How seCO₂ia calculates your carbon footprint

How does seCO₂ia calculate the CO₂ of a product?

For each item on a receipt or barcode, our AI identifies the product type, estimates its weight and reads its price. We then apply a transparent formula: CO₂ = estimated weight × emission factor for that product type.

Where do the carbon factors come from?

From public databases published by ADEME, France's ecological-transition agency — and each one covers a different part of the app:

• Food products — ADEME, AGRIBALYSE® v3.2, data last updated 30 June 2026, available under the Etalab Open Licence 2.0.
• Other categories — ADEME, Base Carbone® V23.6, data last updated 30 June 2026, same licence.
• National per-person reference figures, shown for comparison only — Eurostat, US EPA, ADEME/INSEE. These sources are not used to compute the figure of any individual product.
• A few specific factors come from institutional or peer-reviewed work (MIT, DEFRA).

Part of our factor table predates this source tracking: for those older values, the exact database version is not documented. We replace them with sourced, dated values as we go.

Product names, brands, weights and images come from Open Food Facts and from our own community. Contains information from Open Food Facts, which is made available here under the Open Database License (ODbL). Individual contents are available under the Database Contents License. Product images are available under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Sources: AGRIBALYSE · ADEME Base Carbone · Open Food Facts

Neither ADEME nor any other public body endorses seCO₂ia or validates the figures it displays.

How reliable are the figures?

They are estimates, not certified measurements — and we say so. Two sources of uncertainty: the AI estimates a product's weight without physically weighing it, and each factor is an average for a product type. So treat a scan as a reliable order of magnitude to guide your choices, not a laboratory result. Every result carries a confidence status, and accuracy improves continuously as the data and AI get better.

How does the community make it more accurate?

Anyone can flag a wrong product, correct its category, weight or name, and vote on others' suggestions. After 5 confirming votes, a correction is applied for everyone — so accuracy compounds with the community.

What exactly does the figure cover?

The ADEME factors we use cover six stages of a product's life: agriculture, processing, packaging, transport, distribution and consumption — what ADEME calls « du champ à l'assiette », from field to plate.

They include no end-of-life stage: neither the treatment of packaging waste, nor food that ends up thrown away. A figure in seCO₂ia therefore stops at your kitchen.

What the figures cannot be used for

Each factor is an average for a type of product. Two items of the same type receive the same figure per kilogram, regardless of brand, origin or production method.

So these figures cannot be used to choose between two products within the same category — between two yoghurts of competing brands, say, or between an organic and a conventional version of the same product. ADEME states the same limit for AGRIBALYSE: « les données […] ne permettent pas de comparer des produits alimentaires d'une même catégorie » — the data does not allow comparing food products within the same category.

What they are good for: comparing categories against each other, and following how your own consumption changes over time.

Where do these factors apply?

The emission factors are calibrated on French consumption and applied identically in every country where the app is available. The same product bought in Sweden or Poland receives the French factor, which reflects neither the local electricity mix nor local supply chains.

Extending them country by country is on our roadmap. Until then, read a figure abroad as an order of magnitude, not a local measurement.

How current is this data, and how do we keep it so?

The ADEME datasets we draw on were last updated on 30 June 2026. Our own factor table was last reviewed on 5 September 2026.

We review it whenever ADEME publishes a new version of AGRIBALYSE or Base Carbone, and at least once a year. Factors are stored in a database rather than in the app itself, so a corrected value reaches you without waiting for an app update. The review date above is updated with every revision.

If a figure looks wrong to you, tell us at contact@secoia.app — we check every report.

Does the app itself pollute?

About 22 g of CO₂e per year for an active user — negligible next to what it helps you avoid. In a single shopping trip, one better choice already dwarfs it: swapping just one beef steak for chicken saves several kilograms of CO₂, far more than the app emits in a whole year.