Beyond national climate action: the impact of region, city, and business commitments on global greenhouse gas emissions

implemented projects.While additionality and the quantification of emission reductions are, in principle, key considerations for unit quality for crediting mechanisms, the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions impact from using credits from already implemented projects is more complex.If the supply of credits considerably exceeds demand, a key consideration for the global GHG emissions impact is whether already implemented projects would continue to reduce GHG emissions even without credit revenues, or whether they are 'vulnerable' to discontinuing GHG abatement.A detailed assessment of the status and operating conditions of projects under the Clean Development Mechanism, and their marginal costs of supplying credits, shows that most projects would continue GHG abatement even if they cannot sell credits.If CORSIA allows airline operators the unlimited use of offset credits from these projects, this will not only undermine its environmental objectives but also lead to continued low carbon prices, and thus neither offer incentives for new investments nor lead to any significant revenues for already implemented projects.The thesis recommends limiting eligibility under CORSIA to new or 'vulnerable' projects (Chapter 5).Unit quality is also a key consideration when linking emissions trading systems (ETSs).As linking of ETSs faces several practical and political challenges and risks, including with regard to whether allowances have 'quality' and whether linking provides incentives or disincentives to enhance the ambition of caps, policy-makers are considering also restricted forms of linking ETSs.The thesis uses a simple economic model and three criteria -abatement outcome, economic implications, and feasibility -to assess three different options for implementing restricted linking of ETSs: quotas, exchange rates, or discount rates.The analysis shows that quotas can enhance cost-effectiveness relative to no linking and allow policy-makers to retain control on the extent of unit flows.Exchange rates could enhance abatement and economic benefits or have unintended adverse implications for cost-effectiveness and total abatement, depending on how rates are set.Due to information asymmetries between the regulated entities and policy-makers setting the exchange rate, and uncertainties about future developments, setting exchange rates in a manner that avoids such unintended consequences could prove difficult.Discount rates, in contrast, can ensure that both cost-effectiveness and total abatement are enhanced.The thesis recommends the consideration of quotas or discount rates, but to refrain from using exchange rates, due to the environmental integrity risks (Chapter 6).The varying scope and ambition of current NDC targets, and possible disincentives to broaden their scope and enhance their ambition, could be addressed by facilitating the adoption of ambitious and economy-wide mitigation targets and by preventing the transfer of carbon market units in situations of high environmental integrity risks.This latter approach could be implemented through eligibility criteria or limits on the generation, transfer or use of carbon market units.Limits could in particular address the risk that some countries have mitigation targets that correspond to higher levels of Summary 10 emissions than independent projections of their likely emissions.If such 'hot air' can be transferred to other countries, it could increase aggregated emissions and create a perverse incentive for countries not to enhance the ambition of future mitigation targets.The thesis proposes a typology for such limits, explores key design options, and tests different types of limits in the context of fifteen countries.The analysis indicates that limits to international transfers could, if designed appropriately, prevent most of the hot air contained in current mitigation targets from being transferred, but also involve trade-offs between different policy objectives (Chapter 7).The thesis concludes by discussing how four strategies to mitigate environmental integrity risks -robust accounting, ensuring unit quality, facilitating economy-wide and ambitious mitigation targets, and restricting international transfers -could be implemented under the Paris Agreement and CORSIA (see Figure S-1).Crediting mechanisms pose higher risks for environmental integrity than linking of ETSs and should therefore have a limited role in the future.International oversight can reduce the risks to environmental integrity to some extent.Acquiring countries could also reduce risks by only acquiring units from countries that also have ambitious NDC targets.Overall, policy-makers should not regard carbon market approaches as the one and only 'silver-bullet' to mitigating climate change but carefully assess what policy instrument or mix of instruments is best suited achieve and balance different policy objectives, in particular in light of the rapid transition that is necessary to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement (Chapter 8). How can the environmental integrity of international carbon market mechanisms be ensured in the new context of the Paris Agreement?To assess this, further research questions are:1. How should environmental integrity be defined in the context of international carbon market mechanisms?1. Accounting for the international transfer of carbon market units: Article 6.2 of the Paris Agreement requires countries to "apply robust accounting to ensure, inter alia, the avoidance of double counting".A lack of robust accounting could undermine environmental integrity in several ways (Chapter 2).If emission reductions are double counted, for example, actual global GHG emissions are higher than the sum of what individual countries report (see Chapter 3).Establishing and implementing robust accounting rules is thus an important prerequisite for achieving environmental integrity (see Chapters 2 and 3).An important question is therefore how robust accounting can be implemented in the new context of the Paris Agreement, taken into account the diverse scopes, metrics, types and timeframes of current NDC targets.Chapter 7: When less is more: Limits to international transfers under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement Chapter 8: Discussion, conclusions and recommendations Note: Dark green indicates that this aspect is the main focus of the chapter.Bright green indicates that this aspect is also considered.Grey indicates that this aspect is not considered.Chapter 5 takes up a matter that is controversially debated under both ICAO and the Paris Agreement: whether carbon market units from the Kyoto mechanisms should be eligible for use after 2020.The chapter assesses the environmental and economic implications of using offset credits from the largest mechanism to date -the CDM -under CORSIA, and analyses what type of eligibility criteria are necessary to perverse environmental integrity.Towards this end, a model is established that estimates the supply potential and the costs of generating certified emission reductions (CERs) for each of the 8,000 registered CDM projects and assesses under which conditions creating new demand for CERs from already existing projects triggers actual emission reductions, taking into account differences between project types.Chapter 6 turns the focus from crediting mechanisms to another form of international carbon market mechanisms: the linking of ETSs.Several jurisdictions are considering, or 'hot air' -a term used in context of mitigation targets that countries over-achieve without pursuing further mitigation actions (Boehringer, 2000;den Elzen & de Moor, 2002;Kollmuss et al., 2015).They could, however, also be used to address other environmental integrity risks, such as the lack of robust accounting system, concerns related unit quality, or possible disincentives to enhance mitigation action in the future.This chapter proposes a typology for limits, explores key design options, and quantitatively tests different types of limits in the context of fifteen countries.Lastly, Chapter 8 discusses the overall findings of the thesis, provides conclusions and makes recommendations.These can inform the ongoing negotiations on Article 6 of the Paris Agreement, and the implementation of carbon market mechanisms by countries, jurisdictions and international organizations, such as ICAO.Chapter 2Environmental integrity of international carbon market mechanisms 19Chapter 2Environmental integrity of international carbon market mechanisms under the Paris

The Republic of Korea submitted its updated Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Secretariat in December 2021. The updated NDC target is to reduce total national greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 40% from the 2018 level, which is 727.6 Mt CO2eq, by 2030. According to the updated NDC, local governments are also required to revise their GHG reduction plans. In addition, local governments should self-inspect the progress and major achievements of the GHG reduction plan every year in accordance with the evaluation guideline of the Ministry of Environment. Of 6 metropolitan cities, Gyeonggi Province shows the highest GHG emissions in the country, which accounts for about 17% of the total national GHG emissions in 2021. Ironically, Goyang City, a basic local government of Gyeonggi Province, was selected as one of the seven best local governments for carbon neutrality in 2021. The City has set a reduction target of 32.8% below BAU by 2030 and prepared a plan to implement reduction targets by sector. Over the last decade, building and transportation sectors have been the major sources of GHG emissions in Goyang City, accounting for approx. 70% of the city’s total GHG emissions. The city promotes zero-energy building (ZEB) for newly constructed buildings and encourages green remodeling for existing buildings in order to reduce GHG emissions in the building sector. It is essential to introduce renewable energy such as solar, geothermal, hydrothermal, etc. for ZEB and green remodeling. In this study, therefore, the potential for solar power generation, which is most easily applicable to the building sector, and GHG reduction were calculated for residential buildings in Goyang City. To calculate the available area for solar power on the roof of residential buildings, spatial data was constructed using high-resolution aerial photographs and the outline of the building roof was extracted through AI training data. AcknowledgementsThis research was carried out as a part of KICT Research Program (Data-Centric Checkup Technique of Building Energy Performance) funded by the Ministry of Science and ICT.

The effectiveness of the Paris Agreement in achieving its global temperature goal relies on countries adopting ambitious mitigation targets and introducing corresponding measures. But do countries adopt such corresponding climate policies? This paper introduces two Vertical Policy Harmonization Indices, which quantify the gap between a country’s nationally determined contribution (NDC) mitigation pledge and its national mitigation policies. These indices incorporate three dimensions of climate policymaking: emission reduction targets, the sectors covered by those targets, and the policy instruments introduced to reduce emissions. By focusing on policy instruments and mixes, we adopt a novel public policy approach for the harmonization assessment. While the Target Index compares the level and scope of reduction targets in the NDCs and national policies of 105 countries, covering approximately 91% of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the Policy Effort Index also incorporates a comprehensive evaluation of the policy mix of selected countries. With the Policy Effort Index, we investigate 37 countries, covering over 70% of global GHG emissions. The indices show that three-quarters of the 105 countries have so far failed to translate their NDC targets into national policy. The remaining quarter has harmonized or even more ambitious national policies. Furthermore, countries show the most complete national policy mix in their most GHG-intensive sector, usually the energy sector. These insights demonstrate the indices’ potential for enabling future research explaining the deviations between countries’ domestic actions and their international pledges and evaluating the effectiveness of the progression mechanism as countries update their NDCs.

Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), submitted by Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change before and after the 21st Conference of Parties, summarize domestic objectives for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions for the 2025–2030 time horizon. In the absence, for now, of detailed guidelines for the format of NDCs, ancillary data are needed to interpret some NDCs and project GHG emissions in 2030. Here, we provide an analysis of uncertainty sources and their impacts on 2030 global GHG emissions based on the sole and full achievement of the NDCs. We estimate that NDCs project into 56.8–66.5 Gt CO2eq yr−1 emissions in 2030 (90% confidence interval), which is higher than previous estimates, and with a larger uncertainty range. Despite these uncertainties, NDCs robustly shift GHG emissions towards emerging and developing countries and reduce international inequalities in per capita GHG emissions. Finally, we stress that current NDCs imply larger emissions reduction rates after 2030 than during the 2010–2030 period if long-term temperature goals are to be fulfilled. Our results highlight four requirements for the forthcoming ‘climate regime’: a clearer framework regarding future NDCs’ design, an increasing participation of emerging and developing countries in the global mitigation effort, an ambitious update mechanism in order to avoid hardly feasible decarbonization rates after 2030 and an anticipation of steep decreases in global emissions after 2030.

This study assessed the potential for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from passenger vehicles in the Republic of Korea and evaluated the feasibility of meeting nationally determined contribution (NDC) targets. Scenarios were developed in three areas: vehicle registration, average mileage, and average GHG emissions of newly registered vehicles. Total GHG emissions were projected by selecting scenarios for each area. The results indicate that achieving the transportation sector’s NDC target remains a significant challenge, even under the most optimistic emission reduction scenarios. Additionally, calculations were conducted to evaluate the adequacy of average GHG emission regulations for newly registered vehicles. The results reveal that full compliance with these regulations would achieve less than half of the target reduction. Even in a scenario where all newly registered vehicles from 2024 onward are zero-emission, the reduction would fall slightly short of the NDC target.

Reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from agriculture has become a critical target in national climate change policies. More than 80% of the countries in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) refer to the reduction of agricultural emissions, including livestock, in their nationally determined contribution (NDC) to mitigate climate change. The livestock sector in Kenya contributes largely to the gross domestic product and to GHG emissions from the land use sector. The government has recently pledged in its NDC to curb total GHG emissions by 30% by 2030. Quantifying and linking the mitigation potential of farm practices to national targets is required to support realistically the implementation of NDCs. Improvements in feed and manure management represent promising mitigation options for dairy production. This study aimed (i) to assess mitigation and food production benefits of feed and manure management scenarios, including land use changes covering Kenya’s entire dairy production region and (ii) to analyse the contribution of these practices to national targets on milk production and mitigation, and their biophysical feasibility given the availability of arable land. The results indicate that improving forage quality by increasing the use of Napier grass and supplementing dairy concentrates supports Kenya’s NDC target, reduces emission intensities by 26%–31%, partially achieves the national milk productivity target for 2030 by 38%–41%, and shows high feasibility given the availability of arable land. Covering manure heaps may reduce emissions from manure management by 68%. In contrast, including maize silage in cattle diets would not reduce emission intensities due to the risk of ten-fold higher emissions from the conversion of land required to grow additional maize. The shortage of arable land may render the implementation of these improved feed practices largely infeasible. This assessment provides the first quantitative estimates of the potential of feed intensification and manure management to mitigate GHG emissions and to increase milk yields at sectoral-level and at a high spatial resolution for an SSA country. The scientific evidence is tailored to support actual policy and decision-making processes at the national level, such as ‘Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions’. Linking feed intensification and manure management strategies with spatially-explicit estimates of mitigation and food production to national targets may help the sector to access climate financing while contributing to food security.

BackgroundSocietal pressures exist to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from farm animals, especially in beef cattle. Both total GHG and GHG emissions per unit of product decrease as productivity increases. Limitations of previous studies on GHG emissions are that they generally describe feed intake inadequately, assess the consequences of selection on particular traits only, or examine consequences for only part of the production chain. Here, we examine GHG emissions for the whole production chain, with the estimated cost of carbon included as an extra cost on traits in the breeding objective of the production system.MethodsWe examined an example beef production system where economic merit was measured from weaning to slaughter. The estimated cost of the carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2-e) associated with feed intake change is included in the economic values calculated for the breeding objective traits and comes in addition to the cost of the feed associated with trait change. GHG emission effects on the production system are accumulated over the breeding objective traits, and the reduction in GHG emissions is evaluated, for different carbon prices, both for the individual animal and the production system.ResultsMultiple-trait selection in beef cattle can reduce total GHG and GHG emissions per unit of product while increasing economic performance if the cost of feed in the breeding objective is high. When carbon price was $10, $20, $30 and $40/ton CO2-e, selection decreased total GHG emissions by 1.1, 1.6, 2.1 and 2.6% per generation, respectively. When the cost of feed for the breeding objective was low, selection reduced total GHG emissions only if carbon price was high (~ $80/ton CO2-e). Ignoring the costs of GHG emissions when feed cost was low substantially increased emissions (e.g. 4.4% per generation or ~ 8.8% in 10 years).ConclusionsThe ability to reduce GHG emissions in beef cattle depends on the cost of feed in the breeding objective of the production system. Multiple-trait selection will reduce emissions, while improving economic performance, if the cost of feed in the breeding objective is high. If it is low, greater growth will be favoured, leading to an increase in GHG emissions that may be undesirable.

Major US electric utility climate pledges have the potential to collectively reduce power sector emissions by one-third

Assessing the economic and environmental impact of freight transport sectors in Thailand using computable general equilibrium model

In this study, a comparative analysis was presented to detect the quota of urban and rural areas from total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in 26 selected countries of the Middle East and Central Asia (MECA) during 1994–2014. For this purpose, 18 independent variables such as land area, population characteristics, energy use and consumption, gross domestic product (GDP), CO2 emissions, etc., were considered in addition to one dependent variable of total GHG emissions. Statistical modeling to investigate GHG emissions was constructed comprising the quantitative procedures of the correlation test and clustering analysis, which can be considered as the fundamental basis of each econometric analysis. The GHG emissions from the urban (rural) sector of total countries in 2014 were obtained as 3313.4 (1135.6) Mt of CO2 equivalents, which is about 74.5% (25.5%) of the total GHG emissions (4449.1 Mt of CO2 equivalents) in the MECA region. The correlation test between GHG emissions and urban indicators revealed the significant records (R from 0.745 to 0.981) compared with rural indicators (R from 0.337 to 0.890). Based on the clustering analysis of the countries, Cluster A, comprised of three countries of Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey, was categorized as countries with very high contributing to the total GHG emissions in the MECA region (~ 43.3%). The quotas of emissions from urban and rural sectors in the Cluster A were estimated as 83.1% and 16.9% from the total GHG emissions in 2014 (1921.3 Mt of CO2), while the same quotas were predicted as 73.1% and 26.9% from the total GHG emissions in 2030 (1921.3 Mt of CO2). This study carried out comprehensive research on the GHG emissions from the urban and rural areas in a crucial region of the world, which is faced with the rising growth of population, urbanization, globalization, high-energy use, and fuel consumption.

This chapter assesses the latest trends in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions as well as progress of G20 economies towards both the Cancun pledges for 2020 and Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) for 2025 and 2030. The chapter is organized as follows: section 2.2 takes stock of the current global GHG emissions status and trends. Section 2.3 provides an assessment of whether G20 members are on track to meet their Cancun pledges and NDC targets, while section 2.4 summarizes recent policy developments of individual G20 economies. This section also serves as a basis for chapter 4, which explores opportunities for additional GHG emissions reductions that could be considered in the NDC update process by 2020 and beyond. Section 2.5 provides an overview of submitted long-term low emissions development strategies to date.

Quality of life for all: A sustainable development framework for India's climate policy reduces greenhouse gas emissions

Studies on the sustainability of crop production systems should consider both the carbon (C) footprint and the crop yield. Knowledge is urgently needed to estimate the C cost of maize (Zea mays L.) production in a continuous monoculture or in rotation with a leguminous crop, the popular rotation system in North America. In this study, we used a 19-year field experiment with maize under different levels of synthetic N treatments in a continuous culture or rotation with forage legume (Alfalfa or red clover; Medicago sativa L./Trifolium pratense L.) or soybean (Glycine max L. Merr) to assess the sustainability of maize production systems by estimating total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (kg CO2 eq ha−1) and the equivalent C cost of yield or C footprint (kg CO2 eq kg−1 grain). High N application increased both total GHG emissions and the C footprint across all the rotation systems. Compared to continuous maize monoculture (MM), maize following forage (alfalfa or red clover; FM) or grain (soybean; SM) legumes was estimated to generate greater total GHG emissions, however both FM and SM had a lower C footprint across all N levels due to increased productivity. When compared to MM treated with 100 kg N ha−1, maize treated with 100 kg N ha−1, following a forage legume resulted in a 5 % increase in total GHG emissions while reducing the C footprint by 17 %. Similarly, in 18 out of the 19-year period, maize treated with 100 kg N ha−1, following soybean (SM) had a minimal effect on total GHG emissions (1 %), but reduced the C footprint by 8 %. Compared to the conventional MM with the 200 kg N ha−1 treatment, FM with the 100 kg N ha−1 treatment had 40 % lower total GHG emissions and 46 % lower C footprint. Maize with 100 kg N ha−1 following soybean had a 42 % lower total GHG emissions and 41 % lower C footprint than MM treated with 200 kg N ha−1. Clearly, there was a trade-off among total GHG emissions, C footprint and yield, and yield and GHG emissions or C footprint not linearly related. Our data indicate that maize production with 100 kg N ha−1 in rotation with forage or grain legumes can maintain high productivity while reducing GHG emissions and the C footprint when compared to a continuous maize cropping system with 200 kg N ha−1.

Are the G20 economies making enough progress to meet their NDC targets?

Climate-smart livestock production at landscape level in Kenya