The Dilemma With Voluntary Carbon Footprint Offsetting: A Case Study in Options, Benefits, Costs and Decision Factors to Address Reducing Pollutant Emissions, Or Greenhouse Gases -- Or Both

This presentation describes a case study that examines the difficulties encountered in analyzing the options, benefits, costs and other factors involved with making a decision to reduce the carbon footprint from pollutant emissions, greenhouse gases or both.  Illustrations are provided to show the outcomes of several options for consideration, and highlight the additional complexities involved with these decisions if the reductions are to be used for generating tradable emission reduction credits.  While the case study is based on an analysis of a group of refuse truck fleets totaling 1000 vehicles operating in a major West Coast metropolitan area, the same principles apply to analyzing any other type of energy-consuming function in building operations, industrial processes, power production, etc.

Major points addressed in the presentation include:

•  Defining baseline operations for initial inventory development – the importance of a quality data collection process.
• Defining the boundary conditions for determining GHG emissions – within and outside of the “sphere of control”.
• Methods for calculating and measuring fuel consumption and GHG emissions – use and limitations of energy use and emission inventory models; accuracy in measuring fuel use.
• Identifying potential GHG and pollutant emission reduction options and their costs – dealing with the dilemma: reducing GHGs, pollutant emissions, or both.
• Factors to consider in selecting GHG reduction options – impacts on cost, maintenance and operations, useful life, and technology extinction factors.
• Characteristics of GHG inventory and reduction data for use in credit/trading/sales – meeting the credibility requirements; where does quantification of the “business as usual” baseline end, and measurement of the reduction strategy begin?