Over 50 biogas and biomethane commerce associations and corporations from around the globe have written to the World Sources Institute (WRI), administrator of the Greenhouse Fuel Protocol,1 calling for a rethink of its place on the usage of biomethane certificates for greenhouse fuel reporting by company fuel customers.
The GHG Protocol is globally recognised because the main GHG accounting customary. Till just lately, corporates eager to decarbonise their emissions bought biomethane certificates and reported this as a part of their Scope 1 emissions accounting.2 This led to funding in new biomethane manufacturing infrastructure, which the world critically wants to chop methane emissions from natural wastes and generate inexperienced fuel, biofertilisers and bioCO2, however this may now not be potential below the proposed new steering.
Of their letter to Pankaj Bhatia, International Director of the GHG Protocol at WRI, the World Biogas Affiliation is joined by nationwide commerce our bodies from throughout Europe, North and Latin America, Africa and Oceania, in addition to stakeholders together with main operators corresponding to TotalEnergies, Nature Vitality, Clarke Vitality and Engie to specific their concern concerning the impression of the proposed new “Land Sector and Removals Steering”3 on the manufacturing of biomethane.
Particularly, the signatories ask for the elimination of Annex B of the steering and for the reinstatement of the present steering permitting corporations to buy biomethane certificates as a part of their Scope 1 reporting.4 The brand new steering requires bodily supply of biomethane to company shoppers by way of devoted pipelines or street transport, reasonably than by way of present fuel grids, which is logistically and commercially unviable, and can result in elevated emissions.
“The proposed modifications have the potential to right away halve funding in a renewable know-how that would ship one third of immediately’s international pure fuel consumption, half of the International Methane Pledge and a ten% discount in complete international greenhouse fuel emissions, in addition to create hundreds of thousands of inexperienced jobs”, explains Charlotte Morton, WBA Chief Government. “Alongside the various different signatories, we name on the WRI to take away the Annex and work with the sector to develop standards to make sure that biomethane certificates proof actual decarbonisation.”
Notes(1) Developed in 2015, The GHG Protocol establishes complete international standardized frameworks to measure and handle greenhouse fuel (GHG) emissions from non-public and public sector operations, worth chains and mitigation actions.
(2) The framework for corporations to measure and handle their GHG emissions is established inside three ‘scopes’:
- scope 1 emissions are direct emissions from companies (e.g. utilizing fossil fuels);
- scope 2 are from the acquisition of power (e.g. for heating or electrical energy); and
- scope 3 are oblique emissions related to enterprise actions and the availability chain.
(3) The draft “Land Sector and Removals Steering” is a complement to the GHG Protocol Company Accounting and Reporting Commonplace, which establishes the methodology for firms to hold out inventories of greenhouse fuel (GHG) emissions of their operations and report on their use of inexperienced options to fossil fuel, corresponding to biomethane.
(4) Below the present steering, it’s particularly said that an organization which purchases biogas or biomethane by way of a contractual instrument, compliant with the ‘GHG Protocol Scope 2 High quality Standards’, could report scope 1 emissions for biomethane utilizing the market-based technique and utilizing a particular emission issue. Because of this, certificates from the AD sector grew to become a horny technique of evidencing GHG discount throughout all kinds of industries, and supported funding of recent biomethane manufacturing infrastructure, which is crucial if the world is to attain its 2030 local weather targets and preserve alive the potential of assembly the 1.5 diploma goal.
