IISD: Procurement Data Gaps Limit The EU's Net Zero Progress
European governments could use public procurement to accelerate their low carbon transitions.
The International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) has identified a data gap that stops governments from measuring whether green procurement reduces emissions.
"The political ambition is real: the Paris Agreement, the European Green Deal, the Clean Vehicles Directive, the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive and many others place explicit expectations on public buyers to procure greener goods and services," says the IISD.
Data platform launched in Europe
The European Commission launched the Public Procurement Data Space (PPDS) in September 2024.
The platform combines procurement data from Tenders Electronic Daily (TED) and national systems into one analytical environment.
IISD tested whether existing data flowing through the PPDS could close the gap between green ambition and action. The test aimed to avoid creating new reporting burdens.
According to IISD, current Green public procurement (GPP) monitoring tracks declared environmental intentions rather than actual results.
Systems like the PPDS record procedures tagged with environmental objectives.
They cannot confirm whether emissions were reduced or if other outcomes were achieved.
Monitoring must evolve beyond outputs to measure real-world impact. This could include CO₂ avoided, water conserved and energy saved.
Testing existing procurement data
Existing procurement data flowing through the PPDS and TED ecosystems could be used to estimate environmental impact.
A pilot by OCP and IISD tested this using German contract award data across construction works and vehicles.
"Our starting hypothesis was that the data needed to measure the environmental impact of public procurement is, to a large extent, already being collected; it is simply not being used for that purpose. We examined whether the procurement data already flowing through the PPDS and [TED] data ecosystems could be combined with established environmental impact modelling approaches to generate meaningful estimates of carbon emissions and potential savings," says the IISD.
OCP and IISD applied spend-based estimation. This calculates CO₂ emissions by combining contract values with known emissions figures per euro spent. The approach is the only one compatible with current PPDS data, which lacks the quantity and unit detail required for more accurate methods.
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Data quality issues limited usable samples. The analysis started with 2.5 million procurement rows.
The usable vehicle sample shrank to just 125 contracts and construction to 5,623 records.
"This is a direct reflection of the current state of structured procurement data across the EU, and it is precisely the gap this analysis sets out to make visible," says the IISD.
Carbon savings potential revealed
According to IISD, construction contracts already tagged with green criteria deliver an estimated saving of more than 42 million kg of CO₂e compared to a conventional baseline. The organisation modelled what would happen if all procurement were tagged as green in the sample.
"When we modelled what would happen if all procurement were tagged as green in our sample (the overwhelming majority of the spend), the estimated additional savings reached approximately 898m kg CO₂e. That is more than 21 times the savings currently achieved by the green-tagged contracts," explains the IISD.
The vehicles sector shows a similar pattern. Applying green criteria to the remaining vehicle sample would yield savings more than five times larger than what existing green tagged contracts currently deliver.
This assumes battery electric vehicle procurement.
"These figures are illustrative, not definitive. But even as order-of-magnitude estimates, they make a powerful point: the environmental potential embedded in public procurement is vastly larger than what current green procurement practices are unlocking," says IISD.
Path to procurement impact
The data gaps identified are real but solvable. Better data creates visibility into procurement outcomes. Visibility enables accountability.
Accountability could drive more consistent application of green criteria. More green procurement delivers real environmental impact.
Closing these gaps is a prerequisite for procurement to function as a strategic lever.
This means scaling impact tracking approaches across Europe. It requires embedding them into the PPDS and national procurement ecosystems.
Public buyers need tools to monitor and improve the environmental performance of their spending.
