Sri Lanka endorses new system to measure, verify and report its industrial greenhouse gas emissions
Sri Lanka’s 2030 goal of cutting industry sector greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 7 per cent got a boost last week at a workshop in Colombo when key stakeholders endorsed a new system designed to track manufacturing emissions and ultimately help tackle global warming.
With support from the EU-funded Accelerating Industries’ Climate response in Sri Lanka project, the Climate Change Secretariat has been leading a group of key public and private stakeholders to consolidate existing methods for GHG data collection and reporting into a single robust system that will cover the national industrial sector. Through the project, the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) fielded international experts to provide technical support to this important process.
The workshop marked 10-months of collaboration between the key stakeholders to devise and test the new system. Last week’s workshop was an opportunity for everyone involved to share their experiences after trialing the new system and to discuss any issues. The session concluded with participants endorsing the new system as fit for purpose.
This represents an important milestone for Sri Lanka as setting up such measurement, verification and reporting (MRV) systems helps decision makers to understand GHG sources and trends, but also to design strategies and make informed decisions about mitigation. A well functioning national MRV system is also essential for Sri Lanka to report against its national determined contributions every two years and meet the international climate goals it has committed to under the Paris Agreement.
MRV systems are also good for industry. They provide critical information about emission sources and trends, helping businesses to increase their energy efficiency and take decisions on where to reduce their emissions. These systems are key to guarantee transparency, precision and comparability on climate change information.
With the system now tested and endorsed by the key stakeholders involved, the next step is to start rolling it out. It is expected that the system will be fully up and running by mid-2024, enabling Sri Lanka to confidently monitor, report and take action on industry emissions.
Check the MRV Factsheet.