Emission Factors in Carbon Emission Calculation

When calculating carbon emissions, the emission factor method is one of the commonly used methods. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the basic equation for calculating carbon emissions is:Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions = activity data (AD) × emission factor (EF).

Activity data (AD) is the amount of production or consumption activities that lead to greenhouse gas emissions, such as fossil fuel consumption, net electricity purchases, etc.;The emission factor (EF) is the coefficient of greenhouse gas emissions per unit of production or consumption activity, such as the amount of carbon dioxide emissions corresponding to each unit of fossil fuel consumption, the amount of carbon dioxide emissions corresponding to each kilowatt-hour of electricity purchased, etc.

Emission factors can be determined by searching for appropriate databases. The following are some commonly cited databases.

International :

Ecoinvent Database:

A commercial database provided by the Swiss Ecoinvent Center, whose data mainly comes from authoritative statistical materials and technical literature.

Cabi Database:

The LCI database is provided by Thinkstep of Germany and covers nearly 17,000 process and planning models. These data are mainly derived from the data accumulated by GaBi in the process of cooperation with many enterprises, associations and public institutions around the world.

IPCC EFDB:

This is a database of emission factors and other parameters with background documents or technical references. The provider is the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which operates independently under the auspices of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

China:

Open LCA:

OpenLCA is a professional tool for life cycle modeling and assessment, as well as for performing life cycle assessments (LCAs).

Tiangong LCA database:

The Tiangong LCA database is an open, free, traceable, trustworthy database launched by Professor Xu Ming's team at Tsinghua University. It uses AI technology to mine data and is continuously updated.

CLCD:

The Chinese Life Cycle Database was created by Sichuan University and subsequently developed by Yike Environment. It is an industry database based on the core model of the life cycle of China's basic industrial systems.

CPCD:

China Products Carbon Footprint Factors Database is a database of greenhouse gas emission factors for the entire life cycle of Chinese products organized by the China Greenhouse Gas Working Group (CCG) and is a voluntary organization. The database is built by professional researchers free of charge and on a voluntary basis. The database is fully public.