Developer
Developed by Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) under the category of “Indicative simplified baseline and monitoring methodologies for selected small-scale CDM project activity”
Location http://cdm.unfccc.int/methodologies/DB/51R65FQGV2IP0FBN6CIDBAJN7ZAZJ3/view.ht
ml
Methodology
This methodology covers project activities involving the cultivation of oilseeds, the production of plant oil, and the use of plant oil for transportation applications. This methodology is applicable under these conditions:
 Oil crops are cultivated on area that is not a forest and has not been deforested during the last 10 years prior to the implementation of the project;
 The establishment of dedicated plantations on peatlands is not allowed;
 The plant oil is used in blends with pure petrodiesel of up to 10% by volume only or use of pure plant oil in converted vehicles;
 Baseline vehicles use petrodiesel only;
 No export of produced plant oil to Annex 1 countries allowed.
The project boundary is the geographical area of the cultivation, production and processing of oil-seeds and the areas where plant oil is blended and sold to the final users. The vehicles of the final users where the plant oil or blend is consumed are also included in the project boundary.
The additionality 1 should be demonstrated that the project activity would not have occurred anyway due to at least one of these barriers: investment barrier, technological barrier, barrier due to prevailing practice or other barriers 2 .
1 The concept of “additionality” under the CDM refers to the project has to prove that the emission reductions are additional to any that would occur in the absence of the certified project activity (CDM Rule book: http://cdmrulebook.org/84)
2 More information about additionality (attachment A to Appendix B) is available at: http://cdm.unfccc.int/Reference/Guidclarif/ssc/methSSC_guid05.pdf

Baseline Emissions
Baseline emissions are calculated based on the amount of plant oil consumed by the project and CO
2 emission factor of diesel. For this purpose the amount of diesel fuel that would have been consumed in the absence of using plant oil is calculated.
Project Emissions
Project activity emissions are the emissions related to the cultivation of oil seeds and production of plant oil (field-to-wheel emissions). It also includes emissions from energy use for processing (e.g. pressing and filtering) of plant oil and methane emissions due to stockpiling, land filling, waste water generated in the plant oil production facility. It can be calculated based on CO
2
emissions from energy use for oil-seed processing of crops, N
2
O emissions in cultivation of crops and CH
4 emissions from solid waste and/or waste water treatment associated with crops.
Project emissions from the cultivation of oil crops and production of oil seeds, shall be calculated in accordance with the “General guidance on leakage in biomass project activities” 3 for small scale CDM project.
Project emissions of CH
4
from solid waste disposal and/or waste water treatment are calculated as per provisions in “AMS-III.G-Landfill methane recovery” 4 , “AMS-III.F-
Avoidance of methane emissions through composting” 5 , “AMS-III.HMethane recovery in wastewater treatment” 6 .
Leakage
Leakage emissions due to a shift of pre-project activities shall be accounted for as per the approved “General guidance on leakage in biomass project activities” 3 for small-scale project activities.
Also, in case oil seeds are cultivated in the baseline situation in the area of land where oil seeds are cultivated in the project situation, the guidance on competing uses for biomass in the “General guidance on leakage in biomass project activities” 3 for small-scale projects shall be taken into account. Leakage shall be estimated accordingly and deducted from the emission reductions.
Inputs
 CO
2
emission factor of fossil fuel types (EF
CO2
)
 Net calorific value of fossil fuel types (NCV)
3 More information is available at: http://cdm.unfccc.int/methodologies/SSCmethodologies/approved/history/c_leak_biomass/guid_biomass_v03.pdf
4 More information is available at: http://cdm.unfccc.int/methodologies/view?ref=AMS-III.G.
5 More information is available at: http://cdm.unfccc.int/methodologies/view?ref=AMS-III.F.
6 More information is available at: http://cdm.unfccc.int/methodologies/view?ref=AMS-III.H.

Parameters Monitored
The parameters below are required for monitoring the project activity progress.
 Harvest of crops (H)
 Oil yield of crops (OY)
 Area in which oil seed types is cultivated for use in the project plant (A)
 Oil content of oil seeds
 CO
2
emission factor for grid electricity supplied to the project plant (EF
CO2,ELEC
)
 Quantity of electricity consumption in processing for crops (EC
OFP
)
 Quantity of fossil fuel consumption for filtering and pressing for crops (FC
OFP
)
 Amount of organic fertilizer nitrogen applied in crops (F
ON
)
 Amount of synthetic fertilizer nitrogen applied in crop (F
SN
)
 Net calorific value of plant oil (NCV)
 Net calorific value of petro diesel (NCV
D
)
 Produced plant oil types (FP)
 Consumed plant oil types (FC)
 Amount of plant oil bought in case the plant oil is sold and/or used as blend (FB
PO
)
 Amount of diesel bought in the case the plant oil is sold and/or used as blend (FB
D
)
 Amount of blended plant oil used (FC
PO
)
 Fraction of petrodiesel in the fuel used for blending (f
PD
)
Pollutants/Gases Analyzed
CO
2
, N
2
O, CH
4
Evaluation
No independent evaluation has been undertaken of this methodology. However as a CDM based methodology the following strengths and weaknesses apply.
Strengths Weaknesses
This methodology allows estimating accurately the emission reduction of biodiesel production and use for transport applications.
It does an ex-ante appraisal, which has to be validated in the future with ex-post estimation in order to get the Certified Emissions
This methodology is considerably data-intensive due to the requirement for verification of progress during the lifetime of the project and the need to undertake exante and ex-post analyses. These data may also not be readily available in developing countries.

Reductions (CER) (Emissions reduction estimations may result in the acquisition of CER).
Strict guidelines for data collection, estimation of leakages and a clear procedure make this methodology accurate.
7
Costly data collection which frequently exceeds what CDM credits pay. (Punte, 2011)
Guidelines are available online.
References
CDM – Executive Board, Plant oil production and use for transport applications, AMS-III.T./
Version 02, Sectoral Scope: 07, EB 55.
Punte, S., Replogle, M., Mejia, A., 2011. Transport Emissions Evaluation Models for Projects
(TEEMP). Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions as Catalysts for Environmentally
Sustainable Transport. Seoul, South Korea. http://www.transport2012.org/bridging/ressources/documents/2/1362,4.-TEEMP-
Overview-Seoul-12Apr2011-f.pdf
7 Each CDM project has to be verified during the lifetime of the project comparing the real emissions with the corresponding forecasted emissions.