Carbon neutrality. What should be done to achieve the goal? What are the indicators to monitor?

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Carbon neutrality. What should be done to achieve the goal? What are the indicators to monitor?

Created February 07, 2012 by George Rybakov 简体中文 Русский

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I suggest you the following steps: 1) Identify you carbon emissions (fuel, electricity, heat use, indirect emissions) eg. by using GHG Protocol, which is widely used method 2) Consider possibilities to save energy and improve energy efficiency 3) Consider possibilities to replace fossil based energy sources by renewables 4) If there is still emissions left, you can off-set emissions by buing carbon credits from projects that reduce emissions elsewhere Juha Vanhanen

February 08, 2012 by Juha Vanhanen 简体中文 Русский

The issue concerns the new governmental programme which states carbon neutrality or 80% reduction of the emmissions till 2050. With respect to the measures you have mentioned, how do you think would that be enough? Are these measures exhaustive in terms of and for State's sake? What sectors must be taken into account?

February 08, 2012 by George Rybakov 简体中文 Русский

In addition, would be interesting to discuss how do you think the government could encourage the enterprises to investigate and track their carbon footprint. For example, companies at all levels could be 'rewarded' in some way for documenting and sharing their carbon footprint information (concerning all their products, services and activities). No doubts that based on LCA and GHG Protocol companies could easily cope with that problem, however, this is time and resources demanding issue. So, companies (those which are not obliged to track eCO2 emissions) in different sectors need a positive incentive.

February 08, 2012 by George Rybakov 简体中文 Русский

There are various ways of promoting tracking and reduction of emissions. One could for example use tax incentives like tax reductions or rebates, or give direct support to the companies offering services or products for the mentioned actions and in that way reduce the costs for the client. The spectrum of various support schemes is wide and thus if there is a will, the available toolbox is big. If a nation wants to become carbon neutral in a short to medium term, they would need to buy carbon credits from the markets. Naturally they could first take steps 1-3 to reduce the emissions as low as possible, however, reaching zero level is difficult: one might find a way to reduce emissions from larger emission sources like power sector and heavy industry, however, sectors like transportation, agriculture and waste management are problematic as then we are talking about high number of relatively small emission sources. Thus we for example would need a totally new infrastructure for transportation.

February 08, 2012 by Jussi Nykanen 简体中文 Русский

Well, I think that carbon credits is useful but vicious practice in a long-run. One could simply buy a forest somewhere in South America (also limit access to this forest for the local people) and by, so to say, “preserving” it have lots of credits but, actually, doing nothing positive towards CO2 reduction in his/her own country. So, despite the fact that credits is a working mechanism this is the way to nowhere because it does not lead to a true CO2 reduction. But, again, now it works efficiently World wide and is predicted to grow drastically. Another very remarkable point that you have mentioned is a Zero CO2 level (say neutral level – balanced with natural sinks etc.). With respect to the emission sources that you have mentioned, I agree that it is more likely to find a solution for heavy industries but the problem might come from a vast number of small and medium sized sources. Finnish statistics reports that all in all these sources in the pie account for about 30% (http://ec.europa.eu/energy/publications/doc/statistics/ext_co2_emissions_by_sector.pdf). Quite huge share, isn’t it? I think that in that situation there are opportunities for the env.consultants to cope with that issue to provide these enterprises with the appropriate services (e.g. CO2 audit and monitoring as the first step) which finally could give us the overall picture of emissions in a sector, region or even country. There are various tools for different sectors and purposes but what do you think about an integrated/unified tool for CO2 auditing and monitoring?

February 09, 2012 by George Rybakov 简体中文 Русский

George said: "So, despite the fact that credits is a working mechanism this is the way to nowhere because it does not lead to a true CO2 reduction." It is not the fault of emission trading system but the lack of global emission reduction target. Global emission ceiling and global price of CO2 would definitely lead to a true CO2 reduction, and what is best, with the most cost-efficient measures. I think we need a real global solution to global problems like climate change. EU's share of global GHG emissions are 11 % and declining, so there is a limit how far we can go with our unilateral emission reduction policy. The additional costs are getting too high and global emissions are still increasing... Global climate deal would also boost the cleantech market, which would be an advantage for Finnish companies and for their high-quality products/services/know-how.

February 09, 2012 by Mikael Ohlstrom 简体中文 Русский

Finnish share in the Global CO2 pie is just around 0,2% - very liitle. But this is more about Finnish attitude to the problem even if Finland itself does not emit that much, meaning that there are more than 100 other countries of the same emission rate. Why don't they do the same (carbon neutrality). Here we close to the USA and China. The troubled children or the wise elders? I think that with the current state of Global development, population and thinking all attempts to arrange a Global climate deal are useless. So ... what is left - to act locally.

February 10, 2012 by George Rybakov 简体中文 Русский

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