building’ at the bottom of the survey page. You will be asked to name the Church Hall and also select a Building Type from the following options: 
– Church Hall/Parish Hall
– Parish-owned housing
– Other
5. Next, you select that you want to fill out a survey for this building, press Save and Start return(s) and you will be asked the EFT survey questions. 

1. Select the Church in your parish for which you would like to enter information about a combined Church-Church Hall.
2. Under the Energy Footprint Tool 2025 Section, click on <View Report/Submit Data>.
3. On the first page of the survey you will see two buildings tables. The first is a table contains details Church buildings that are part of your Parish (if you are a one-church Parish, then you will only see one building in this first list). The second table contains the details of any other buildings that belong to your Parish, such as Church Halls or Parish-owned housing. 
   You record information about the Combined Church-Church Hall in the first table. Go to the Church building which is combined with its Church Hall on a shared meter. Under the Building Type section of the table, in the drop down menu select ‘Church and Church Hall/Parish Hall combined (shared meter).
4. From here you enter EFT survey data as normal, by selecting this building from your Buildings table and then selecting ‘Save and Start return(s)’.

No, not currently.

In previous years we have asked churches to provide information about any work-related travel. This year, we have paused data collection on this element of our carbon emissions in order to refine our data collection methods. In future years, you may have to fill out a survey on work-related travel. 

The best way to tell if a property has a three phase supply is by looking at the electrical fuse.

Check your electrical meter, meters are sometimes labelled “Single-Phase,” “Mono-Phase,” or “1-Phase” and 3-phase supplies sometimes say “3-Phase,” “Tri-Phase,” or “Polyphase.

Count 3 fuses for 3-phase or 1 fuse for single-phase.

Or your utility bill may say what type of power you have.

If you do not know the answer to this question, please do not guess, but select the option “I don’t know”. 

The Energy Footprint Tool calculate the carbon footprint of your energy use (oil, gas, electricity).  It shows both the ‘gross’ and ‘net’ carbon footprint.  The gross figure represents all the energy your church has used, whilst the net figure deducts any electricity or gas which is either generated on-site or purchased from a 100% renewable tariff meeting certain criteria.

The list of companies meeting these criteria is reviewed each year.

Here is the list of providers who met the criteria in 2025.

This list is backward looking, applying to 2025 utility data entered into the EFT in 2024. 

To exclude an area of a building which is permanently rented out to tenants and sub-metered, you will need both your main energy bills and the sub-metering bills.

To complete the EFT you will need to subtract the sub-metered energy from your total energy use for the year and record this value in the EFT. 

Yes, on the Energy Footprint Results or Summary Screen, select the option <Print/Download Report>.

Clicking this button will produce a pdf of your energy footprint results which can be taken to your PCC meeting for discussion.

To save this report, follow the instructions in the pop-up window. 

If you notice that EFT information for previous years are incorrect or missing for your church, please feel free to provide this information either directly to your diocesan office contact, or directly to the Data Services team, by emailing statistics.unit@churchofengland.org.

The easiest way to share the necessary information, is by completing a paper return – available above or on the parish returns login page.

1. Select the Church in your parish for which you would like to see previous information.
2. Use the menu <View Data> at the top of the EFT screen, from this dropdown menu, select <Archived Returns>.
3. You can view EFT return data if it was previously submitted by clicking on ‘View’ under the relevant year in the Energy Footprint Tool column.
4. The EFT Results Page for the data submitted in that year is displayed.
5. To see individual fields entered and calculated for that year, click ‘Show/Hide’ under the “Submit Data” section. 

If the EFT is still open, you can edit the data and re-submit it as follows.

1. Select the Church in your parish for which you would like to see previous information.
2. Under the Energy Footprint Tool 2025 Section, click on <View Report/Submit Data>.
3. Click on the <Unsubmit> option.
4. Confirm that you would like to unsubmit this entry by clicking <OK> in the pop-up dialogue box.
5. Click on the <Enter Data> option, you can then walk through the entry form and correct your mistake.
6. Please remember to click <Submit> again when you have completed your corrections. 

If you get stuck you can find help in the following ways:

• If it relates to how to fill in the forms click on the “?” help symbols you will find throughout the forms.
• If it relates to getting access to the system or if you want to let someone know about problems with historic data contact your diocesan office.
• If you think the system is not doing what it should be then use the Report Problem / Give Feedback facility at the bottom of each page.
• You can also get in touch with our Diocesan Net Zero Lead, Phil Leigh.

The tool also offers some helpful tips to reduce your carbon emissions. Using the tool each year will help you to track the impact of the different steps you are taking to reduce your carbon footprint.

You can use the Practical Path to Net Zero Carbon to plan your action, and our Net Zero Carbon church webpage to get informed. We have case studies from other churches to inspire you. You can also see how Parish Buying can help you. 

The EFT helps us know our carbon baseline – where we are starting from – and how much progress we are making. Over 10,000 churches entered their information in 2024. Full findings from the EFT are published within the annual Energy Toolkit Report. The most recent publication relates to the year 2023.

The 2025 report, reporting on energy use and emissions data in 2024, is currently being finalised and will be published in early 2026. For earlier iterations of the Energy Toolkit and Energy Footprint Tool reports, please see our Resources, publications, and data webpage.

The Energy Footprint Tool will tell your church the amount of carbon produced annually by heating and lighting your church buildings, based on the energy data you provide. It can take account of separate buildings such as church halls, as long as you have the utility bills for them.

The Energy Footprint Tool was created by the Church of England Data Team in response to the call from General Synod in Feb 2019 to be able to measure the carbon footprint of the Church. It is a key step towards meeting our goal to cut our emissions and play our role in responding to the climate crisis.

As a Church, we have a target to meet net carbon zero by 2030. The EFT is one of the tools developed as part of this ambition. Nationally, it helps us know our carbon baseline – where we are starting from – and how much progress we are making.