Accounting
Issues of Disclosing Global Protocol for Community-Scale Greenhouse Gas
Emission Inventories (GPC) in Sri Lanka
Abstract
The main aim of this
paper is open the mind set of community and community related authorities to understand
the Global protocol for Gas Emission inventories (GPC). This paper is based on
the reporting practices issued by the Climate Data projects in UNDP. There are
few issues are addressing in this paper, especially lack of awareness and lack
of training among the communities. Further, issues of disclosing and defining
of GPC reporting practices also discussed. Qualitative discussion with
stakeholders reveals that still Sri Lankan community; Institutions are infant
stage of reporting and disclosing the GPC.
Key
Words: Global Protocol for community-Scale Greenhouse Gas,
Carbon Accounting, Greenhouse Gas emission inventories
Introduction
The objective of this paper is to report global protocol for community scale greenhouse gas emission to the public. First part of this paper reports as it is CDP guide line and mechanism. Second part is some issues of understanding and disclosing GPC.Cities are the global centers of communication, commerce and culture;they are also a significant, and growing, source of energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. A city’s ability to take effective action on mitigating climate change, and monitor progress, depends on having access to good quality data on GHG emissions. Planning for climate action begins with developing a GHG inventory. An inventory enables cities to understand the emissions contribution of deferent activities in the community.
The objective of this paper is to report global protocol for community scale greenhouse gas emission to the public. First part of this paper reports as it is CDP guide line and mechanism. Second part is some issues of understanding and disclosing GPC.Cities are the global centers of communication, commerce and culture;they are also a significant, and growing, source of energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. A city’s ability to take effective action on mitigating climate change, and monitor progress, depends on having access to good quality data on GHG emissions. Planning for climate action begins with developing a GHG inventory. An inventory enables cities to understand the emissions contribution of deferent activities in the community.
Inventory methods that
cities have used to date vary significantly. This inconsistency makes comparisons
between cities difficult, raises questions around data quality, and limits the
ability to aggregate local, subnational, and national government GHG emissions
data. To allow for more credible and meaningful reporting, greater consistency
in GHG accounting is r3equire,. The Global Protocol for Community-Scale
Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventories (GPC)responds to this challenge and offers
a robust and clear framework that bids on existing methodologies for
calculating and reporting city-wide GHG emissions.
The GPC requires cities
to measure and disclose a comprehensive inventory of GHC emissions and to total
these emissions using two distinct but complementary approaches. One captures
emissions from both production and consumption activities taking place within
the city boundary, including some emissions released outside the city boundary.
The other categorizes all emissions into “scopes” depending on where they
physically occur. Separate accuonting of emissions physically released within
the city boundary should be used for aggregation of multiple city inventories
in order to avoid double counting.
The GPC is divided into
three main parts
- Part I
introduces the GPC reporting and accounting principles, sets out how to define
the inventory boundary specifies reporting requirements and offers a
sample reporting template
- Part II
provides overarching and sector specific accounting and reporting guidance
for sourcing data and calculating emissions, including calculation methods
and equations
- Part III
shows how inventories can be used to set mitigation goals and track
performance over time and shows how cities can manage inventory quality
Note, the term “city” is
used throughout this document to refer to any geographically dissemble
subnational entity, such as a community, town, city, or province, and covers
all levels of subnational jurisdiction as well as local government as legal
entities of public administration.
Defining an inventory
boundary and emission sources
To use the GPC, cities
must first define an inventory boundary. This identifies the geographic area,
time span, gases, and emission sources, covered by a GHG inventory. Any
geographic boundary may be used for the HGH inventory. Depending on the purpose
of the inventory, the boundary can align with the administrative boundary of a
local government, a ward or borough within a city, a combination of administrative
divisions, a metropolitan area, or another geographically identifiable entity,
The GPC is designed to account for GHG emissions in a single reporting year and
coves the seven gases covered by the Kyoto Protocol (section3.0 in the report.)
GHG emissions from city
activities shall be classified into six main sectors:
·
Stationary energy
·
Transportation
·
Waste
·
Industrial processes and product use
(IPPU)
·
Agriculture, forestry, and other land use
(AFOLU)
·
Any other emissions occurring outside the
geographic boundary as a result of city activities, These emissions are not
covered in this version of the GPD but may be reported separately
Table 1 Sectors and
sub-sectors of city GHG emissions
|
sectors and sub- sectors
|
|
STATIONARY
ENERGY
|
|
Residential
buildings
|
|
Commercial
and institutional buildings and facilities
|
|
Manufacturing
industries and construction
|
|
energy
industries
|
|
Agriculture,
forestry, and fishing activities
|
|
Non
– specified sources
|
|
Fugitive
emissions from mining, processing, storage, and transportation of coal
|
|
Fugitive
emissions from oil and natural gas systems
|
|
TRANSPORTATION
|
|
On
–road
|
|
Railways
|
|
Waterborne
navigation
|
|
Aviation
|
|
Off
– road
WASTE
|
|
Solid
waste disposal
|
|
Biological
treatment of waste
|
|
Incineration
and open burning
|
|
Wastewater
treatment and discharge
|
|
INDUSTRIAL PROCESSES AND PRODUCT USE (IPPU)
|
|
Industrial
processes
|
|
Product
use
|
|
AGRICULTURE, FORESTRY AND OTHER LAND USE (AFOLU)
|
|
Livestock
|
|
Land
|
|
Other
agriculture
|
|
OTHER SCOPE 3
|
Categorizing emissions
Activities taking place
within a city can generate GHG emissions that occur inside the city boundary as
well as outside the city boundary. To distinguish among them, the GPC groups
emission into three categories based on where they occur: scope 1 or scope2 or
scope 3 emissions. Definitions are provided in Table 2, based on an adapted
application of the scopes framework used in the GHG Protocol Corporate
Standard.
The scopes framework
helps to differentiate emissions occurring physically within the city (scope
1), from those occurring outside the city (scope3) and from the use of
electricity, steam, and or heating/cooling supplied by grids which may or may
also be termed “territorial” emissions because they occur discretely within the
territory defined by the geographic boundary. Figure 1 illustrates
Figure 1 Sources and
boundaries of city GHG emissions
Table 2 Scopes
definitions for city inventories
|
Scope
|
Definition
|
|
Scope 1
|
GHG
emissions from sources located within the city boundary
|
|
Scope2
|
GHG
emissions occurring as a consequence of the use of grid – supplied
electricity, heat, steam and / or cooling within the city boundary
|
|
Scope 3
|
All
other GHG emissions that occur outside the city boundary as a result of
activities taking places within the city boundary
|
Which emission source
occurs solely within the geographic boundary established for the inventory,
which occurs outside the geographic boundary, and which may occur across the
geographic boundary?
Aggregating city
inventories
The GPC has been designed
to allow city inventories to be aggregated at subnational and national levels
in order to:
·
Improve the data quality of a national
inventory, particularly where major cities’ inventories are reported:
·
Measure the contribution of city
mitigation actions to regional or national GHG emission reduction targets:
·
And identify innovative trans boundary and
cross-sartorial strategies for GHG mitigation.
Reporting requirements
The GPC requires cities
to report their emissions by gas, scope, sector and subsector, and to add to
add up emissions using two distinct but complementary approaches:
·
Scopes framework:
This totals all emissions by scope 1, 2 and 3 Scope 1 (or territorial emissions)
allows for the separate accounting of all GHG emissions produced within the
geographic boundary of the city, consistent with national-level GHC reporting.
·
City-induce framework:
This totals GHG emissions attributable to activities taking place within the
geographic boundary of the city. It covers selected scope 1, 2 and 3 emission
sources representing the key emitting sources occurring in almost all cities,
and for which standardized methods are generally available.
The GPC sets out
reporting requirements and explains how to add up emission totals. Cities may
also report emissions based on relevant local or program-specific requirements
in addition to the requirements of the GPC. GHG inventories should be updated
on a regular basis using the most recent date available. The GPC recommends
that cities update their inventory on an annual basis, as it provides frequent
and timely progress on overall GHG emissions.
Table 3 summarizes the
emissions sources and scopes covered by the GPC for both city-level and
territorial reporting. Cities should aim to cover all emissions for which
reliable data are available, To accommodate limitations in data availability
and differences in emission sources between cities, the GPC requires the use of
notation keys, as recommended in IPCC Guidelines, and an accompanying
explanation to justify exclusion or partial accenting of HGC emission source
categories.
The city-induced
framework gives cities the option of selecting between two reporting levels:
BASIC or BASIC+ The BASIC level covers scope 1 and scope 2 emissions from
stationary energy and transportation, as well as scope 1 and scope 3 emissions
from waste. BASIC + involves more challenging data collection and calculation
processes, and additionally includes emissions from IPPU and AFOLU and
transboundary transportation. Therefore, where these sources are significant
and relevant for a city, the city should aim to report according to BASIC+ The
sources covered in BASIC + also align with sources required for national reporting
in IPCC guidelines.
Tick marks in Table 3
indicate which emissions sources are covered by the GPC, and cells are colored
to indicate their inclusion in city-level BASIC or BASIC+ totals and the
territorial total. rows written in italics represent sub-sector emissions
required for territorial emission totals but not BASIC/BASIC+ Gray cells in the
scope 2 column indicate emissions sources that do not have applicable GHG
emissions in that scope category. Emission sources corresponding to the blank
boxes in the scope 3 column are not required for reporting, but may be
identified and disclosed separately under other scope 3
The GPC provides a sample
reporting template that covers all reporting requirements. Cities may report
GHG emissions in a variety of additional formats depending on purpose and
audience, and may also disaggregate emissions by fuel type, municipal
operations within each sector or sub-sector, etc.
Calculating GHC emissions
Part
II of the GPC provides overarching and sector-specific reporting guidance for
sourcing data and calculating emissions. Cities should select the most appropriate methodologies based on the
purpose of their inventory, availability of data, and consistency with their
country’s national inventory and/or other measurement and reporting programs in which they participate. The GPC
does not require specific methodologies to be used to produce emissions data:
rather it specifies the principles and rules for compiling an city-wide GHG emissions
inventory. Where relevant, the GPC recommends using methodologies aligned with
the 2006 IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories.
For
most emission sources, cities will need to estimate GHG emissions by
multiplying activity data by an emission factor associated with the activity
being measured. Activity data is a quantitative measure of a level of activity
that results in GHG emissions taking place during a given period of time (e.g,
volume of gas used, kilometers driven, tones of waste sent to landfill, etc.).
an emission factor is a measure of the mass of GHG emissions relative to a unit
of activity. For example, estimating co2 emissions from the use of electricity
involves multiplying data on kilowatt-hours (KWh) of electricity used by the
emission factor (KgCO2/KwH) of electricity used by the emission factor
(kgCO2/kWh) for electricity, which will depend on the technology and type of
fuel used to generate the electricity.
GHG emissions data shall be reported as metrictonnes of each GHG as well
as CO2 equivalents (CO2e).
