a comparative study of carbon footprint and assessment standards

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A comparative study of carbon footprintand assessment standards

Tao Gao*, Qing Liu and Jianping Wang

Institute of Project Management, School of Mechanics and Civil Engineering, ChinaUniversity of Mining and Technology, Xuzhou, China

*Corresponding author:

[email protected]

AbstractThis paper focuses on the research methods and steps involved in carrying out studies on different typesof carbon footprints. Furthermore, a comparative study of different carbon footprint assessmentstandards was carried out to identify their similarities, differences and deficiencies. Goals, principles,research boundaries, calculation methods, data selection and other aspects of organizations footprint andproduct carbon footprint were analysed, respectively. Organizations carbon footprint assessmentstandardsISO14064 and Greenhouse Gas (GHG) protocol and product carbon footprint assessmentstandardsPAS2050, TSQ0010, ISO14047 and Product and Supply Chain GHG Protocol were analysedcomparatively. The selection of GHG, system settings, quantification and carbon footprint, selection ofdate and treatment of specific emissions are the most important part of the study of the carbon footprintand assessment standards, especially for organizations and products. Guidelines had been made on theseissues from existing assessment standards, but further improvement is still needed.

Keywords: carbon footprint; carbon emissions; assessment standards; comparative study

Received 28 February 2013; revised 23 April 2013; accepted 24 April 2013

1 INTRODUCTION

Global warming is a fact, and evolves into a full range of issues ofpolitics, economy, society, technology, environment and ecology ona global scale from a single scientific problem [1]. It becomes one ofthe tremendous challenges for human being. Global warming and aseries of problems have aroused intense concerns of the internation-al community. A series of international conventions like the UnitedNations Framework Convention on Climate Change (1992), TheKyoto Protocol (1997), Bali roadmap (2007), CopenhagenAgreement (2009) were signed, which reflect the determinationand efforts by the government in response to global warming.According to consensus, countries have made commitments toemission reductions and action plan. Thus, the innovative conceptsof low-carbon economy, low-carbon city, low-carbon life, carbontrade, carbon tax, means to reduce carbon emissions become theimportant development strategy of the whole world. Relatedresearch studies were carried out by governments, organizations andresearchers on the economic, social and other aspects, and all thestakeholders are trying to find a low-carbon development path.

Current research studies on the low-carbon issue, focused onemissions accounting and reduction, carbon emissions tradingplatform, carbon tax and carbon emission policy [2][3][4][5],

have made a lot of achievements. The carbon footprint and as-sessment standard is one of the most basic and crucial researchin low-carbon research. However, due to this issue consistentresults have not been achieved yet, and hence, concerned re-search were greatly affected. Research on the carbon footprintand assessment standards has become a hot topic for govern-ments and researchers.

This paper focuses on the research methods and steps involvedin carrying out studies on different types of carbon footprints.Furthermore, a comparative study of different carbon footprintassessment standards was carried out to identify their similarities,differences and deficiencies.

2 BACKGROUND

2.1 Concept of carbon footprintsThe carbon footprint originates from the concept of ecologicalfootprint, which is a measure of human demand on the Earthsecosystems. It is a standardized measure of demand for naturalcapital that may be contrasted with the planets ecological cap-acity to regenerate. It represents the amount of biologically pro-ductive land and sea area necessary to supply the resources a

International Journal of Low-Carbon Technologies 2014, 9, 237243# The Author 2013. Published by Oxford University Press.This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/ .0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. For commercial re-use,please contact [email protected]:10.1093/ijlct/ctt041 Advance Access Publication 25 June 2013 237

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human population consumes, and to assimilate the associatedwaste. Using this assessment, it is possible to estimate how muchof the Earth (or how many planet Earths) it would take tosupport humanity if everybody followed a given lifestyle.

However, a widely accepted and concrete definition of a carbonfootprint does not exist at present. But the notion of what a foot-print is does exist. A mostly recognized concept was proposed byWiedmann et al.: the carbon footprint is a measure of the totalamount of carbon dioxide emissions directly and indirectly causedby an activity or accumulated over the life stages of a product.Meanwhile, the carbon footprint is a measure of carbon dioxideemissions [6][7].

2.2 Classifications and methods of carbonfootprintsThe carbon footprint mainly applies to personal, products, orga-nizations, cities and countries, etc [6][7][8]. A personal carbonfootprint is carbon dioxide emissions caused by each personsclothing, food, housing and traffic of daily life. A product carbonfootprint measures the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions over theentire life of a product (goods or services), from the extraction ofraw materials and manufacturing right through to its use and thefinal re-use, recycling or disposal. An organizational carbon foot-print measures the GHG emissions from all the activities acrossthe organization, including energy used in buildings, industrialprocesses and company vehicles. A country carbon footprintfocuses on carbon dioxide emissions in the entire country gener-ated by the overall consumption of materials and energy, vegeta-tion and other carbon sequestrations, as well as the indirect anddirect emissions caused by import and export activities, toanalyse the carbon dioxide emissions of the entire country.

Different footprint boundaries of person, product, organiza-tion and country are illustrated in Figure 1. Meanwhile, there aresome crossovers among the four types. For example, the produc-tion process itself is part of the product life cycle, but would alsobe included in the organizational footprint [9].

The methods used to determine the carbon footprint shouldnot be specified in the definition. It is only necessary that themethod satisfactorily meets the requirements of the definition.So a carbon footprint can be analysed for various different func-tional units at different scales and using different methods.There are three principal methods to calculate carbon emissions:inputoutput (IO) analysis [10][11][12][13], life-cycle assess-ment (LCA) [14][15] and IOLCA.

The method depends on a functional unit via scale in practice(Figure 2) [16]. Consumer products prefer bottom-up LCA,while studies at the national level would apply top-down IO ana-lysis. Hybrid methods which combine the strength of both LCAand IOA are an active area of research and are being increasinglyused in practice.

2.3 Assessment standards of carbon footprintsIn order to make the results of carbon emissions accountingcomparable, governments and international organizations, suchas the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), theWorld Resources Institute (WRI), the World Business Council forSustainable Development (WBCSD) and the British StandardsInstitution (BSI), have introduced different kinds of carbon foot-print assessment standards mainly for organizations and productsthrough a large number of research studies since the end of thelast century. After years of development, a higher awareness of as-sessment standards of carbon footprint, such as ISO14064, GHGProtocol, PAS2050, has been created. Implementation of thesestandards played a huge role in promoting global carbon emissionreduction.

However, there are still many problems in the application ofthese standards, such as carbon emissions accounting methodsare uniform. The boundary definition is unscientific, and carbonemission factors are uncertain. These issues need further researchand analysis, especially in organization and product fields.

3 ORGANIZATIONAL CARBON FOOTPRINTAND ASSESSMENT STANDARDS

3.1 Organizational carbon footprintAn organizational carbon footprint refers to the direct and in-direct carbon dioxide emissions generated within the rangedefined by the organizations (enterprises or projects)

Figure 1. Different carbon footprint boundaries of person, product, organization

and country. Figure 2. Applications and corresponding methods of the carbon footprint.

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themselves. The results of assessment can only focus on thecarbon emissions inventory of sources and information ofgreenhouse gas emissions can also be a complete carbon inven-tory report to public carbon footprints of organizations.

Currently, a terminal consumption analysis method based onthe IO analysis is the major method for organizational carbonfootprint evaluation. The key steps in calculating an organiza-tional carbon footprint are shown in Figure 3:

(1) Defining organizational boundaries: It is an important pro-cedure to set clear, explicit boundaries on which parts of theorganization are included in the organizational carbon foot-print. Meanwhile, an organization may comprise one ormore facilities, which usually apply control and equity shareapproaches to consolidate facility-level GHG emissions andremovals at the organization level.

(2) Establishing operational boundaries: The operationalboundary determines which emission sources will be quan-tified. It should include the full range of emissions fromactivities under operational control. All material Scope 1and 2 emissions should be included, but Scope 3 emissionscan be chosen to include [14]. (Scopes 1, 2 and 3 are shownin Figure 2).

(3) Calculating carbon footprint: The accuracy of the footprintrelies on collating consumption data for all of the emissionsources within the established boundary. It is important toclarify any gaps in the data and list any assumptions thathave been made in calculating the footprint. The carbonfootprint is typically calculated using activity data collatedmultiplied by standard emissions factors, although there areother calculation methods, such as calculation of the use ofmodels or measurement.

(4) Reporting and verifying: Organizations should prepare areport to facilitate inventory verification, participation in aGHG program, or to inform external or internal users.Meanwhile, a third-party verification of carbon footprintwas suggested to be carried out, to add credibility and confi-dence to carbon reporting for public disclosure.

3.2 Assessment standards of an organizationalcarbon footprintThe GHG Protocol, a collaboration of the WRI and the WBCSDin 2004, provides the foundation for sustainable climate strat-egies and more efficient, resilient and profitable organizations.The standards follow an inclusive, consensus-based multi-stakeholder process with balanced participation from businesses,government agencies, non-governmental organizations and aca-demic institutions around the world. For organizations (corpor-ate, project), they introduced The GHG Protocol: A corporateaccounting and reporting standard (2004). It provides sector-specific and general calculation tools and deals with the quanti-fication of GHG reductions, resulting due to the adoption ofmitigation methods in its project protocol [17].

In March 2006, ISO released the ISO14064 standard, which is aninternational standard for the determination of boundaries, quanti-fication, mitigation and removal, used to guide the government andcompanies to measure and control the GHG emissions, as well ascarbon trading, and got awide range of global consensus [18].

3.3 Comparative analysis of organizational carbonfootprint assessment standardsBoth GHG Protocol and ISO14064 provide requirements forquantifying the GHG impact of an organization, while harmon-ization on all qualification methodologies was sought during thedevelopment of both standards, some minor differences doremain. Table 1 provides the details of each aspect of the meth-odologies, the differences between them and estimates whetherthe difference may affect the final result.

By comparative analysis of the two organizations carbonfootprint assessment standards, some differences can be seen.The GHG Protocol is the first standard for corporate GHG emis-sions evaluation. As a voluntary initiative, the GHG Protocolnot only pays attention to the procedure of analysis, while agreater emphasis on analysis results, which are utilized for emis-sions reduction and carbon trading. As an international stand-ard, ISO14064, formed on the basis of the GHG Protocol, isfocused on the guiding, framework and the certification process.So, it is mainly used for corporate GHG accounting certificationto reflect the corporate social responsibility.

Both of the standards select the six GHGs in the KyotoProtocol. For the setting of the system boundaries, two standardshave the same organizational boundary settings; the differenceis the settings of the operational boundary. As for the quantiza-tion of carbon footprint, the two standards are given several dif-ferent quantization methods. However, the quantization basedon GHG activity data multiplied by GHG emission or removalfactors is recommended and widely used. Meanwhile, owing toseveral complementary standards had been published, such as theGHG Protocol for Project Accounting (2005), Land Use, Land-UseChange and Forestry Guidance for GHG Project Accounting(2006), Guidelines for Quantifying GHG Reductions fromGrid-Connected Electricity Projects (2007) and Corporate Scope3 (value chain) Accounting and Reporting (2011), the selectionFigure 3. Assessment procedures of the organizational carbon footprint.

Carbon footprint and assessment standards

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and collection of GHG activity data and emission factors aremore clear and operational when using the GHG Protocol.These complementary standards also provide a specific and op-erational guidance especially to system boundaries defined,quantization of GHG emission and carbon footprint assessmentof specific industries, such as the power industry.

4. PRODUCT CARBON FOOTPRINT ANDASSESSMENT STANDARDS

4.1 Product carbon footprintA product carbon footprint is carbon dioxide emissions causedby products (goods or services) in its life cycle. To achieve this,an LCA method is needed to enhance the credibility and con-venience of carbon footprint calculation. ISO releasedISO14040/44 standards, developed frameworks and steps for theenvironmental management standard assessment with the LCAmethod in 1996.

Currently, LCA analysis is the major method for projectcarbon footprint evaluation. The key steps in calculating aproduct carbon footprint are shown in Figure 4:

(1) Product life cycle analysis: it is an essential procedure forcarrying out the product life cycle analysis to identify allmaterials, activities and processes that contribute to the

chosen products life cycle. To perform a product life cycleanalysis, start by breaking down the selected products func-tional unit into its constituent parts. Focus on the most sig-nificant inputs first, and identify their respective inputs,manufacturing processes, storage conditions and transportrequirements.

(2) Defining system boundary: the relevant boundaries for thecarbon footprint analysis must be determined after product

Figure 4. Assessment procedures of the product carbon footprint.

Table 1. Contrastive analysis of the GHG Protocol and ISO14064.

ISO14064 GHG protocol

Essential information

Publisher ISO WBCSD&WRI

Date 2006 2004, 2011 (revise)

Type Official official

Availability Instructional operability

Property International standard Voluntary initiatives standard

Objects Organizations Organizations

Applications Mainly used in industry enterprises Various industries, governments, (NGOs), carbon trading platform

Goal, scope and principle

Goal Specifies principles and requirements for the design, development, management, reporting and verification of an organizations GHG

inventory.

Principle Essentially the same drawing on ISO 14044, including relevance, completeness, consistency, accuracy and transparency.

GHG Six GHGs in the Kyoto Protocol

GWP The second report of IPCC (1996)

System boundary

Organizational

boundary

Same methods to consolidate organization facility-level GHG emissions and removals: by control or by equity share.

Operation

boundary

Both divide the whole emissions to three parts: direct emission, energy indirect emission and other indirect emissions.

Energy indirect emission was denoted as indirect emissions from the

generation of imported electricity, heat or steam consumed by the

organization.

Energy indirect emission was denoted as indirect emissions only

from the generation of imported electricity consumed by the

organization.

Quantification

Quantization

method

Calculation, detection, combination of detection and calculation.

Mainly use GHG activity data multiplied by GHG emission or removal

factors

Refer to emission factors and direct monitoring, as well as

cross-industry tools and industry-specific tools.

Double counting Not expected The method was proposed to avoid double counting

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life cycle analysis had been done to determine which unitprocesses shall be included within the product carbon foot-print study.

(3) Calculating carbon footprint: The accuracy of the footprintrelies on collating consumption data for all of the emissionsources within the system boundary of the entire life cycle ofproduct. The key point in collecting data include materialamounts, activities and emission factors across all life cyclestages. Calculated based on the carbon footprint equationmay ensure that all input, output and waste are included,without missing.

(4) Reporting and communication: Organizations shouldprepare a report to report the results of the quantification ofthe product carbon footprint and the achievement of thegoal and scope and to demonstrate that the provisions ofthis standard have been followed. Meanwhile, communica-tion may take the form of a declaration, a label, a claim, areport or a performance tracking report based on productcarbon footprint standards.

4.2 Assessment standards of a product carbonfootprintThe British Standards Institution, Carbon Trust and Departmentfor Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) published aPublicly Available Specification (PAS) to specify requirementsbased on LCA and Product Category Rules (PCRs) for assessingthe life cycle GHG emissions of goods and services in 2008(revised in 2011) [19].

In April 2009, The Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade andIndustry issued a Technical Specification TSQ0010 Generalprinciples for the assessment and labeling of Carbon Footprintof Products, after a carbon footprint trial project and the criteriafor developing CF PCRs were released in March 2009.

The WBCSD and WRI develop a standard under their GHGProtocol Product/Supply Chain Initiative: A Product Life CycleAccounting and Reporting Standard [20], meanwhile, issued aCorporate Accounting and Reporting Standard Guidelines forValue Chain (Scope 3) Accounting and Reporting as a comple-mentary standard.

Since 2007, ISO started developing an international standardISO 14067 on the Carbon Footprint of Products (Part 1: quanti-fication and Part 2: communication), and there is already a pro-posal for a standard on the Carbon Footprint of Organizations.Businesses can use the standard to assess the carbon footprint ofits products throughout the life cycle; the carbon footprint of in-formation can be used for internal management or external an-nouncement and exchange [21]. The international standard isexpected to be formally promulgated in 2013.

4.3 Comparative analysis of product carbonfootprint assessment standardsThe four standards provide principles and requirements forquantifying the GHG impact of a product; while methodologies

and procedures of the four standards are similar, there are stillsome differences. Table 2 shows the details of each aspect of themethodologies, the differences among the four standards.

By comparison of the four product carbon footprint assess-ment standards, we can see that the core content of the studyand application of product carbon footprint assessment stan-dards are still concentrated on greenhouse gas choice, system set-tings, quantification and carbon footprint and treatment ofspecific emissions and removals and other aspects.

Six GHGs in the Kyoto Protocol were selected in the fourstandards. GHG and ISO can be applied to both B2B andB2Ccarbon footprint assessment, and TS-Q0010 only applies toB2C carbon footprint assessment. The PCR, as outlined in ISO14025, was preferentially recommended to settle the systemboundaries by the four standards.

Four standards gave different methods to the quantizationproduct carbon footprint, but quantization based on GHG ac-tivity data multiplied by GHG emission or removal factors issuggested and most widely used. Activity data and emissionfactors can come from either primary or secondary sources.Primary data come from direct measurements on products lifecycle, while secondary data refer to external measurements thatare not specific to the product, but rather represent an averageor general measurement of similar processes or materials,usually find in types of databases, such as multi-sector life cycledatabases, industry-specific databases and country-specific datasources.

In order to get an accurate study of product carbon footprint,researchers and organizations paid more attention to specificemissions and removals, such as land use change, delayed emis-sions, renewable power resources and carbon storage. Treatmentsof specific emissions and removals are given in the four standards,although the approach is different and not complete.

The PAS2050, TSQ0010 and Product Life Cycle Accountingand Reporting Standard have been officially released. Most ofthe existing carbon footprint assessment cases are carried outbased on the PAS2050 assessment standard, while TSQ0010 stan-dards are only used in Japan and the applications of Product LifeCycle Accounting and Reporting Standard have just begun. Thesethree standards are mainly used in the food, drinks, drinks, cloth-ing, cosmetics and other areas of life. At the same time, combinedwith the existing assessment standards, ISO is being prepared forISO14047, which is expected to be released in 2013.

5 CONCLUSION

The carbon footprint has started becoming synonymous to acomprehensive GHG account, over the life cycle stages of anyproduct or activity. The carbon footprint study is the basis oflow-carbon research. The carbon footprint has been commercia-lized and is being utilized by organizations to count themselvesand their products carbon and adopt measures to cut downemissions, to meet the green consumer expectations of consu-mers or governmental request, and provides enormous




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opportunities to encourage enterprises to improve productionefficiency and reduce resource consumption and waste, andpromote the development of innovation and technology, to helpopen new business opportunities, and promote corporate socialresponsibility and achieve sustainable development.

However, as carbon footprint reports are increasing in re-sponse to business and legal requirements, most of the calcula-tions are following the GHG protocol and PAS worldwide. Sinceit has been extended to cover the natural system as well, itbecomes essential to deal with the unavoidable emissions. Thetype of GHG, system settings, quantification and carbon

footprint, selection of date and treatment of specific emissionsare the most important part of the study of the carbon footprintand assessment standards, especially for organizations and pro-ducts. Guidelines had been made on these issues from existingassessment standards, but it still needs further improvement.Because carbon emission has been commercialized, and hasbeen found to influence businesses, legal guidelines are neces-sary to guide and monitor these calculations, so that enterpriseand their products carbon footprint analysis will be included inthe decision-making stage. Meanwhile, as the strong measuresand tools for the global problem of climate warm, research of

Table 2. Contrastive analysis of assessment standards of product carbon footprint.

PAS 2050 TS-Q 0010 Product Life Cycle Accounting and

Reporting Standard

ISO14047 (As far as known)

Essential information

Organization BSI JIS WBCSD&WRI ISO

Date 2008, 2011 2009 2011 Expected to release in 2013

Type version Official version Official version Official version CD edition

Operating

availability

Operability Operability Operability Instructional

Properties Open standard Technical regulation Voluntary initiatives International standard

Objects Product/serve

User fields Mainly used in foods, drinks,

clothing and cosmetics, etc. on a

global scale

Mainly used in foods and

consumer goods in Japan

Mainly used in foods, drinks and

cosmetics, etc. on a global scale

Goal, scope and principles

GHG Six GHGs in the Kyoto Protocol

GWP Fourth report of IPCC (2007)

System boundary

System boundary B2B&B2C B2C B2B&B2C B2B&B2C

Use phase Obligatory; disclose use profile; Included Cradle to Gate or Cradle to Grave

if product is supplied to the

consumer

Included

Allocation System boundary expansion;

Economic Spec. rules for EoL

Preference for PCR Adapted from ISO 14044, 4.3.4.2 Adapted from ISO 14044, 4.3.4.2

Cut off rules 1% of GHG emissions; 95%

complete

5% of GHG emissions (to be

discussed more)

Significance as principle; 80%

complete

Adapted from ISO 14044:2006,

4.2.3.3.3

Quantification

Function unit Preference for PCR

Data quality Specific rules Specific rules Pedigree matrix Pedigree matrix

Data type No IO data, transparent process data Prefer process data, but IO data

are acceptable if there are no

process data.

Prefer process data, but IO data are

acceptable if there are no process

data.

Prefer process data, but IO data are

acceptable if there are no process

data.

Quantization

method

Preference for quantization based on GHG activity data multiplied by GHG emission or removal factors.

Treatment of specific emissions and removals

Capital goods Excluded Excluded Relevance criterion Relevance criterion

Reduction Code of practice require reporting Could be included, if both CFP

are certified.

Important aim, not many rules Not specified

Land use change Describes procedure and provides

default soil emissions per country

Not specified Proposal to use PAS2050 Proposal to use IPCC guidelines for

National GHG inventories

Carbon storage Provides calculation method Not specified Major discussion point, probably

included

Probably included

Delayed emissions Describes calculation method Not specified Major discussion point, Probably

included

Probably included

Renewable power

resources

Describes additionality and double

counting in renewable electricity

generation

Can be included if it is paid as

actual cost

Not specified Not specified

Reporting and communication

Communication Not included in PAS, but in the Code

of practice

Adapted from ISO 14025 Not for comparison Adapted from ISO 14025

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carbon footprint and assessment standards need to be carriedout within the global scope, to solve problems such as carbonleakage and border-tax adjustments .

FUNDING

This work was supported by Soft Science Research Projects ofMinistry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development of thePeoples Republic of China (No. 2011-R1-15) and Humanitiesand Social Sciences Fund of Ministry of Education of thePeoples Republic of China (No. 11YJCZH125).

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a comparative study of carbon footprint and assessment standards

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