BC emission inventories

Emissions inventories and systems that facilitate and ensure reporting of national inventory data provide both a baseline for developing emissions reduction targets and a transparent gauge for monitoring individual and collective progress toward those targets.

The EUA-BCA technical report Review of Reporting Systems for National Black Carbon Emissions Inventories (EUABCA 2019b) provided a basis for the development of this area of action. The report highlighted that many EU-, Arctic Council- and Air Convention countries are reporting national black carbon emissions. While the level of emission reporting is encouraging, the report concluded that there is substantial room for improvement. Several potentially significant emitters, whose emissions impact the Arctic, do not report black carbon emissions data to the respective institutions of the Air Convention and the Arctic Council. Furthermore, the report identified transparency, consistency, comparability, completeness and accuracy issues in the inventories that have been reported.

The six suggested actions identified within this area of action identify opportunities through which the international exchange of national black carbon emissions inventories can be improved. From the perspective of the Arctic, the ultimate long-term goal to be strived for in terms of black carbon emissions reporting is: Regular compilation and reporting of national black carbon inventories which are of high quality in terms of transparency, consistency, comparability, completeness and accuracy by all countries whose black carbon emissions (significantly) impact the Arctic.

Actions 2.1 to 2.3 highlight paths along which the number of countries that compile and report black carbon emissions inventories can be increased, while Actions 2.4 to 2.6 have been developed to increase transparency, consistency, comparability, completeness and accuracy of reported black carbon inventories. It is, however, important to note that certain components may contribute to more than one action and thus contribute to both increasing the number of countries reporting black carbon and increasing the quality of reported emissions