TO : |
Mayor and Members of Council |
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DESTINATAIRE : |
Maire et membres du conseil |
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FROM : |
Dixon Weir, P.Eng. General Manager Environmental Services |
Contact : Michael
Murr Manager,
Environmental Sustainability Ext.
25195 Michael.Murr@ottawa.ca |
EXPÉDITEUR : |
Dixon Weir, inj. Directeur général Services environnementaux |
Personne
ressource : Michael Murr Gestionnaire,
Direction durabilité de l’environnement poste 25195 Michael.Murr@ottawa.ca |
DATE : |
April 26, 2012 |
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Le 26 avril
2012 |
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REF NO. : |
ACS2012-COS-ESD-0004-IPD |
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SUBJECT : |
2004 and
2008 GREENHOUSE GAS INVENTORIES, REDUCTION MEASURES AND APPROACH TO FUTURE
TARGETS |
|
OBJET : |
INVENTAIRES
2004 ET 2008 DES ÉMISSIONS DE GAZ À EFFET DE SERRE, MESURES DE RÉDUCTION ET
ÉTABLISSEMENT DES PROCHAINS OBJECTIFS |
PURPOSE
The purpose of this memorandum is to
present the results of the 2004 and 2008 Corporate
and Community Greenhouse Gas Inventories for the City of Ottawa, highlight
the emission reduction measures undertaken since 2009, and discuss how this
information can be used in terms of future emission reduction targets.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions have
become a common indicator of environmental performance and resource use. GHG emission inventories measure emissions
that are related largely to energy use that results from the burning of fossil
fuels (oil and gas) to produce electricity, heat and cool buildings, and power
vehicles. Landfill gas emissions in the
form of methane are also counted.
The City has recently completed
corporate and community inventories for 2004 and 2008 which show that good progress
has been made towards reducing GHG emissions.
Corporate
emissions – which include emissions from City buildings, fleets, water and
wastewater treatment and solid waste – decreased by 12.5% between 2004 and
2008. A number of corporate initiatives including
the Energy Reduction Program for City facilities, and landfill gas capture,
contributed to this reduction. Community
emissions saw an increase of only 0.9% between 2004 and 2008. Given that there was a 5.2% increase in
population over the same period, per capita emissions have actually dropped
from 7.14 tonnes per person to 6.84 tonnes per person.
Since 2009, the City has implemented a
wide range of measures, such as reducing building energy demand and the
introduction of hybrid vehicles, which will continue to reduce GHG
emissions. These measures will be reflected
in the next inventory planned for the 2012 calendar year. When complete in early 2014, the 2012
inventory can be used along with the results of the 2004 and 2008 inventories to
provide a more complete trend analysis, assess progress relative to current
targets and to consider future projections and targets.
RÉSUMÉ
Les émissions
de gaz à effet de serre (GES) sont maintenant un indicateur commun de la
performance environnementale et de l’utilisation des ressources. Les
inventaires des émissions de GES tiennent surtout compte des émissions
provenant de l’utilisation de combustibles fossiles (pétrole et gaz) pour la
production d’électricité, pour le chauffage et la climatisation des édifices et
comme carburant. Le méthane émanant des décharges est également pris en compte.
La Ville a
récemment effectué les inventaires de GES municipal et communautaire pour les
années 2004 et 2008, qui révèlent des progrès intéressants en matière de
réduction des émissions de GES. En effet, les émissions de la Ville, qui
comprennent les GES provenant du parc automobile et des édifices municipaux,
ainsi que les émissions résultant du traitement de l’eau, des eaux usées et des
déchets solides, ont diminué de 12,5 % entre 2004 et 2008. Cette réduction
est en partie attribuable à la mise en œuvre d’initiatives stratégiques, dont
le Programme de réduction de la consommation d’énergie pour les installations
de la Ville et la capture des gaz d’enfouissement. Quant aux émissions de la
communauté, elles n’ont augmenté que de 0,9 % entre 2004 et 2008. Étant
donné qu’une croissance de la population de 5,2 % a été observée au cours
de cette même période, les émissions ont en réalité diminué, passant de
7,14 à 6,84 tonnes par habitant.
Depuis 2009,
la Ville a mis en œuvre diverses mesures, comme la réduction des besoins
énergétiques de ses édifices et l’introduction de véhicules hybrides dans son
parc automobile, qui permettront de maintenir cette
tendance en matière de réduction des émissions de GES. Les effets de ces
initiatives pourront être observés dans le prochain inventaire, qui portera sur
l’année civile 2012. Tôt en 2014, une fois cet inventaire terminé, les
résultats qui y figureront pourront être mis en parallèle avec ceux des
inventaires 2004 et 2008, ce qui permettra une analyse plus complète des
tendances, une évaluation des progrès réalisés vers l’atteinte de nos objectifs
actuels et un réexamen des prévisions et des objectifs à venir.
BACKGROUND
As one of Council’s Term of Council priorities, the City has
committed to Environmental Stewardship
– “promoting long-term sustainability and reducing our environmental footprint
by maintaining and improving the quality of our air and water, by using green
technology and promoting energy efficiency, and by protecting our natural
resources and land to enhance the quality of the environment of our residents.”
One way to assess the city’s environmental
performance and overall sustainability is by measuring greenhouse gas emissions
(GHGs) and carbon footprint. These indicators are a function of our collective
energy use and transportation choices. Adopting more environmentally friendly
actions that lower fuel consumption and reduce GHG emissions benefits both the
City and the community through:
For the City, the GHG inventories show
how various City policies and initiatives such as the Smart Energy Initiative,
Green Building Policy, Green Municipal Fleet Plan, Transit Vehicle Emissions
Reduction Strategy, Idling Control By-law and more - have impacted emissions. As a member of the Federation of Canadian
Municipalities Partners for Climate Protection (PCP) program, the City has
committed to maintaining GHG inventory information as one of the program
milestones.
The 2004 and 2008 GHG inventories
provide a starting point from which the municipality can track and forecast its
GHG emissions. The GHG inventories, by their very nature, are designed to
capture the corporate and community emission profile at past points in time,
and as such, will not reflect more recent actions and investments that have
been made to further reduce emissions. Consideration of the 2004-2008 results
should be done in conjunction with the measures undertaken since 2009 as
discussed in this memo.
DISCUSSION
New Corporate and Community GHG
inventories were prepared for two points in time, a baseline year (2004) and
benchmark year (2008). The inventories document the amount
of fuel used for transportation, as well as the energy consumed from heating
and cooling houses/buildings, the energy used to treat wastewater and sewage,
and the emissions resulting from the decomposition of waste. The GHG
inventories were coordinated by the Environmental Services Department,
Environmental Sustainability Branch, with
the assistance of many staff and agencies.
The Corporate GHG Inventory
was calculated using data from Transit Services (OC Transpo, O-Train, Para
Transpo), Planning and Growth Management (transportation modeling, population
statistics), Environmental Services (wastewater, sewage, waste), Public Works
(municipal fleet, buildings, streetlights, traffic lights), and Ottawa Police
Services.
The Community GHG Inventory
used energy usage data obtained through Statistics Canada (Census of
Agriculture, Census for Population, Waste Management Industry Survey), Natural
Resources Canada (National Energy Use Database), City of Ottawa (Transportation
Strategic Planning Unit, Research and Forecasting Unit, Planning and Growth
Management; Operations Engineering Unit, Environmental Services), and the US
Environmental Protection Agency (LandGEM model).
The Canadian Standards Association was
contracted to validate these inventories and to develop a procedural manual to
maintain consistency in future inventories. The inventories are based on
protocols recommended by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the World
Resource Institute. The City followed the principles of the ISO 14064 standard,
ensuring accuracy and transparency but did not apply for accreditation due to
the time and cost associated with attaining formal certification.
The reported GHG emissions are in
tonnes of equivalent carbon dioxide emissions (t eCO2) and are
calculated based on carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4)
and nitrogen oxide (N2O) emissions.
The two inventories provide a
relatively short timeline, so any trend interpretation should be treated with
caution. The next inventory is scheduled to be done in 2013/2014 for the 2012
calendar year with the intent to undertake inventories every four years. It
should also be noted that the 2004 and 2008 inventories are based on more
stringent international reporting protocols and as a result are not directly
comparable with previous inventory work.
Corporate GHG
Inventory Results 2004-2008
The Corporate GHG Inventory shows that the City made good progress to
reduce its GHG emissions between 2004 and 2008, with total emissions decreasing
by 12.5%. This represents a reduction of almost 42,000 tonnes of eCO2 emissions. This
decrease is significant considering that over this period the city’s population
grew resulting in further demand for some services, and some changes were made
to the reporting protocol which require the City to include transit emissions
in its corporate inventory.
Table 1 shows the corporate GHG
emissions in 2004 and 2008 for each of the City’s four emissions sources: solid
waste; facilities; fleets and wastewater/sewage. While the reduction in corporate GHG emissions from 2004 to 2008
was largely due to the solid waste sector, a variety of other actions
contributed to the decrease such as corporate vehicle and equipment idling
policy, purchase of hybrid vehicles, replacement of older buses, biodiesel
testing and more.
Table 1: Corporate GHG emissions in
2004 and 2008
Emission
Source |
2004 (t eCO2) |
2008 (t eCO2) |
Change from 2004 to 2008
(t eCO2) |
Tonnage Change 2004 to 2008 |
Solid
Waste* |
98,754.96 |
51,512.67 |
-47,242.29 |
-47.8% |
Facilities |
93,189.37 |
87,695.14 |
-5,494.23 |
-5.9% |
Fleets* |
136,111.47 |
146,334.89 |
10,223.42 |
7.5% |
Wastewater
/ Sewage |
7,288.46 |
7,935.39 |
646.93 |
8.9% |
Total |
335,344.26 |
293,478.09 |
-41,866.17 |
-12.5% |
*Excludes
biogenic emissions
The City’s Solid Waste sector was responsible for
the majority of reductions in corporate GHG emissions with a decrease of 47.8%
from 2004 to 2008, where landfill gas from the Trail Rd. Landfill was captured and
converted to electricity, thereby minimizing the amount of gas that is flared
to the atmosphere. The efficiency of
its capture system has improved yearly.
The City’s Facilities sector also reduced its GHG
emissions with a decrease of 5.9% (5,494 t eCO2) between 2004 and
2008. This decrease was principally the result of the provincial closures of
the coal plants and the introduction of the City’s Energy Reduction Program
that used effective and efficient energy procurement, retrofitting and
conservation measures. Offsetting these reductions was increased demand from
new City facilities and growing demand from new street lighting and water
distribution requirements. Another initiative that helped mitigate emissions
was the 2007 Green Building Policy which mandates high performance (LEED
certified minimum, LEED Silver preferred) sustainable City buildings.
The City’s Fleets sector, including Transit,
Municipal and Police, was responsible for the majority of the increase in GHG
emissions, 7.5% over the four-year period. The Transit component of this sector
is a recent addition to the corporate inventory (from the community inventory) due
to changes in accounting protocols.
The Transit component of
the Fleets sector was responsible for almost three quarters of the fleet
emissions. Transit increased its GHG emissions by only 2.7% (2,895 t eCO2)
between 2004 and 2008 despite OC Transpo’s increase in ridership (5.8%), in
kilometers driven (6.5%) and in buses (116). On a per-rider basis, the
emissions decreased from 1.12 to 1.11 kg of GHG emissions for 2004 and 2008
respectively. It’s important to recognize that while Transit GHGs increase as ridership
increases, this will be more than offset by community GHG reductions due to
reduced personal vehicle use. In this instance the corporate increase has an
overall community benefit.
Within this same timeframe
many initiatives took place that facilitated the increase in ridership and
reduced GHG emissions per rider. These included the Terry Fox and Standherd
Park and Rides, the Millennium, Standherd, and Hawthorne bus stations, dedicated
bus lanes on the 417 in Kanata, and ‘SmartDriver’ training for bus drivers. The
Transit Fleet retired 331 buses that were well above 18 years in age and
replaced them with 404 new and more fuel efficient buses, two of which were
hybrid buses. In addition to this, successful trial studies took place on
biodiesel fuel, air pressure monitoring, and double decker buses that provided
the necessary data for decision makers on future bus operations, maintenance
and equipment.
The Municipal Fleet portion
of the Fleet sector was responsible for almost 20% of GHG emissions in 2008.
Between 2004 and 2008, their GHG emissions increased by 29.8%. Vehicle growth
accounted for half the emissions increase with the remainder caused by a year
of very unusual weather including the “2008 North American Blizzard”
where 52 cm of snow fell. Between 2004 and 2008 many City initiatives reduced
the Fleet sector’s GHGs. These include the replacement of unregulated emission
vehicles, the purchase of three hybrid vehicles and internal anti-idling
awareness campaigns.
The Police Fleet was
responsible for 4% of the emissions from the Fleet sector. From 2004 to 2008
their emissions increased by 12%. During this time the Police Fleet undertook a
study to monitor their vehicle idling and found that they idled 67% of the
time. At that time idling reduction measures were explored and were then
adapted for use on two police cars as a pilot.
The Wastewater sector was responsible for the smallest amount of
emissions. The wastewater treatment plant cogenerates electricity and heat
resulting in this sector producing a consistently low amount of GHGs. 2008
emissions was higher (647 t eCO2) than 2004 levels. This variation is mostly
due to the emissions from effluent discharge.
A summary of the initiatives
that helped to reduce corporate GHG emissions from 2004 to 2008 is attached as
Document 1.
Corporate GHG
Emission Reduction Measures 2009-2012
The City of Ottawa has
implemented a wide range of additional measures since 2009 that will continue to
reduce the city’s GHG emissions. Further reductions will also result from
measures that are already planned as they come into fruition. The emission
reductions that result from these initiatives are not yet reflected in the
City’s corporate GHG emission inventory, but will be captured as part of the
next update for the calendar year 2012. Some of these initiatives will also
positively impact community emissions.
Environmentally friendly
actions such as the Green Bin, and future initiatives such as bi-weekly solid
waste curbside collection (reduced fuel use), and a 30-year municipal waste
management plan will continue to further reduce GHGs in the Waste sector.
In addition, GHGs will be
reduced by the City’s Facilities sector
which has embarked on further initiatives to reduce energy demand including
building automation systems, solar energy, and lighting upgrades.
Furthermore, since 2008 the
Fleet sector has had not only the
Transit Emissions Reduction Strategy approved but has placed 175 hybrid electric
diesel buses in service and retired 70 older buses. In addition, 306 new buses
(2010 EPA low-emission diesel engines) were acquired, 75 double decker buses were
approved for purchase (more fuel efficient and less polluting) and an intensive
fuel management program is being launched. Together these initiatives will
further increase ridership and at the same time reduce GHG emissions. In the
case of the double decker buses - they have the same ridership capacity but use
less road space thereby alleviating some congestion.
The Municipal Fleet has
further mitigated its GHGs by acquiring four Electric Zamboni’s and 37 Hybrid
vehicles. Staff continue to right–size vehicles,
replace vehicles with better fuel efficiencies, and consider new technologies.
Since 2008, the Police Fleet has used the results of the anti-idling technology
pilot and further developed it with the assistance of the National Research
Council into a viable solution. The
Police are installing the systems in 10 vehicles in the first half of 2012 with
more to come in the fall. This initiative will significantly reduce fuel use,
pollution and GHGs from the Police Fleet.
Finally, the Wastewater sector will further reduce
its emissions by continuing its water conservation efforts through water efficiency,
water loss control and infrastructure renewal programs. Taken together, these programs will result in
lower production, distribution, collection and treatment requirements, thereby
reducing energy demand and consequent GHG emissions.
A summary of many of the
initiatives that will reduce
corporate GHG emissions since 2008 that have been completed or are approved for
implementation are attached as Document 1.
Additional reduction
measures approved in the 2012 Budget include the Mobile Workforce Solutions
that reduce travel and more Smart Energy Measures through retrofits that
increase energy efficiency. Further GHG reductions will be achieved in the near
future with six Alstrom Trains that were approved that will facilitate transit
and reduce single occupancy vehicle trips.
Community
Inventory Results 2004-2008
The Community GHG Inventory showed that Ottawa’s community emissions
were 6,153,819 t eCO2 in 2008, representing an increase of only 0.9% between 2004 and 2008. This
compares to a population increase of 5.2% over this period, resulting in a
decrease in the carbon footprint of each resident from 7.14 tonnes per person
to 6.84 tonnes per person. This low increase in emissions is largely due to
Ontario’s closure of several coal-fired electricity producing plants in the
province that resulted in lowering the GHG intensity of electricity – so
although electricity consumption still increased, GHG emissions was still less.
Also helpful to the reduction of emissions were federal regulations for more
stringent exhaust emission standards. There were no significant changes in the
sources of emissions from 2004-2008 as the following chart illustrates.
*Includes
septic.
The citizens of Ottawa make choices
about where and how they live. These choices directly impact their energy
consumption, and their related GHG emissions. The City of Ottawa as a
corporation influences these choices in many ways, including:
For example, decisions made by the
City affect the flow of traffic, the use of roads, and the transportation mode
choice (i.e. walking, biking, transit), which directly impacts fuel consumption
and GHG emissions. As well, the City influences development (residential,
commercial), which in turn influences building construction and neighbourhood
development.
Many decisions taken by citizens
reduce greenhouse gases, such as:
Some City initiatives have helped
mitigate community GHGs such as the Idling Control By-law and more recently,
since 2008, the Green Bin Program and the segregated bike lane pilot. Community
GHG emissions are also influenced by City policies. Examples include increasing
the tree canopy, mixed housing and intensification.
The 2012 Budget approved
many measures that will reduce GHG emissions. Initiatives include facilitating
walking, biking and transit use – from building and maintaining pedestrian and
cycling pathways to improved transit technology, and the Coventry (pedestrian)
overpass to the train station. Of note is that the City will foster green
building development by creating a “Green Express Lane” for building and
development approvals for projects that target environmental excellence. Those
projects will reduce emissions through energy and water efficiency,
construction waste minimization, and an overall reduced environmental
footprint. Council has prioritized initiatives
that increasing forest cover including tree planting programs in both urban and
rural areas, as well as the rehabilitation of urban parks with increased tree
planting. This will ensure carbon sequestration.
How the GHG
Inventories can be used in terms of Future Targets
The
City currently has greenhouse gas reduction targets established based on past
data and inventory sources and City programs. These targets, established
through Council resolutions, are:
·
Reduction
of 20% in community emissions by 2012 from 1990 levels (approved in January 2005)
·
Reduction
of 30% in corporate emissions by 2012 from 1990 levels (approved in October
2009).
As
previously mentioned, the next GHG inventory is scheduled for the 2012 calendar
year. Once the 2012 inventory is complete – with 2008-2012 measures
factored in – Council will have a three point trendline (2004-2008-2012) that
can be used to better assess progress made against the targets and consider
future projections.
CONCLUSION
As
the 2004-2008 results show, the City of Ottawa has made good progress towards
reducing its GHG emissions. Completion
of the next GHG inventory in early 2014 (for the 2012 calendar year) can be
used along with the results of the 2004 and 2008 inventories to assess progress
relative to current targets and to consider future projections and
targets. In the interim, the kinds of
reduction measures discussed in this memo will continue and ongoing progress
will be made in reducing GHG emissions in Ottawa.
Should
you have any questions or comments in regards to this information, please do
not hesitate to Michael Murr, Manager of Environmental Sustainability, at
extension 25195.
Dixon
Weir, P.Eng.
General
Manager
Environmental
Services Department
cc: |
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SUPPORTING
DOCUMENTATION:
Document 1 – Summary of Emission Reduction
Measures