Accounting for greenhouse gases

The first greenhouse gas accounting standard that businesses can use to uniformly report emissions was unveiled on October 23 by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), an international business coalition of more than 150 companies, and the World Resources Institute (WRI), a U.S. think tank. Developed over a three-year period by a partnership of more than 350 individuals from nonprofit organizations, corporations, and governments, the Greenhouse Gas Protocol uses financial accounting practices and will allow companies to generate information for internal management, as well as provide data that complements other initiatives, such as the United Kingdom’s Emissions Trading Scheme. The protocol addresses the six greenhouse gases identified in the international Kyoto Protocol on climate change and is supplemented with a number of calculation tools that can be found at www.ghgprotocol.org. —CATHERINE M. COONEY