Greenhouse gas emissions inventory data acquisition and analytics for low carbon cities

Abstract

This paper studied greenhouse gas inventory data acquisition and analytics for municipalities in Thailand. A complete and transparent GHG inventory of eight municipalities was developed to document the current situation, and to help decision-makers to clarify their priorities for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The Global Protocol for Community-Scale Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventories guidelines was used to investigate and calculate the greenhouse gas emissions and assess data accuracy. The results indicated that the data source, data format, and data collection of each municipality are relatively similar. Moreover, the activity data needed to be obtained from several authorities. The results showed that Nonthaburi Municipality had the highest greenhouse gas emissions at 2,286,838 tCO2e/yr and Buriram Municipality, the lowest at 239,795 tCO2e/yr. On a per-capita basis, Lamphun Municipality was the highest with 10.1 tCO2e/capita and Buriram Municipality the lowest with 3.8 tCO2e/capita. The results suggest that the municipalities should continually develop a GHG database by creating a routine procedure. An information management system should be produced in the shape of big data which can lead to state policies, plans, and actions for city development to ensure the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. This in turn will lead to a low carbon city.