This course will provide in-depth training on the process of GHG accounting for EE actions conducted at a single end user’s site, or at multiple users’ sites included in area-wide programs, and includes a step-by-step process that marries the common requirements of the EE community (IPMVP and other energy efficiency industry references) with the requirements of common international GHG accounting (such as ISO 14064-2 and the UNFCCC’s CDM program).

This course aims to train experts from both the EE and carbon management communities in the special aspects of GHG accounting for EE projects. The course presumes basic knowledge in both fields, focusing on the interface between the two, so that the two existing communities of experts can effectively communicate. Persons new to either field should take note of the course prerequisites in order to maximize the benefit they receive from this course.

A prerequisite for this course is GHGMI’s 202 Basics of Project-Level Accounting or equivalent training or experience elsewhere. It is also expected that students will enter this course with a good understanding of the basics of energy savings accounting as documented in the widely recognized International Performance Measurement and Verification Protocol, Volume I (IPMVP®). Good grounding on the IPMVP may be obtained through independent study, the two-day live workshops offered by the Efficiency Valuation Organization (EVO®) and the Association of Energy Engineers (AEE), or equivalent. Persons carrying the CMVP® designation (Certified Measurement and Verification Professional) will already have such grounding.

The course uses examples from the near infinite number of ways to improve energy efficiency, showing how course methods apply to any type of EE project in industrial, agricultural, commercial and residential facilities. EE methods may involve, for example:

• Industrial processes
• Lighting systems
• Space heating cooling and ventilation systems
• Pumping systems
• Blower systems
• Furnaces, boilers
• Refrigeration, chillers
• Compressed air systems
• Fixed conveyor systems
• Facility-wide multi-faceted EE programs
• New facilities or systems built to be more energy efficient than conventional standards
• Area-wide EE programs conducted by a government or utility

Specifically, after completing this course you will understand:

• the eligible portion of the actual energy savings, considering the common possibility of competing claims to the ownership of emission reductions, and additionality;
• the relevant IPMVP Option (A, B, C or D), measurement boundaries, baselines, baseline adjustments, and energy computations not in IPMVP;
• area-wide EE programs or policies: common evaluation techniques, the role of deemed values, net-to-gross factors;
• GHG emission factors for on-site and off-site GHG source reductions: reference fuel values, electrical grid factors, transmission losses, and converting different GHGs to CO2 equivalent;
• evaluation and management of carbon credit quality;
• carbon credit marketing; and
• requirements for transparent documentation throughout a project’s life.

After completing this course, you will be able to:

• determine the portion of actual energy savings from an EE project that is eligible for reporting under common GHG programs,
• express the eligible energy savings in proper GHG terms, and
• report (or audit) the GHG impacts of EE projects under the rules of common GHG programs.