Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Mitigation
The greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation resources below provide an overview of the current legislative landscape, as well as technological, procedural, and business opportunities to support registrants in developing and implementing solutions to reduce GHG emissions. The case studies provided in the table below are meant to:
- Provide examples of current market opportunities for GHG emissions reduction;
- Identify GHG mitigation work that can be scaled up through the work done by registrants; and
- Reflect the wide variety and scope of work undertaken by engineers and geoscientists in BC.
The document providing an Overview of Provincial, National, and International GHG Legislation, Policy, Programs and Data was developed and authored with the support of Engineers and Geoscientists BC's Climate Change Advisory Group and is intended to be a living document this is to be revised and updated as required in the future, to reflect the evolution of regulations and policy related to GHG mitigation.
Case Studies
| Organization | Case Study |
|---|---|
| BC Hydro | Copper Mountain's Electric Trolley Assist Copper Mountain, near Princeton BC, has installed a one-kilometer section of electric trolleys to help 11 full-size Komatsu trucks haul ore uphill from the main mining put to the operations primary crusher, expecting to reduce GHGs by 930,000 tonnes per year by 2026. |
| CDP | How an Oil and Gas Company Survives the Low-Carbon Transition Vermilion Energy Inc., headquartered in Alberta, Canada, shares its approach to the energy transition, including their collaboration with agricultural engineers to create greenhouse operations to grow tomatoes using geothermal energy, resulting in 10,000 tCO2e avoided each year. |
| FP Innovations | Hybrid Trailer Trucks: A Breakthrough Towards the Electrification of Heavy Trucks FPInnovations is working on a a cutting-edge project to develop a hybrid tractor-trailer for use in forestry operations. The objective is to replace one of the conventional axles on forestry trailers with a drive axle powered by an electric motor. The system would be combined with a conventional tractor to create a parallel hybrid configuration. |
| Industry Intelligence Inc. | GHG Emission Reduction Project at Catalyst Pulp Mill in British Columbia Paper Excellence's GHG emission reduction project at Catalyst pulp mill in British Columbia includes 3 process improvements—re-engineering unused diffusion washer, investing in fiber filter equipment, and automating cleaning process of evaporator No. 3 |
| LaFarge | Co2ment The Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage pilot project at Lafarge's Richmond cement plant will be used as a feasibility study to asses the viability and design of a commercial-scale system designed to capture 1.5 million tCO2 per year at Holcim projects across the US. |
Resources
| Organization | Resource |
|---|---|
| Argonne National Laboratory/US Department of Energy's Technology Integration Program | Greenhouse Gases, Regulated Emissions, and Energy use in Technologies (GREET) Model The GREET model is a one-of-a-kind analytical tool that simulates the energy use and emissions output of various vehicle and fuel combinations. Sponsored by the US Department of Energy's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, GREET offers 2 free platforms to use: the GREET.net model and the Excel model. Additional tools available: Feedstock Carbon Intensity Calculator (FD-CIC), Refinery Products Volatile Organic Compounds Emissions Estimator (RP-VOC), Building LCA Module, Aviation module. |
| BC Government | Climate Action Resources for Indigenous Communities Resources for Indigenous communities to support actions that reduce GHG emissions and prepare for and adapt to climate change. Includes toolkits, learning resources, and funding programs. |
| BC Government | Local Government Climate Action Municipalities and regional districts play an important role in both climate change mitigation and adaptation. Almost every local government in BC has committed to climate action under the BC Climate Action Charter. This link provides resources for local governments. |
| Government of Canada | The Canadian Critical Minerals Strategy The Canadian Critical Minerals Strategy seeks to increase the supply of responsibly sourced critical minerals and support the development of domestic and global value chains for the green and digital economy. |
| International Air Transportation Association (IATA) | The Future of the Airline Industry 2035 What should airlines be thinking about, and what steps should they start taking today to be ready for the opportunities and challenges of the next 20 years? |
| International Association of Oil and Gas Producers | Flaring Management Guidance for the Oil and Gas Industry: A Summary The Flaring Management Guidance, developed by Ipieca, IOGP, and GGFR in partnership, outlines new developments in flaring management and reduction, and examines industry experiences with eliminating flaring, new technologies, business models, operational improvements, and regulatory policy. It also features case studies and examples of positive change. |
| International Energy Association (IEA) | International Energy Association Tracking Progress Report: Chemicals In the Net Zero Emissions by 2050 Scenario, emissions from primary chemical production peak in the next few years and then decline to ~10% below the 2020 level by 2030, despite strong growth in demand. To get on this track, government and industry efforts need to address CO2 emissions from chemical production, as well as from the use and disposal of chemical products. |
| International Energy Association (IEA) | Renewable Electricity: Forecast Summary Renewable capacity additions are set to grow faster than ever in the next 5 years, but the expansion trend is not on track to meet the IEA Net Zero by 2050 Scenario. |
| International Energy Association (IEA) | Flaring Emissions Despite global oil demand dropping nearly 7% in 2020 (precipitated by the Covid-19 pandemic), flaring fell by only 5%. Globally, 142 bcm of natural gas was flared in 2020—roughly equivalent to the natural gas demand of Central and South America. This resulted in around 265 Mt CO2, nearly 8 Mt of methane (240 Mt CO2-eq) and black soot and other GHGs being directly emitted into the atmosphere. |
| Natural Resources Canada | Climate Change Mitigation in British Columbia’s Forest Sector: GHG Reductions, Costs, and Environmental Impacts This research paper presents the results of a comparative analysis that examined mitigation options for BC's forest sector. |
| Research Publication: Jeffrey Rissmana, Chris Bataille, Eric Masanetd, Nate Adene, William R.Morrow III, Nan Zhou, Neal Elliott, Rebecca Dell, Niko Heeren, Brigitta Huckestein, Joe Creskok, Sabbie A. Miller, Joyashree Roy, Paul Fennell, Betty Cremminso, Thomas Koch Blank, David Hone, Ellen D. Williams, Jonas Helseth | Technologies and Policies to Decarbonize Global Industry: Review and Assessment of Mitigation Drivers Through 2070 Fully decarbonizing global industry is essential to achieving climate stabilization, and reaching net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050–2070 is necessary to limit global warming to 2 °C. This paper assembles and evaluates technical and policy interventions, both on the supply side and on the demand side. It identifies measures that, employed together, can achieve net zero industrial emissions in the required timeframe. Key supply-side technologies include energy efficiency (especially at the system level), carbon capture, electrification, and zero-carbon hydrogen as a heat source and chemical feedstock. There are also promising technologies specific to each of the 3 top-emitting industries: cement, iron and steel, and chemicals and plastics. |
| Research Publication: Mehdi Azadi, Stephen Northey, Saleem Ali, Mansour Edraki | Transparency on Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Mining to Enable Climate Change Mitigation The climate change impacts of mining are often not fully accounted for, although the environmental impact of mineral extraction more generally is widely studied. Copper mining can serve as a case study to analyse the measurable pathways by which mining contributes to climate change through direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions. |
| Responsible Mining Foundation | Beyond Emissions Reductions: Climate Change and Mining Recent research by RMF reveals that the majority of assessed large mining companies cannot demonstrate they have considered how climate change may exacerbate the impacts of their operations on communities, workers, and the environment. Climate change is already aggravating mining-related risks to water, biodiversity, forests and health, and these are expected to worsen without adequate responses by the companies concerned. |
| Rocky Mountain Institute | Decarbonization Pathways for Mines The purpose of this report is to discuss the behavioral, policy, technological, and regulatory changes needed to drive the mining industry’s carbon reductions. The first section assesses how the mining industry is performing with respect to reducing its carbon emissions, and points out problems with current measures and data tracking. The second section identifies areas, processes, and technologies with high carbon-reduction potential for mining companies. The report concludes with a discussion of the corporate governance and strategy needed to lead these changes. |
| Sustainable Gas Institute Blog | Methane Emissions From Biogas Facilities are Underestimated Biogas production could have an important role in renewable energy, reducing the adverse effects on the climate. However, biogas production’s contribution to emissions of the greenhouse gas, methane, is not fully understood. Methane (CH4) is the second most potent and abundant greenhouse gas after carbon dioxide (CO2) but because it only lasts in the atmosphere for short time (a decade) reducing methane emissions could have a more rapid impact on mitigating climate change. Unfortunately, there are significant discrepancies between official inventories of methane emissions and estimates derived from direct atmospheric measurement of biogas plants. If biogas is to be a solution to climate change, we need to find effective emission methane reduction strategies, and sources also need to be properly quantified. |
| UN Climate Technology Centre and Network (CTCN) | UN Climate Technology Centre and Network Information Resources Database This is a database of informational resources connecting countries to climate technology solutions. |
| United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) | Emerging Climate Technologies in the Energy Supply Sector The energy supply sector offers a wide range of emerging decarbonization technologies with high potential for climate change mitigation. Such technologies also have relevance to multiple social and environmental co-benefits (e.g., employment and income generation for local communities, reduced impact on water and land). |
| US EPA | Available and Emerging Technologies for Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions from the Pulp and Paper Manufacturing Industry This document provides information on control techniques and measures that are available to mitigate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the pulp and paper manufacturing industry at this time. Because the primary GHG emitted by the pulp and paper manufacturing industry include carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), and nitrous oxide (N2O), and the control technologies and measures presented here focus on these pollutants. |