Annex 1 Countries: These are the industrialised countries that have been set emissions targets under the Kyoto Protocol.
Non-Annex I Countries: Those developing countries without a binding GHG emissions reduction commitment under the Kyoto Protocol. Non-Annex I countries are expected to receive technology transfer and financial assistance from Annex II countries to help them achieve emissions reductions in the absence of a binding commitment.
Additionality: Additionality is the whether a project would have occurred irrespective of whether the carbon credit incentives had been in place, under a “business as usual” scenario. Crucial to the additionality consideration is whether the deforestation threat was genuine and real, and whether this itself would also have occurred under a business as usual scenario.
Adaptation Fund: A fund set up under the Kyoto Protocol to provide money for poorer non-annex 1 countries to adapt to climate change. This currently receives 2% of transactions under the Clean Development Mechanism.
Afforestation: Afforestation is the practice of planting new seeds to forest land that has not historically (considered to be more than 50 years) previously been forested, generally accepted as “agricultural land”.
Agroforestry: This is the practice of combining forestry production with agricultural production to gain full benefits such as biomass grown on short-rotation plantations can replace the burning of fossil fuels whilst therefore decreasing carbon emissions.
Assigned Amount Units (AAUs): The total volume of green house gas in units of one tonne CO2e – that each Annex B country is allowed to emit during the first phase of the Kyoto Protocol. Unless the country government agrees otherwise, any emissions reductions that occur in that country can be counted towards its AAU reduction target. Organisations that buy and sell carbon offsets from Annex B countries may thus run the risk of double-counting their emission reductions.
Baseline: An established benchmark against which any reduction in emissions can be calculated, ie the volume of greenhouse gas emissions in the absence of the project activity or emissions reduction initiative. The baseline is compared against the emissions following project implementation. The difference between baseline emissions and with project emissions is the emission reduction that can be used as a carbon offset.
Business-as-usual: The scenario in which policies to reduce emissions are not enacted. The business-as-usual scenario is often used to determine the greenhouse gas emissions baseline.
Bioenergy: Any form of energy created from bio matter such as crops, algae or timber, that can be converted into fuel. In Brazil corn has been successfully turned into ethanol to replace petrol, whilst many scientists believe oil derived from Algae represents the future of Bio fuel
Biomass: This is solid, mostly wood-based material used for heating (woodchips), cooking (fuel wood in developing nations) and increasingly for power generation to replace coal. Fast growing woods such as Paulownia and Eucalyptus are idea for this. Biomass projects can also receive carbon credits for the sequestration of CO2.
Cap and Trade: A system pioneered in the United States in the 1980s under which an overall limit or “cap” for emissions is set and tradable allowances are auctioned, sold or granted to participating organisations. The total amount of allowable emissions is gradually reduced causing participants to trade their permits to achieve the desired reduction at the lowest overall cost.
Carbon Budget: A set amount of carbon that can be emitted in a give a country. Part of a strategy to limit climate change by capping greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere.
Carbon Credit: An instrument created to represent one metric tonne of CO2e whose emission is either avoided or removed.
Carbon Dioxide: a naturally-occurring atmospheric gas, widely attributed as being responsible for global fluctuations in climate change. Created by burning fossil fuel, and naturally released by peat bogs, oceans, volcanoes and biological respiration.
Carbon Dioxide equivalent (CO2e): A metric used to compare the relative global warming potential of different greenhouse gases. For example, methane is 21 times more potent than CO2 making 1 tonne of methane equal to 21 tCO2e.
Carbon Footprint: The total greenhouse gas emissions produced by individuals and companies expressed in tonnes of CO2 equivalent. Activities such as travel, heating, air conditioning and waste disposal all form part of your carbon footprint.
Carbon Funding or Finance: This is where an investor pays a project developer in return for ownership of the emissions reductions achieved by that project over a certain time period. Funding may be provided as capital at the start of a project, as income over its life or as a mixture of the two.
Carbon Neutral: Being carbon neutral refers to neutral (zero) total carbon release brought about by balancing the amount of carbon released with the amount sequestered or offset. When an individual or organization sets out to become carbon neutral it is usually achieved by the following; limiting energy usage and emissions, obtaining electricity and other energy from a renewable source (e.g. solar power) and offsetting the remaining emissions (that cannot for the moment be avoided or generated) in a carbon project or buying carbon credits.
Carbon Neutrality: The state in which the emissions from one activity are balanced by emission reductions achieved elsewhere. For example, a company that emits 100 tCO2e can be carbon neutral if they purchase and retire 100 tCO2e of carbon credits from outside their company.
Carbon Neutral: when a person or company – through energy efficiency, carbon offsetting and sustainable practices- contributes no net CO2.
Carbon Offsetting: The process by which emissions from one source are matched against carbon credits derived elsewhere. Buying carbon credits to offset the impact of your business or personal activities on the environment by contributing to support projects that reduce CO2 production.
Carbon Source: Any natural store of carbon that releases CO2 into the atmosphere. Note that soils, forests and oceans can be both sinks and sources at different times.
Carbon Sequestration: The process when greenhouse gases or carbon dioxide are absorbed from the atmosphere by growing plants, trees and algae or even the storage underground.
Carbon Sink: Process or structure that removes a greenhouse gas from the atmosphere. Forests, water, peat deposits, and carbonate deposits (shells and limestone) and mechanical carbon capture and storage systems are carbon sinks.
Carbon Trading (cap and trade): Any system where countries, companies or others trade in the right to emit CO2 into the atmosphere. Europe has already implemented and the USA is planning a “cap and trade scheme”, in which major emitters are given or sold a certain allocation of a limited (capped) number of permits and then allowed to trade the permits among themselves.
The Carbon Trust: Is a not for profit company set up by the UK Government in 2001. Its purpose is to advise businesses on how to reduce the amount of energy they use. The Carbon Trust works with both large and small companies.
Certified Emission Reductions (CERs): Carbon Credits granted by the Clean Development once a project has been validated and the emission reductions themselves have been verified. They can then be used by governments towards their Kyoto targets or by companies to trade in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme. The purchasing company surrenders the CERs to government as part of the company’s emissions target.
Clean Development Mechanism (CDM): The CDM allows Annex 1 countries that have targets under the Kyoto Protocol to make emission reductions overseas in non-Kyoto countries and count those reductions towards their own legal commitments. A CDM project is issued with Certified Emission Reductions, which may then be traded.
Crediting Period: The period of time during which the emissions reduction project generates valid carbon credits. The crediting period cannot exceed the operational lifetime of the project, but may be considerably shorter, depending on the rules of the project standard and the decisions of the project proponent.
CO2 equivalent: A term used to describe the global warming potential of greenhouse gases in terms of the equivalent amount of CO2. For instance, CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere are now approaching 390 parts per million (ppm). If other greenhouse gases added by human activity are included the figure rises to above 460 ppm of CO2 equivalent.
Concentrate Solar Power (CSP) systems produce heat or electricity using mirrors which track the sun (“heliostats”), reflecting and concentrating the suns radiation to a communal region where the temperatures can reach between 400 and 1000 deg C. Heat is converted immediately to electricity or alternatively stored in various medium to be released at night or on overcast days. It is suitable for peak-loads and base-loads.
COP15 is the 15th “Conference of Parties” under the United Nations climate change convention and will be held in Copenhagen in December 2009. Its single goal is to produce a road-map for the safety of human kind in the face of potentially catastrophic climate change
Dangerous climate change: A term embedded in the UNFCCC. It is not defined, but the world’s governments have agreed to prevent it.
Designated Operational Entity (DOE): An organization accredited by the carbon credit standards body to validate projects, request registration, and verify emission reductions from the project activity.
Emission coefficient: A number used to convert units of an activity or product into units of CO2e that result from the activity or from the manufacture and/or use of the product. Emission coefficients are usually expressed as tonnes CO2e/[unit of activity].
European Solar Thermal Electricity Association (ESTELA) is a European Industry Association created to support the emerging European solar thermal electricity industry for the generation of green power in Europe and abroad in the Mediterranean region
European Union Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS): In 2005 the European Union Greenhouse Gas Emission Trading Scheme (EU ETS) commenced operation as the largest multi-country, multi-sector Greenhouse Gas emissions trading scheme. The main participants in the scheme are large industrial users of energy who are allocated a maximum emissions cap by the government. It is a regional cap and trade system intended to help the European Union meet its 2012 goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 8% below 1990 levels.
European Union Emissions Allowance (EUA): A EUA is a unit of one tonne of CO2 and was designed to be identical with the equivalent AAU (assigned Amount Unit) of CO2 defined under Kyoto. Hence, because of the EU’s decision to accept Kyoto-CERs as equivalent to EU-EAUs, it will be possible to trade EAUs and UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change)-validated CERs on a one-to-one basis within the same system.
Emission reduction: The removal, limitation, reduction, avoidance, sequestration or mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions.
Fossil Fuels: fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas, created by the decomposing of plants and animals and algae. When burnt create CO2
Global Warming: is the increase in the average temperature of the Earth’s near-surface air and oceans since the mid-20th century and its projected continuation.
Global Warming Potential (GWP): The GWP is used to compare the abilities of different greenhouse gases to trap heat in the atmosphere. GWPs are based on the radiative efficiency (heat-absorbing ability) of each gas relative to that of carbon dioxide (CO2), as well as the decay rate of each gas (the amount removed from the atmosphere over a given number of years) relative to that of CO2. The GWP provides a construct for converting emissions of various gases into a common measure, which allows climate analysts to aggregate the radiative impacts of various greenhouse gases into a uniform measure denominated in carbon or carbon dioxide equivalents.
Gold Standard (GS): This is awarded to CDM and voluntary projects that have higher sustainable development credentials than required by CDM regulations. There is a GS VER accreditation scheme for the voluntary market. GS was set up by a group of environmental NGOs to encourage developers to run high quality projects and created to facilitate the move from fossil fuels to renewable energies. GS was created by the Gold Standard Foundation in order to offer a quality label to CDM / JI and voluntary offset projects. The Gold Standard is endorsed by 49 non-governmental organisations worldwide.
Greenhouse Gases (GHG): GHG’s trap heat radiated from the earth, and contribute to global warming. The Kyoto Protocol covers human-induced emissions of six gases: carbon dioxide (CO2, the most important), methane, nitrous oxide, hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs) and sulphur hexafluoride (SF6).
Hydro-electric Power: electricity generated by hydropower, i.e., the production of power through use of the gravitational force of falling or flowing water. It is the most widely used form of renewable energy.
Hydrogen Engine: Hydrogen-fueled internal combustion engines convert the chemical energy of hydrogen to mechanical energy or electrochemical conversion in a fuel-cell.
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC): Set up by the UN in 1988 to produce consensus reports on the science, impacts and mitigation of climate change, it has now produced four major assessments, the latest in 2007. All go through extremely detailed reviews by both experts and governments before publication.
ISO 14064-1: Standard issued in 2006 by the International Organisation for Standards (ISO). Provides guidance for quantifying and reporting greenhouse gas emissions at the organisational level. Based on the WRI/GHG Protocol for measuring organisational carbon footprints.
ISO 14064-2: Standard issued in 2006 by the International Organisation for Standards (ISO). Provides guidance for quantifying and reporting greenhouse gas emissions reductions from project activities. Forms the basis for the 2007 version of the Voluntary Carbon Standard.
Joint Implementation: The mechanism established under the Kyoto Protocol that allows for emission permits to be transferred between Annex B countries. Whereas CDM projects generate CERs, JI projects generate ERUs (Emission Reduction Units).
Kyoto Protocol: The agreement negotiated at the Third Conference of Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Kyoto, Japan in December 1997, and subsequently ratified by most nations except the USA, it gives industrialized nations legally binding emissions reduction targets for six main greenhouse gases, covering the period 2008- 2012. The Kyoto Protocol defined the emission reduction obligations of Annex B countries and defined CDM, JI and emission trading as mechanisms for achieving emission reductions. This means that in the five years between 2008 and 2012 the UK has to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, on average, to 12.5% below what they were in 1990. Each country has a different target, but the total emission reductions amount to 5.7% below 1990 levels.
Land Use, Land Use Change And Forestry (LULCF): all have impacts on the global carbon cycle – they can add or remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, contributing to climate change. For example land-use change such as the conversion of forest into agricultural land contributes to a significant increase in carbon into the atmosphere. All areas excluded under the Kyoto Protocol can claim the amount that is stored in trees in their country.
Mediterranean Solar Plan (MSP) originally initiated in Barcelona in 1995 to create a Europe-wide plan for solar-powered-electricity generation. On 13 July 2008 announced an objective of 20GW of renewable energy capacity within Europe by 2020, roughly forecast to be delivered as 10-12 GW from concentrated solar power (CSP), 5-6 GW from wind power and 3-4 GW from photo-voltaic technology.
Mixed Use Projects involve a number of forestry and carbon accreditation practices thereby giving the owners or investors maximum return potential whilst still mitigating climate change.
NAPAs – National Adaptation Programmes for Action: Plans being developed by the least developed countries to help protect their citizens, ecosystems and economies against climate change.
Parts Per Million (ppm): The amount of pollution concentrated in the air. Concentrations of pollutant gases such as CO2 in the atmosphere are usually measured in parts per million by volume (ppmv)
Parabolic Trough: Parabolic trough power plants use curved troughs that reflect direct solar radiation onto a linear receiver running along the trough. As the sun moves, the troughs track the Sun along one axis, typically north to south. A thermal fluid such as synthetic thermal oil is circulated within the linear receivers and is heated to approximately 400 deg C by the reflected radiation.
Parabolic Dish: Parabolic dish concentrators are individual motor-generator units that due to their singularity are ideal for de-centralised power supply and remote, stand-alone power systems. The leading producer of these dishes is Stirling Energy, whose SunCatcher Power Systems are 25 kW comprising of a 38ft diameter dish structure supporting 82 curved glass mirror facets, each 3 ft * 4 ft.
Peak Oil: is the point in time when the maximum rate of global petroleum is reached after which the rate of production enters terminal decline
Paulownia: is extremely fast growing; some species of plantation Paulownia can be harvested for saw timber in as little as five years. Once the trees are harvested, they regenerate from their existing root systems, earning them the name of the “Phoenix tree.” Paulownia has the ability to reclaim ecologically stressed and degenerate patches of land relatively quickly. Its root systems run deep and penetrate compacted and contaminated soils which have resulted from industrialized development. Paulownia is a phyto-remediator, increasing the organic content of degraded soils, processing and filtering contaminants through the uptake of its vascular system, and emitting oxygen into the atmosphere.
Per capita emissions: Emissions (usually of a country) divided by the number of inhabitants. Often seen as a measure of fairness or emissions entitlements. (The CO2 emissions of China and the USA are about the same, but because China has four times as many people, its per capita emissions are only a quarter of those of the USA.)
Photovoltaics: The method of converting solar energy directly into electricity using solar panels. ‘Photovoltaic’ is the marriage of two words, ‘photo’ from Greek roots meaning light, and ‘voltaic’ from ‘volt’ which is the unit used to measure electric potential at a given point. Photovoltaic systems use cells consisting of one or two layers of a semi-conducting material. When light shines upon the cells an electric field is created across the layers causing electricity to flow. Whilst a photovoltaic system does not need bright sunlight to operate, indeed they work well on cloudy days, the greater the intensity of the light the greater the flow of electricity.
Permanence: Permanence is the title given to the concern over a project’s longevity in relation to the carbon credits produced. This is a major issue for forestry when considering potential fire, disease or logging all of which will release the carbon sequestered back in to the atmosphere. For REDD projects, the only solution is the ongoing verification of the project’s forest status once carbon offset emission credits have been generated.
Project Design Document (PDD): A document that describes an emission reduction project’s relevant characteristics, including name, location, project technology, baseline scenario, use of the additionality tool, estimated greenhouse gas reductions, etc.
Renewable Energy: sources of energy that are seemingly infinite (such as wind and solar) and do not rely on a finite source (such as fossil fuels) to create power.
Reforestation: This is the practice of planting new seeds to forest land that has been recently deforested, harvested or burned. REDD projects are also achievable in areas predicted to be under a “high-risk of deforestation” such as many areas in the Amazon Basin. Certain forecast models have been developed such as the SimAmazonia Model which forecast 50 years of deforestation in high-risk areas of the Brazilian Amazon, thereby enabling several deforestation protection projects to acquire CCB / VCS accreditation.
Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD): REDD mechanisms use market/financial incentives to reduce the emission of green house gases from deforestation and forest degradation. While initially excluded from the land use change sector within the UNFCC Clean Development Mechanism it is suspected to be part of the successor to the Kyoto Protocol. REDD credits offer the opportunity to utilise funding from developed countries to reduce deforestation in developing countries.
Registry: An inventory system that tracks the accumulation and removal or retirement of emission reduction credits by an organisation. Registries may be specific to a particular credit type, as is the case for the Gold Standard, CDM and Voluntary Carbon Standard registries, or may hold multiple credit types, as is the case for generic third party registries and proprietary registries maintained by individual companies.
Sustainable Forestry is the practice of reforestation combined with a small amount of timber harvesting, enabling both the environmental advantages from reforestation combined with the economical incentive of harvesting. Sustainable harvestry programs typically only permit 5% of the timber to be harvested and trees are replanted to ensure developing forest.
Tipping point: Any point of no return, after which change is sudden and irreversible. In climate change, this might be runaway global warming, the collapse of an ice sheet or the shutting down of an ocean current which won’t switch back on even if you go back to the old climate conditions.
“Trans Mediterranean Renewable Energy Cooperation” (TREC) aims to boost the generation of electricity and desalination of water by using solar thermal plants in Europe, Middle East and North Africa (EUMENA) and transmit the power generated via HVDV transmission lines.
UK Emissions Trading Scheme: In 2002, 33 companies voluntarily took on a legally binding obligation to reduce their emissions and began trading under this DEFRA scheme. Companies with Climate Change Levy Agreements could buy and sell credits in the scheme to help them achieve their targets. The UK ETS ended in December 2006 with final reconciliation completed in March 2007. The UK ETS was the world’s first economy-wide greenhouse gas emissions trading scheme.
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Signed in 1992 at the Rio Earth Summit and ratified by 192 nations. It commits them to stabilizing climate-changing emissions and to preventing “dangerous human interference with the climate”. Its parties meet every year. The next meeting is in Copenhagen in December this year.
Voluntary Emissions Reductions (VERs): This is a unit of emission reductions that may have been verified by an independent auditor to a recognised standard. A VER can also be a CER awaiting confirmation or can be a unit that has not been verified at all.
Voluntary Carbon Standard (VCS): Work to develop the Voluntary Carbon Standard was initiated by The Climate Group, the International Emissions Trading Association and the World Economic Forum in late 2005. The VCS Program provides a new global standard and program for approval of credible voluntary offsets. VCS offsets must be real (have happened), additional (beyond business-as-usual activities), measurable, permanent (not temporarily displace emissions), independently verified and unique (not used more than once to offset emissions).
Validation: The systematic, independent and documented process for evaluating the proposed project activity and project documentation against the requirements of a project standard.
Verification: The systematic, independent and documented process for evaluating the emissions reduction claims of a project proponent against agreed verification criteria.
Verified Emission Reduction (VER): Emission reductions generated by projects that are assessed and verified by objective third party mechanisms other than the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Category : Green Basics