Page 16 - Methodology to assess Net Zero progress in cities

2 Businesses and labour size (industry, service and farming sectors).
3 Transportation (public and private), which now evolves to an electric vehicle (EV) charging
network.

4 Public lighting (street and open space lighting, fountain operation).

5 Water and sewage treatment and distribution.
6 Waste chain operation (collection, delivery and processing).

7 Telecommunication networks.

8 Land uses.

The following formula can be used to calculate the produced emissions of a sector:

GHG emissions = Activity data × Emission factor (1)
2

Formula (1) can be measured different times for each sector, and the results can be compared to
highlight whether the produced emissions have decreased or not.

On the other hand, for a product or service, the produced emission should be calculated based
on the entire lifecycle (Figure 1). For instance, for a construction facility product, the following
formula (2) depicts the baseline calculation methodology of the produced emission (Construction
Leadership Council, 2019):

A = Estimated cost of bridge = USD 5 million

B = Industry average of GHG emissions per USD spent = 0.224 kgCO e per USD 3
2
A x B = 1 120 tCO e for delivery of the construction product (2)
2

Moreover, the European Union (EU) has launched a large-scale initiative called the 100 European
Climate Neutral Cities, which has defined specific indicators to measure their performance.

1 Scope 1 GHG emissions for the city within the geographic boundary (mandatory from the
beginning of the mission). This indicator will be calculated based on the emissions from
buildings, industry, transport, waste treatment (solid waste and wastewater), agriculture and
forestry, and other activities.

2 Activity data are a quantitative measure of a level of activity that results in GHG emissions taking place during a given
period (e.g., volume of gas used, kilometers driven, tons of solid waste sent to landfill). An emission factor is a measure of
the mass of GHG emissions relative to a unit of activity. For example, estimating CO emissions from the use of electricity
2
involves multiplying data on kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity used by the emission factor (kgCO /kWh) for electricity,
2
which will depend on the technology and type of fuel used to generate the electricity (ICLEI, 2021).
3 The value of each USD is different for each economic sector. For instance, USD 1 for building upgrades contribute differ-
ently to USD 1 spent for a car replacement by an electric vehicle.

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