Carbon Footprinting: Methodological Approaches, Challenges & Opportunities Simon Aum ô nier Environmental Resources

1. Carbon Footprinting:Methodological Approaches, Challenges & OpportunitiesSimon AumônierEnvironmental Resources Management4 October 2007

2. Outline • What does a carbon footprint measure and report? • How do we go about footprinting? • Sources of uncertainty • Data and assumptions • What resolution is fit for purpose? • Beyond carbon?

3. Everything Has A Carbon Footprint • Person • Product • New product formulation • Service • Business or organisation • Project • Choices/alternatives • Hotspots • Opportunities for benefit

4. What Does A Carbon Footprint Measure? • The WBCSD / WRI GHG Accounting Protocol: • a ‘basket’ of greenhouse gases • both direct and indirect scopes for reporting

5. Storage & Retail Storage & Consumption INDIRECT Retail Transport Production Distribution Transport Disposal DIRECT Raw Materials The Carbon Footprint and the Value Chain • The product life cycle is a series of ‘direct footprints’ • Controlling one single direct footprint can lead to ‘burden shifting’ and may be counter-productive or not cost-effective

6. Direct Emissions • Where regulation affects the business • Under a business’ direct control • Most obvious link to costs associated with energy consumption • Data generally available • electricity consumption • fuel consumption • refrigerant use • A small part of the overall product footprint

7. Indirect Footprinting • Business interacts with environment across the supply chain, not just its direct activities • Indirect footprinting calculates all of the GHG emissions associated with a product, process or service activity, including: • raw materials extraction; processing; manufacturing; retail; use; and disposal • At each stage, natural resources are consumed and GHGs are released into the atmosphere = a ‘carbon footprint’

8. Calculating a Carbon Footprint Map the product life cycle Identify and quantify inputs and outputs at each stage Source data to describe greenhouse gas (CO2 equiv) impacts for each input and output Balance mapped flows (inputs and outputs) to reflect one unit of product Multiply flows by greenhouse gas impacts to generate a carbon footprint (expressed in CO2 equiv)

9. What Methods Already Exist? • The WBCSD/WRI Protocol • Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) • ISO 14040 and 14044 – full LCA is peer reviewed • ‘streamlined’ or simplified LCA • Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) • Input/Output Analysis • The Carbon Trust method • The emerging BSI PAS 2050 • Web-based footprinting tools

10. 0.2% 10% End of life Retail and use 22% 68% Processing and packaging Carbon Footprint of a Food Product • Total footprint = 7.3 kg CO2 equivalents per 500g of product Production and transport of raw materials

11. Carbon Footprint of a Textile Product

12. Footprinting Challenges • Access to specific data – particularly with complex supply chains and manufacturing facilities • Which generic data sets (electricity etc.)? • Temporal boundaries • do we footprint for 2006/07, or 2007/08… and revise how often? • No two products actually have the same footprint • Equivalence – where ‘like’ products differ • Interpretation, reporting and communication

13. Further Sources of Uncertainty • Complexity in raw materials sourcing • Seasonality • Variation in the performance of equipment • from line to line, site to site, country to country… • Soil carbon sink issues • Direct emissions from livestock • Consumer and post-consumer behaviours (cooking, waste disposal etc.)

14. Data and Assumptions • Old data • Data in Input/Output models - the basis of some carbon footprints - is already 12 years out of date • ‘Allocation’ • how can emissions from a source shared by 2 or more products be fairly distributed? • Data collection is time-consuming (and expensive) • The greater the resolution required, the more onerous the exercise, and the more frequently it must be repeated

15. What Resolution is Fit for Purpose? • Trying to inform? • the footprint directs supply chain improvement • Seeking to communicate with consumers? • the challenge is in labelling as much as footprinting • Attempting to discriminate between products? • can we deal with the sources of error? • can we manage ‘equivalence’? • Looking to compete between brands? • can the numbers stand up to challenge?

16. What Do We Find? • Food miles are misleading • transport is often insignificant • air transport isn’t always bad • Non CO2 emissions are important in food and drink products • N2O and CH4 from soils and animals • these are highly uncertain • Streamlined approaches sufficient to identify hotspots and inform improvement • Peer review allows flexibility (prescription doesn’t)

17. Beyond Carbon • Climate change is the most significant environmental threat that we must deal with • But: • resource depletion • toxicological effects (human and ecosystem) • water pollution (nutrification) • social and landuse impacts… • There will be a trade-off, and society will continue to emit greenhouse gases

18. Opportunities and Conclusions • Consumer, City and retailer demand emerging • First mover advantage – a value for carbon • Cost reduction through energy, material and logistic efficiencies across the supply chain • Climate stability • Footprinting is achievable, deliverable and valuable • …but it’s subject to many sources of error • Labelling is either: • broadly indicative, expensive or inaccurate