Technical guidelines

The National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting (Measurement) Technical Guidelines (NGER technical guidelines) assist corporations to understand and apply the NGER (Measurement) Determination 2008.

The guidelines outline calculation methods and criteria for determining greenhouse gas emissions, energy production and consumption.

Users of the NGER technical guidelines should note that the guidelines are derived from the Measurement Determination. In cases where a corporation perceives a contradiction between the NGER technical guidelines and Measurement Determination, the Measurement Determination takes precedence. The National Greenhouse Account Factors do not apply and have no standing in relation to reporting under the NGER legislation.

Overview

The National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act 2007, the Regulations under that Act and the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting (Measurement) Determination 2008 establish the legislative framework for a national greenhouse and energy reporting system.

These Technical Guidelines embody the latest methods for estimating emissions and are based on the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting (Measurement) Determination 2008 as amended ('the Determination') 1 by the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting (Measurement) Amendment Determination 2011 (No. 1) . The Technical Guidelines provide additional guidance and commentary to assist Reporters in estimating greenhouse gas emissions for reporting under the NGER system and in general are applicable to the 2011-2012 reporting year.

The objectives for the NGER system are set out in the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting Act 2007 (the Act) and include:

  • informing government policy formulation and the Australian public
  • meeting Australia's international reporting obligations
  • assisting Commonwealth, State and Territory government programs and activities
  • underpinning the introduction of an emissions trading scheme in the future, and
  • avoiding duplication of similar reporting requirements in the States and Territories.

Thresholds for reporting

The Act makes reporting mandatory for corporations whose energy production, energy consumption, or greenhouse gas emissions meet certain specified thresholds. These thresholds are detailed in the Regulations.

The Determination was made under subsection 10 (3) of the Act and provides methods, and criteria for methods, for the estimation and measurement of the following items arising from the operation of facilities:

  1. greenhouse gas emissions
  2. the production of energy, and
  3. the consumption of energy.

The structure of the Determination is designed to facilitate the integration of corporate and facility level data provided under the Act with international data standards on greenhouse emissions estimates. Descriptions of emissions sources are based on those provided in the IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories, while estimation methods are based on those used by the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency in preparing the Government's annual submission to the UNFCCC in the National Inventory Report.

Emissions

Emissions are defined in the Regulations as the release of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere as a direct result of scope 1 emissions and scope 2 emissions. These Guidelines are largely concerned with scope 1 emissions. Scope 1 emissions concern emissions released from a facility as a direct result of the activities of the facility.

The greenhouse gases covered by these Guidelines are defined in the Regulations and include:

  • carbon dioxide
  • methane
  • nitrous oxide
  • specified hydrofluorocarbons
  • specified perfluorocarbons, and
  • sulphur hexafluoride.

Scope 2 emissions are a form of indirect emission and are activities that generate electricity, heating, cooling or steam that is consumed by the facility but that do not form part of the facility. They occur principally at electricity generators as a result of electricity consumption at another facility. Scope 2 emissions are covered only in chapter 7.

Coverage of Scope 1 emission sources in the Determination is given by the following categories:

  1. fuel combustion, which deals with emissions released from fuel combustion (see Chapter 2), and
  2. fugitive emissions from fuels, which deals with emissions mainly released from the extraction, production, processing and distribution of fossil fuels (Chapter 3), and
  3. industrial processes emissions, which deals with emissions released from the consumption of carbonates and the use of fuels as feedstocks or as carbon reductants, and the emission of synthetic gases in particular cases (see Chapter 4), and
  4. waste emissions, which deals with emissions mainly released from the decomposition of organic material in landfill or wastewater handling facilities (see Chapter 5).

The most important source is emissions from fuel combustion, which accounts for over 60 per cent of the emissions reported in the national greenhouse gas inventory. The scope of the Determination does not include land based emissions covered by the UNFCCC categories 'Agriculture' and 'Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry'. However, emissions from fuel combustion or any other emission source listed above and which occurs from a facility operating within a land-based industry are, nonetheless, covered by the Determination.

Updates of these Guidelines

It is recognised that these Technical Guidelines will need to be updated as new information on emissions estimation methods becomes available. This will need to be balanced against the need to maintain time-series consistency of the emissions data as far as possible. Reflecting the need for this balance, it is planned that these Guidelines will be updated each year only for updated Scope 2 emission factors (see Chapter 7), while other revisions will occur on a periodic basis. It is planned that the Technical Guidelines will be updated periodically to:

  • provide Methods for emission sources where currently there are gaps or omissions in the Methods currently available
  • take account of new documentary standards applicable to the estimation of emissions under Methods 2, 3 and 4
  • take account of new information in relation to Method 1 emission factors, and
  • take account of new information in relation to the Methods detailed in the Determination.

A full review of emission factors used for Method 1 was completed in 2010, through a discussion paper and external submission process. The review compared default factors used in the NGER (Measurement) Determination with the factors used by Annex 1 countries as part of their annual inventory report under the Kyoto Protocol or UNFCCC. Where information is available the default factors were also compared with facility specific data collected under the first year of reporting under NGERS. This review and submissions process completed a commitment to review the factors and methods within 5 years of the initial release of the NGER Determination in 2008.

This review informed a number of updates to the Determination as well as setting out a work program for further review.

The Department will continue to refine and elaborate the Determination as other issues arise from ongoing consultation, and domestic and international developments.