Planning sustainable carbon neutrality pathways: accounting challenges experienced by organizations and solutions from industrial ecology

TL;DR

This paper identifies key accounting challenges in planning organizational carbon neutrality, evaluates current standards, and proposes systemic solutions using industrial ecology tools like LCA and EEIO analysis.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive framework addressing accounting challenges and suggests systemic solutions for organizations aiming for sustainable carbon neutrality.

Findings

Proposes a Measure-Reduce-Neutralize-Control sequence for planning

Identifies 24 accounting challenges in carbon neutrality pathways

Recommends development of open-source life cycle inventory databases

Abstract

Purpose : Planning a transition towards sustainable carbon neutrality at the organization level raises several accounting challenges. This paper aims to shed light on key challenges, highlight answers from current accounting standards and guidance, point out potential inconsistencies or limits, and outline potential solutions from the industrial ecology community through systemic environmental assessment tools, such as life cycle assessment (LCA) and environmentally-extended input-output (EEIO) analysis. Results and discussion: We propose a Measure-Reduce-Neutralize-Control sequence allowing organizations to plan their sustainable net-zero strategy, and discuss 24 accounting challenges occurring within this sequence. We then outline ways forward for organizations planning their carbon neutrality trajectory, pointing to existing resources, and for guidelines providers and the industrial ecology communities to address current limitations in the development of future accounting methods and guidelines. Overarching solutions to many accounting issues are to develop comprehensive, open-source, and high-quality life cycle inventory databases, to enable improved dynamic assessments and prospective LCA through integrated assessment models, to refine methods for assessing mineral scarcity and environmental impacts, the supply in some metals being expected to be a bottleneck to the energy transition, and to identify the appropriate climate metrics for planning sustainable carbon neutrality pathways at the organizational level.