The case for consumption-based accounting of greenhouse gas emissions to promote local climate action

One of the challenges faced by local governments in the work with municipal climate action plans concerns accounting for the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions—what emissions should be targeted, development of emissions over time, and how to effectively measure the success of local climate action. In this paper, we present challenges in developing a GHG emissions inventory related to the provision of municipal services. We argue that a consumption-based perspective, illustrated through the use of the carbon footprint (CF), rather than more conventional production-based inventory, provides a more useful and less misleading indicator. We present an analysis of the CF of municipal services provided by the city of Trondheim. The use of data directly from the city's accounting system ensures a reliable calculation of indirect emissions, and, with some minor modifications, also accurate data on direct emissions. Our analysis shows that approximately 93 percent of the total CF of municipal services is indirect emissions, located in upstream paths, underlining the need of introducing consumption-based indicators that takes into account upstream GHG emissions.