ESS 333: Counting Carbon for Climate Action

Course Description

It's often said that you can't manage what you don't measure. In that spirit, this course will explore and practice approaches for estimating CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions of different activities across different scales of space, time, and organizational levels. We will then discuss the usefulness of these emissions estimates for identifying, planning, and monitoring climate mitigation efforts. The course will be structured around the different scales of emissions accounting (e.g., global, national, city-level, project-level, etc.). At each scale, we will cover the current state-of-practice, data, and science in estimating emissions and reduction opportunities, including relevant institutional and policy context. For projects, pairs of students will work together with the instructors to identify an area or application of carbon accounting they're interested in. This could be related to standards or policies (e.g., GHG Protocol, CSRD, SB253, etc.), a particular emission pathway (methane from livestock, deforestation, etc.), solutions (tree planting, regenerative agriculture, SAFs etc.), tool (e.g., Cool Farm Toolkit), or corporate disclosures and target-setting (e.g., CDP, SBTi). Students will be asked to present on their idea and interim progress throughout the quarter.