全球智库信息集成服务系统

An effective climate change strategy for a country, corporation, or facility requires a detailed understanding of GHG emissions sources, quantities, and trends over time. An inventory is the tool to provide such information. It allows both governments and companies to take into account their emissions-related risks and opportunities and focus efforts on mitigation activities that can produce the greatest GHG reductions.

National inventories and corporate/facility inventories each fulfill unique roles: for example, while the former track a country’s total emissions, the latter allow individual companies or facilities to assess their emissions performance. Further, corporate/ facility reporting programs can provide localized information on the most significant emissions sources and emissions trends. Despite important differences in category definitions, methodology, and other elements, governments interested in developing (or enhancing) a national inventory system and corporate/facility reporting program should seek to capitalize on possible linkages between the two systems. In this paper, we have identified two potential areas for linkages: (1) integrating source data into the national system to improve completeness and accuracy; and (2) sharing institutional resources, technical expertise, and data systems to build on existing capacities and get the most from limited resources.

Proactively identifying and exploiting these and potential other linkages between national inventory and corporate/ facility reporting systems can bring enhanced benefits, such as greater consistency across national datasets, formalizing the role of data from corporate/facility inventory systems in the national inventory system, and maximizing data collected and analyzed. Establishing such linkages will continue to be critical in improving the quality of inventories, increasing their utility for mitigation strategies, and reducing emissions at both the national and corporate/facility level.