CEP Climate Change & Carbon Footprint 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: In a community-scale greenhouse gas inventory, which Scope category encompasses value chain emissions that are not owned or directly controlled by the reporting city?
- Scope 1
- Scope 2
- Scope 3 (Correct answer)
- Scope 4
Correct answer: Scope 3
Scope 3 encompasses all other indirect emissions in an organization's value chain, such as employee commuting, waste disposal, and supply chain activities not owned or controlled by the city.
Question 2: Which term describes a community's capacity to anticipate, prepare for, respond to, and adapt to incremental change and sudden disruptions related to climate change?
- Climate mitigation
- Carbon neutrality
- Climate resilience (Correct answer)
- Ecosystem services valuation
Correct answer: Climate resilience
Climate resilience refers to the ability of social-ecological systems to absorb, accommodate, and recover from climate-related stressors while maintaining essential structure and function.
Question 3: Under CEQA, a qualified Climate Action Plan (CAP) adopted by a local agency can be used to do which of the following for consistent development projects?
- Replace all future environmental impact reports within the jurisdiction
- Streamline GHG analysis by allowing projects to tier off the plan (Correct answer)
- Permanently exempt transportation projects from GHG review
- Establish binding federal carbon reduction targets for the city
Correct answer: Streamline GHG analysis by allowing projects to tier off the plan
A qualified CAP under CEQA allows individual development projects that are consistent with the plan's GHG reduction measures to tier off the plan, streamlining project-level GHG analysis.
Question 4: What is a 'carbon offset' in the context of environmental planning and GHG accounting?
- A government-imposed tax on carbon emissions
- A verified emission reduction used to compensate for emissions produced elsewhere (Correct answer)
- A type of renewable energy certificate traded on energy markets
- A unit used to measure soil carbon content in agricultural fields
Correct answer: A verified emission reduction used to compensate for emissions produced elsewhere
A carbon offset represents a verified reduction or removal of one metric ton of CO2-equivalent from the atmosphere that an organization can use to compensate for its own unavoidable emissions.
Question 5: The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was jointly established in 1988 by which two United Nations bodies?
- UNDP and UNESCO
- UNEP and WMO (Correct answer)
- WHO and FAO
- UNFCCC and UNEP
Correct answer: UNEP and WMO
The IPCC was established in 1988 by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) to assess scientific information relevant to climate change.
Question 6: Which greenhouse gas accounting framework, implemented through ICLEI's ClearPath software, is most widely used by U.S. local governments to inventory community-scale emissions?
- ISO 14064 Standard
- The Corporate GHG Protocol
- The Global Protocol for Community-Scale GHG Inventories (GPC) (Correct answer)
- EPA's Mandatory Greenhouse Gas Reporting Rule
Correct answer: The Global Protocol for Community-Scale GHG Inventories (GPC)
The Global Protocol for Community-Scale GHG Inventories (GPC), implemented through ICLEI's ClearPath platform, is the predominant framework used by U.S. cities and counties for community emissions inventories.
Question 7: In GHG accounting, what is unique about the 'land use, land-use change, and forestry' (LULUCF) sector?
- It requires federal permits for all land-clearing activities
- It can function as both a net source and a net sink of GHG emissions (Correct answer)
- It only tracks emissions from agricultural tillage practices
- It is excluded from all national GHG inventories under the Paris Agreement
Correct answer: It can function as both a net source and a net sink of GHG emissions
LULUCF is unique because it can be a net emitter (deforestation, land conversion) or a net carbon sink (reforestation, improved forest management), making it a critical lever in climate mitigation planning.
CEP Climate Change & Carbon Footprint 2
In a community-scale greenhouse gas inventory, which Scope category encompasses value chain emissions that are not owned or directly controlled by the reporting city?