ESM 271 Carbon Footprints and Carbon Accounting
Instructor:
Sangwon Suh
Bren hall 3422, suh@bren.ucsb.edu
Course hours:
Mon and Wed 2:30pm – 3:45pm
Oct. 1 – Oct. 31
Course credit:
2 credit
Course location:
Bren 1424
Final exam:
Oct. 31 (during the course hours)
Assessment:
Homework (1 for each week @10%):
Personal carbon account :
Final exam:
Homework note:
Homeworks are designed in such a way that you can practice what you have
learned during the week and that following the homework schedule leads to a
step-by-step completion of your personal carbon footprint project.
Course schedule
Week 1:
40%
30%
30%
Introduction to carbon footprint and carbon account
- Background: carbon awareness, major drivers; major sources of GHG
emissions: GHG inventory of the U.S. v.s. the article, “Are services good for
climate change?”
Introduction to national and international specifications and standards
- PAS 2050, ISO 14067, GHG protocols.
Introduction to the personal carbon account project
Homework (due next Wed; both (a) and (b) need to be completed):
(a) find out a report or a web site about carbon footprint results of a product or
of a company. Write a two page report on the report or the web site including
the followings: (1) general description of the product/company and the
project, main motivations and objectives; (2) which standard is used, if any?;
(3) main results?; (4) any personal reflections?
(b) draw a process-flow diagram of croissant using the “worked example” of the
PAS2050 (Guide to PAS 2050, pp. 47-54), and follow the calculation. Check
whether you arrive at the same result.
Week 2:
Goal and scope definition
1
-
Scope I, II and III distinction; drawing system boundary; cut-off criteria and
materiality threshold; temporal and geographical system boundary; boundary
between the nature and the economy
Calculation of carbon footprint
- Process flow diagram approach
Homework (due next Wed): Non-disclosure agreement, proposal, and data
collection sheet for PCF project (see the PCF instruction at the end of the
syllabus).
Week 3:
Calculation of carbon footprint (continued)
- Effect of land use change
- Allocation
- Introduction to generalized carbon accounting framework
Homework (due next Wed): Final process flow diagram of the PCF project.
Draw the final process flow diagram of your client in such a way that it gives a
clear idea on what’s included and what’s not.
Week 4:
Interpretation of the carbon footprint results
- Identification of hotspots
- Envisaging the effect of changes
- Identification of effective strategies to reduce carbon footprint
- Sensitivity analysis
- Uncertainties
Homework (due next Monday): 3 page report on the carbon footprint results of
your clients with an analysis of the hotspots, sensitivity, reduction potential and
uncertainty.
Week 5:
Reporting and communication of carbon footprint results
- International standards on reporting and communication
Final exam: Oct. 31 2:30pm – 3:45pm.
Final exam instruction
The exam will be about basic knowledge on the concept and the terms of carbon footprint, carbon
accounting and associated standards. Short answers and multiple choices will be used.
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Personal Carbon Footprint (PCF) Instruction
Objectives:
Overall objective of the personal carbon footprint/account (PCF) project is to acquire basic skills to
perform a carbon footprint/account project. At the end of the project, each student will analyze the results
to quantify the reduction potential, where the amount of one’s personal carbon footprint that can be
reasonably reduced is quantified. Students will collect data, make assumptions, process the information,
calculate and analyze the results and generate the final report. Specific objectives are:
- Be able to calculate carbon footprint of a person for the month of September 2012.
- Be able to apply concepts of allocation, materiality threshold, and emission factors.
- Be able to follow the standard process of carbon footprinting
- Be able to analyze the result and identify a strategy to reduce carbon footprint
Description
This year, students have two choices: (1) Conducting PCF in a pair (in this case, students are clients to
each other); (2) Conducting PCF for yourself (in this case, students are clients of her/himself). If you are
to work in a pair, it would be a good idea to find someone who you didn’t have much chance to know
each other, so that you can take this project as an opportunity to learn more about him/her. The project is
carried out as if each student is a consultant providing personal carbon footprint/accounting service.
Therefore, students need to prepare and submit a proposal accompanied with non-disclosure agreement
(NDA), if applicable, and a data collection sheet. In the proposal, each student should identify the goal of
the project, timeline, data requirement, brief method description, and description of the final deliverables.
Final report should contain the objectives of the study, method, process flow diagram, total annual carbon
footprint (in kg), key contributors (goods, services or activities), recommendation for carbon footprint
reduction, potential cost implications of the recommendations, and overall conclusions. Students may
choose any existing standards on Carbon Footprint including PAS 2050 and WRI/WBCSD’s GHG
protocol as the basis. Students may work with any software tools. Simply using MS Excel with carbon
footprint factors derived from Ecoinvent or CEDA is also fine. All data will be made available to the
student.
Generic work flows
1. Determine the goal and scope of your project
2. Determine the methodology
3. Draw a initial (rough) process flow diagram (process map in PAS 2050)
4. Collect data considering:
- Have you included all materials, food, energy, services, and durable goods input?
- Have you established materiality of the system defined? For instance, do the inputs that you
included matches well with your client’s total expenses in that month?
- Did you consider breaking down some of the key inputs to appropriate categories? For
example, “home electricity use” can be broken down into “electricity for TV”, “electricity for
refrigerator”, “electricity for lighting”, etc. for analyzing the reduction potential.
- Have you applied appropriate allocation rules to the products or services that are shared with
others (for example, a bus ride can be prorated by the number of passengers)?
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5.
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7.
8.
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10.
Is the data quality acceptable? For instance, what portion of the data came from validated
data sources such as bank statements, receipts, electricity bills, gas bills and water bills?
Draw the final process flow diagram (noting data gaps)
Populate the GHG account framework with the data collected
Calculate scope 1, scope 2 and scope 3 emissions.
- For direct combustions, apply appropriate emission factors.
- Scope 2 emissions from electricity can be calculated using eGrid.
- Scope 3 emissions from other inputs are calculated using the CEDA 4 GHG tool, Ecoinvent
(in Umberto) or supplier information (if available).
Assemble the results to form the baseline carbon footprint
Interpretation of the result
- Identify major contributors
- Perform sensitivity analysis for major assumptions and data points
- Assess the quality of the data and the model
- Identify areas that need improvement
Identify strategies to reduce your client’s carbon footprint
- What can be done and how much can be reduced by such actions?
- What is the cost implications?
Deadlines:
 Non-disclosure agreement, proposal, and data collection sheet: part of the homework
 Final report due by Nov 7th (max 10 page, min 5 page, 12point font, 1 inch margin on each side)
 Application for voluntary presentation on Oct 29th (up to 3): Oct 24th (5% bonus point)
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