Has anyone come across any work on harmonising and regulating carbon accounting?
The problem needing addressed is that when a greenhouse gas positive (emitting) or negative (sequestering) process involves more than one household, organisation, or country, there needs to be a decision on who counts the balance of that towards their own "net zero" target. If there isn't, I see a risk that carbon targets will glibly be met by individual accounts while falling well short globally because of no-one or multiple people claiming the balance as suits them - and it will be too late to limit warming to 1.5ÂșC and prevent disaster for populations and ecosystems vulnerable to climate change.
Practical examples range from the electricity use of me typing out (do I count that, or does the property owner, or Power NI?) and posting this (do I count it or does Wix?) - to a farmer renting land for grazing (does he or the landowner count the methane and CO2 emission of the cows and the climate balance of the land itself?).
It strikes me as something that governments and intergovernmental bodies are best placed to do. Are London and Dublin on top of it? Just looking at our sector, the smorgasbord of farm carbon accounting tools like Agrecalc and the Farm Carbon Calculator (and varying estimates of sequestration for various habitats) would indicate they are currently not! Is any national government? Has the UN addressed this problem?
If anyone has any info, please share below; if this interests you, let me know by liking the post and I'll follow up with comments on anything I find on my own.
While there is a danger of undercounting there is also a danger of double counting. For example counting the carbon in boundary features by neighbours, or a tenant and grazier both counting the emissions from grazing animals on rented land.
I agree these zero, or double, counting issues should have clear attributions to ensure accurate Carbon Footprint assessments.