Measurement and Performance Tracking in Developing Countries

This blog post was co-authored with Soffia Alarcon-Diaz, an intern with WRI's Climate and Energy program.

Measuring and reporting greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) across different sectors is no easy feat. But creating a national inventory of GHGs is one important step for countries to take toward managing them. Starting in 2014, many developing countries will begin providing more frequent updates to their national inventories under guidelines from the COP 17 Durban Platform. How can they best meet international reporting requirements and, more importantly, use the development of their national inventory systems to support domestic low-carbon growth?

In a new set of case studies (see the text box) we have documented experiences from Brazil, Colombia, India, Mexico, and South Africa—countries that have already made notable efforts to develop robust national inventory systems. Each study explores critical aspects of these countries’ inventory processes and provides lessons that could benefit other countries looking to further develop their own systems.

3 Attributes of Successful National Greenhouse Gas Inventories

Although each national inventory system is unique, the case studies reveal several common attributes of successful inventory improvement. Here are three:

At WRI, we like to say that “you can’t manage what you can’t measure.” For managing and mitigating climate change, one of the most fundamental measurements is a periodic inventory of the problem’s root cause: greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from human activities.

GHG emissions inventories are carried out at several levels, including corporate, city, and state. Measuring emissions for entire nations has its unique challenges, but it’s a critical first step for any country that wants to effectively manage its contribution to global climate change. National GHG inventories provide a baseline of data and, if regularly updated, a tracking mechanism for assessing how domestic policies impact emissions.

In recent years, several developing countries, with support from donor agencies, have begun to seriously consider Low Emissions Development Strategies (LEDS), country-driven plans that enable the transition to a low-carbon economy as an effective mechanism for combating climate change. Last week, the LEDS Global Partnership – launched in early 2011 and comprised of 30 governmental and international institutions – held a workshop on the topic in Chesham, U.K. WRI is a member of the steering committee of the LEDS Global Partnership and attended the meeting. Others in attendance included government representatives, donors, and representatives from research institutions.

The workshop focused on three key themes: (1) strategy development for LEDS, including governance of the LEDS process and integration of LEDS into other national plans; (2) analytics and tools for LEDS; and (3) financing LEDS implementation. Highlights included discussions on: LEDS scenario development in Chile and South Africa, leadership and cross-ministerial cooperation for LEDS in Kenya, and a new World Bank initiative to develop an open source tool database that can equip LEDS planners.

The Durban climate deal reached in December 2011 marked an important milestone in the design of a system to measure, report, and verify (MRV) countries’ greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and their actions to reduce them. The deal succeeded in making the MRV system operational. However, the text still falls short on several important issues that WRI outlined before the meeting. In this post, we review the main MRV elements of the Durban deal.

The UNFCCC’s ultimate goal is to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a “level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.” Thus, the most compelling measure of success of the Durban climate negotiations is arguably its ability to secure an adequate level of collective ambition on the part of countries. In this post, we review how well the Durban decisions can help reach this goal.

Though forests play an essential role in international efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the development of systems to monitor deforestation and forest degradation has been slow. This is due to the demanding technical requirements and the large capacity gaps in many countries. Measuring and monitoring change on the ground and via satellite in a consistent way is no easy task.

Countries need to develop national measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV) systems to monitor progress towards achieving REDD+ goals. Establishing procedures to do so would be a significant outcome of the UN climate negotiations in Durban. This task falls to the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA).

You can’t manage what you can’t measure. This is one reason it is important to track countries’ individual and aggregate progress in reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Next week, COP17 of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Durban will mark an essential milestone in the design of an effective system to “measure, report, and verify” countries’ emissions, commitments, and actions. Known as “MRV,” this is one of the fundamental issues to watch in the negotiations.