Greenhouse gas emissions in the Netherlands 1990, 1991, 1992 and projections for 1990-2010

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was ratified by the Netherlands in December 1993. One of the obligations is to provide a National Communication on greenhouse gas emissions, projections and programmes to reduce these emissions. This background report was written at the request of the Dutch Ministry of Housing, Physical Planning and Environment as a background report for the first Dutch National Communication for the Framework Convention on Climate Change. It documents the methodologies, both for estimating greenhouse gas emissions and sinks, and for projections. For the most important greenhouse gases, it gives estimates for 1980, 1985, 1990, 1991 and 1992, and projections of possible future emissions in 2000 and 2010 under two scenarios. The short-term aim of the Convention is stabilization of emissions between 1990 and 2000. Therefore 1990 was chosen as the base year for emission estimation and 2000 as the base year for evaluation. Emissions were estimated using internationally agreed IPCC methodology as well as methodology used in the Netherlands. The differences between the methods are explicitly explained. Carbon dioxide emissions were estimated with and without a temperature correction. The original Dutch policy method estimates emissions including feedstock use. For methane and nitrous oxide emissions, Dutch emission factors were applied instead of IPCC defaults. As more sources were found for nitrous oxide in the Netherlands, the Dutch emission was higher than when strictly applying IPCC methodology.