Currys FY2025/26 Sustainability Report: Operational Excellence Meets Scope 3 Reality
Written by Jack Linnett (Co-founder & CEO)
Currys' latest sustainability report shows a retailer that is winning on operations but still wrestling with its supply chain.
The company's FY2025/26 Annual & Sustainability Report reveals strong progress on waste, renewable energy and Scope 1–2 emissions, yet total emissions rose 4.05% year-on-year to 9.17 million tonnes of CO2e, driven almost entirely by Scope 3.
For anyone tracking ESG data in retail, the Currys story is a useful case study in what "good" looks like today — and where the real decarbonisation battle still lies.
What Currys' FY2025/26 report covers
Currys' latest report runs to 196 pages and includes detailed disclosures on energy, carbon, waste, circular economy activities and governance.
In our analysis, we processed the full document in under five minutes and extracted 106 verified metrics covering FY26, FY25 and FY20, allowing for clearer year-on-year comparison than a single headline figure.
The report itself confirms that Scope 3 emissions account for over 99% of total emissions, with Purchased Goods and Services (Category 1) and Use of Sold Products (Category 11) the most material categories.
Key performance highlights
1. Earthmark score among the tech retail set
Against sector peers, Currys scores 3.2 out of 5.0 on Earthmark, well above the Consumer Discretionary sector median of 0.5.
In the tech retail sub-set:
Currys: 3.2 / 5.0
AO.com: 3.0 / 5.0
Argos: 4.0 / 5.0
Currys' Earthmark score is underpinned by a 3.0 Environmental score and a 3.6 Governance score, suggesting relatively mature disclosure and oversight compared to competitors.
On current operational metrics, Currys is a relatively strong performer in this peer set. The caveat is that all three retailers face similar Scope 3 dynamics: purchased goods and product use dominate their footprints.
2. Operational waste down nearly 50%
Operational waste fell 48.9% year-on-year, from 900 tonnes to 460 tonnes in FY26.
This puts Currys far below both the sector average and AO's reported waste volume, which sat around 15,300 tonnes in comparable datasets.
The scale of reduction signals genuine operational focus on waste prevention, recycling and reuse across stores, distribution and repair centres.
3. Strong renewable energy uptake and low Scope 1–2 footprint
Currys used 141,000 MWh of renewable energy in FY26, representing 63.5% of total energy consumption.
This helped drive market-based Scope 2 emissions down 10.5% YoY to 770 tonnes of CO2e.
Total Scope 1 and Scope 2 (market-based) emissions came to 15,770 tonnes of CO2e, materially lower than key competitors:
Currys: ~15,770 tCO2e
AO: ~27,084 tCO2e
Argos: several million tonnes when full operations are included
In absolute terms, Currys' operational carbon footprint is small for a retailer of its scale, reflecting a lean store and warehouse estate and improved energy efficiency.
The Scope 3 challenge
Despite operational progress, total emissions rose 4.05% YoY to 9.17 million tonnes of CO2e, driven by a 4.06% increase in Scope 3.
Scope 3 makes up 99.8% of Currys' total footprint, consistent with the company's own disclosure that purchased goods and use of sold products dominate its impact.
Why did Scope 3 rise?
Three main factors explain the increase:
Revenue and volume growth
Group revenue grew 6% YoY to £9,254m, with like-for-like sales up 4%. More sales of TVs, appliances, computing and mobile devices directly increase upstream manufacturing emissions and lifetime energy use.Product mix shift
Growth in large-screen TVs, refrigeration, gaming and computing likely pushed up estimated use-phase emissions, since Category 11 (Use of Sold Products) is a major component of Currys' Scope 3.Logistics and procurement
Expanding inventory to stock 708 stores and fulfilment networks increases freight and transport emissions embedded in purchased goods.
The net effect: Currys is decarbonising its own operations, but growth in product volumes is still pulling the overall footprint higher.
What Currys needs to do next
The company's own reporting and external analysis point to three strategic levers:
1. Supplier decarbonisation (Category 1)
Purchased Goods and Services is the largest single source of emissions. Currys can:
Require top OEM partners (Samsung, LG, Sony, Bosch, etc.) to adopt Science Based Targets (SBTi) and transition manufacturing to 100% renewable power.
Embed carbon intensity requirements into sourcing decisions, not just cost and service levels.
This is where the biggest absolute reductions must come from.
2. Scale circular economy services
Currys already operates one of Europe's largest e-waste and repair operations. The next step is to:
Expand certified refurbished sales.
Grow trade-in programmes that extend product lifespans.
Use repair and reuse to decouple revenue growth from new manufacturing emissions.
Every additional year of product life reduces the need for new production and associated Scope 3 Category 1 emissions.
3. Point-of-sale eco-incentives (Category 11)
Use of Sold Products is the other major Scope 3 category. Currys can:
Promote A-rated energy efficiency appliances more aggressively.
Bundle smart home energy management tools at checkout.
Use pricing, promotions and in-store guidance to steer customers toward lower lifetime energy consumption.
This aligns commercial incentives with emissions reduction: more efficient products mean lower customer bills and lower Scope 3 over time.
Why this matters for ESG data and benchmarking
Currys' story illustrates a broader point about ESG reporting in retail:
Operational metrics can look excellent while total emissions still rise.
Scope 3 dominates, so any meaningful climate strategy must focus on suppliers and product lifecycles.
Comparability is hard: reporting boundaries, methodologies and product mixes differ across retailers.
This is where automated benchmarking becomes valuable. By processing reports like Currys' in minutes and standardising data across peers, platforms like Earthmark help investors, brands and shoppers see beyond headlines to the underlying drivers of performance.
The bottom line
Currys' FY2025/26 report shows a retailer that is:
Leading its peer set on Earthmark rating, governance and operational emissions.
Delivering real operational improvements on waste, renewable energy and Scope 1–2.
Still exposed to Scope 3, where growth in product volumes currently outweighs efficiency gains.
The strategic question for Currys — and for the sector — is how quickly it can turn circular services, supplier engagement and product efficiency into a downward bend in total emissions, not just a flattening of intensity.
If you're tracking sustainability performance in UK retail, Currys is now one of the clearest examples of what "good operations, hard upstream" looks like in practice.
Sources & data: Currys plc Annual Report & Accounts 2025/26, Climate Action pages, and FY2025/26 trading updates; competitor emissions data from public sustainability disclosures and third-party datasets. See Currys' Earthmark page for more information.