scholarly journals University air travel and greenhouse gas mitigation: An analysis of higher education climate policies

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony Schmidt
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Air Travel ◽  
Greenhouse Gas Mitigation ◽  
Quality Data ◽  
Gas Emissions ◽  
Carbon Footprints ◽  
Climate Policies ◽  
Doctoral Institutions

Higher education institutions have been involved with environmental and sustainability issues since at least the 1970s. More recently, efforts have shifted to a specific focus on climate change. Numerous institutions have created policies that aim to reduce their carbon footprints, with an emphasis on energy production and consumption and reducing their greenhouse gas emissions. One area that has received less attention has been greenhouse gas emissions from university air travel. The present research used qualitative document analysis to examine the climate policies of 46 public doctoral institutions to understand how they address university air travel greenhouse gas mitigation. Five major themes emerged in this research: no consideration of air travel, lack of quality data for accurate consideration, recommendations to offset air travel emissions, support for videoconferencing, and other suggestions for mitigation. These themes are discussed in detail, as are practical suggestions and implications stemming from this and related research.

scholarly journals Local governance of greenhouse gas emissions from air travel

2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (5) ◽  
pp. 578-594 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna Elofsson ◽  
Nora Smedby ◽  
Jörgen Larsson ◽  
Jonas Nässén
Keyword(s):  
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Local Governance ◽  
Air Travel ◽  
Gas Emissions

scholarly journals Study of the viticultural technical itineraries carbon footprint at fine scale

2019 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
pp. 01030
Author(s):  
E. Adoir ◽  
S. Penavayre ◽  
T. Petitjean ◽  
L. De Rességuier
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Carbon Footprint ◽  
Primary Data ◽  
Life Cycle Approach ◽  
Gas Emissions ◽  
Carbon Footprints ◽  
Life Project ◽  
One Year

Viticulture faces two challenges regarding climate change: adapting and mitigating greenhouse gas emissions. Are these two challenges compatible? This is one of the questions to which Adviclim project (Life project, 2014–2019) provided tools and answers. The assessment of greenhouse gas emissions was implemented at the scale of the plot using a life cycle approach: calculating the carbon footprint. This approach makes it possible to take into account the emissions generated during each stage of the life cycle of a product or a service: in this case, the cultivation of one hectare of vine for one year. Carbon footprint was assessed for the 5 pilot sites of the Adviclim project: Saint-Emilion (France), Coteaux du Layon/Samur (France), Geisenheim (Germany), Cotnari (Romania) and Plompton (United Kingdom). An important work for primary data collection regarding observed practices was carried out with a sample of reresentative farms for these 5 sites, and for one to three vintages depending on the site. Beyond the question asked in the project, the calculation of these carbon footprints made it possible to (i) make winegrowers aware of the life cycle approach and the share of direct emissions generated by viticulture, (ii) acquire new references on the technical itineraries and their associated emissions, (iii) improve the adaptation of the methodology for calculating the carbon footprint to viticulture.

Standards als Steuerungsinstrumente

2015 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hannah Witting
Keyword(s):  
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Gas Emissions ◽  
Carbon Footprints ◽  
Carbon Footprinting ◽  
The Past ◽  
Current State ◽  
Open Questions ◽  
Controlling Mechanism

Standards as a controlling mechanism: Methods and effects of carbon footprinting in the logistic sector. Carbon footprints describe the greenhouse gas emissions of predefined objects, such as products, companies, persons or transport units. Corresponding emission calculation standards have been developed and their application increased over the past decade. The article discusses this development, the current state of implementation and open questions regarding application and harmonization using the example of the logistic sector. Additionally, the author explores the question, how carbon footprints contribute to CO

A cost-minimizing approach to eliminating the primary sources of greenhouse gas emissions at institutions of higher education

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
David S. Timmons ◽  
Benjamin Weil
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Energy Efficiency ◽  
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Dynamic Pricing ◽  
Institutions Of Higher Education ◽  
Renewable Electricity ◽  
Gas Emissions ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Marginal Costs

Purpose Many institutions of higher education have committed to carbon neutrality. Given this goal, the main economic issue is minimizing cost. As for society as a whole, dominant decarbonization strategies are renewable electricity generation, electrification of end uses and energy efficiency. The purpose of this paper is to describe the optimum combination of strategies. Design/methodology/approach There are four questions for eliminating the primary institutional greenhouse gas emissions: how much renewable electricity to produce on-site; where and at what price to purchase the balance of renewable electricity required; how to heat and cool buildings without fossil fuels; and how much to invest in energy efficiency. A method is presented to minimize decarbonization costs by equating marginal costs of the alternates. Findings The estimated cost of grid-purchased carbon-free energy is the most important benchmark, determining both the optimal level of campus-produced renewable energy and the optimum efficiency investment. In the context of complete decarbonization, greater efficiency investments may be justified than when individual measures are judged only by fossil-fuel savings. Practical implications This paper discusses a theoretically ideal plan and implementation issues such as purchasing carbon-free electricity, calculating marginal costs of conserved energy, nonmarginal cost changes, uncertainty about achieving efficiency targets, and dynamic pricing. The principles described in this study can be used to craft a cost-minimizing decarbonization strategy. Originality/value While previous studies discuss decarbonization strategies, there is little economic guidance on which strategies are optimal, on how to combine strategies to minimize cost or how to identify a preferred path to decarbonization.

A proposed approach to estimate and reduce net greenhouse gas emissions from whole farms

2006 ◽  
Vol 86 (3) ◽  
pp. 401-418 ◽  
Author(s):  
H H Janzen ◽  
D A Angers ◽  
M. Boehm ◽  
M. Bolinder ◽  
R L Desjardins ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Key Words ◽  
Greenhouse Gas Mitigation ◽  
Interactive Effects ◽  
Gas Emissions ◽  
The Past ◽  
Parallel Streams ◽  
Farm Types

Greenhouse gas emissions from farms can be suppressed in two ways: by curtailing the release of these gases (especially N2O and CH4), and by storing more carbon in soils, thereby removing atmospheric CO2. But most practices have multiple interactive effects on emissions throughout a farm. We describe an approach for identifying practices that best reduce net, whole-farm emissions. We propose to develop a “Virtual Farm”, a series of interconnected algorithms that predict net emissions from flows of carbon, nitrogen, and energy. The Virtual Farm would consist of three elements: descriptors, which characterize the farm; algorithms, which calculate emissions from components of the farm; and an integrator, which links the algorithms to each other and the descriptors, generating whole-farm estimates. Ideally, the Virtual Farm will be: boundary-explicit, with single farms as the fundamental unit; adaptable to diverse farm types; modular in design; simple and transparent; dependent on minimal, attainable inputs; internally consistent; compatible with models developed elsewhere; and dynamic (“seeing”into the past and the future). The Virtual Farm would be constructed via two parallel streams - measurement and modeling - conducted iteratively. The understanding built into the Virtual Farm may eventually be applied to issues beyond greenhouse gas mitigation. Key words: CO2, N2O, CH4, agroecosystems, models, climate change

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