Background 

The Initiative for Climate Action Transparency (ICAT) aims to help countries better assess the impacts of their climate policies and actions, and fulfil their transparency commitments. It does this by increasing the overall transparency capacities of countries, including the capacity to assess the contribution of climate policies and actions on countries’ development objectives, and providing appropriate methodological information and tools to support evidence-based policy-making.

ICAT’s innovative approach is to integrate these two aspects. ICAT focuses on countries that can highlight the benefits of increased transparency to demonstrate policy impact and evidence-based action. ICAT will generate evolving methodological guidance and extract best practices, to be publicly available to all actors, increasing the global knowledge base. ICAT’s work is country-driven, efforts build on existing Monitoring, Reporting and Verification (MRV) systems and knowledge in countries and complement previous or on-going activities by other initiatives, where applicable. 

As the number of countries including actions that reduce short-lived climate pollutants (SLCPs) and other air pollutants within their climate change plans increases, it is important to consider how progress on SLCP and air pollutant mitigation can be monitored as part of or coordinated with climate change MRV frameworks. With support from the Climate and Clean Air Coalition (CCAC) Supporting National Action and Planning (SNAP) initiative, some countries have incorporated SLCPs and air pollutants within climate change MRV documents and reports submitted to the UNFCCC. 

The majority of countries, however, do not quantify SLCP emissions, or track progress on those policies and measures that target major SLCP and air pollution sources. This is a missed opportunity to maximize synergy and reap co-benefits from air pollution and climate mitigation actions. While the IPCC will expand its emission inventory guidance to include methods for all short-lived climate forcers, covering all SLCPs as well as major air pollutants, the integration of these pollutants into national GHG inventory systems is not guaranteed. In addition, there are elements beyond estimation of the emissions that can be included in MRV frameworks and methods for this need to be defined. In particular, the assessment of the impacts of policies and measures on projected emissions, air quality and associated health impacts is gaining prominence. As countries are in the process of setting up these systems, it appears very timely to propose an approach for the integration of SLCPs and air quality into climate change MRV frameworks. 

In order to encourage and support this, ICAT and the CCAC SNAP initiative are partnering to develop and disseminate a guide on the inclusion of SLCPs and air pollutants in climate change MRV frameworks. Building on existing ICAT assessment guides, in particular the ICAT Sustainable Development Methodology, the objective of this guide will be to provide information and examples to national practitioners regarding the benefits and methodologies for tracking short-lived climate pollutants and air pollutants as part of MRV frameworks consistent with the Paris Agreement’s Enhanced Transparency Framework. The target audience is primarily national policy makers, regulators and agencies involved in MRV, but also encompasses the wider group of stakeholders that contribute to or are impacted by MRV efforts. The guide is envisioned to then be used by CCAC and ICAT partners, but will also be more widely distributed, including to the countries where CCAC and ICAT have projects.

This enhanced capacity will also include an increased ability to identify and evaluate the multiple benefits of different mitigation measures to improve air quality and mitigate climate change, integrate SLCP and air pollutant mitigation within climate change policy planning processes and climate change MRV frameworks, and will result in an increased level of commitment and implementation of key identified actions.

This project provides an opportunity for CCAC to collaborate with key organisations, and influence national climate change MRV frameworks that are being developed. It provides ICAT with an opportunity to link up to a different community and respond to requests by countries that it supports for a methodology to integrate air quality into their climate-related assessments. As countries revise their NDCs, and attention turns to implementation, the inclusion of SLCPs and other air pollutants in MRV frameworks is essential if climate change commitments are to be achieved in the most cost-effective way taking full account of SLCP and air pollution benefits. 

The CCAC is one of the few institutions that has provided support to countries to track progress on SLCPs within climate change MRV systems, e.g. through the inclusion of SLCPs in GHG inventories, National Communications and Biennial Update Reports in Ghana, Mexico, Chile, and Costa Rica. This activity builds on progress and experience CCAC has gained, but also links to experts in MRV, such as those collaborating under ICAT, who have already developed clear guidance documents on other aspects of climate change MRV and would be able to use this additional methodology as part of their work. In this context, this call for proposals aims at selecting a suitable partner to work with ICAT to develop a guide on the inclusion of SLCPs and air pollutants in climate change MRV frameworks.

Description of Scope of Work

The proposed guide will build on ICAT’s existing series of assessment guides and highlight considerations and methodologies that are specific to the inclusion of short-lived climate pollutants and air pollutants. The guide will encompass all aspects of MRV, including quality assurance and verification. Some aspects can be covered through references to other existing ICAT guides such as the stakeholder participation guide and the technical review guide as well as SNAP guidance documents such as National Planning for reducing short-lived climate pollutants or Opportunities for Increasing Ambition of Nationally Determined Contributions through Integrated Air Pollution and Climate Change Planning: A Practical Guidance document. 

Measures that mitigate GHGs and SLCPs can also reduce the emissions of air pollutants that cause health impacts due to exposure indoors and outdoors and lead to reductions in crop yields. The document will outline practically how climate change policies and measures can be assessed in terms of their impact on air pollution, so that these impacts can be reported in climate change reporting, such as Biennial Transparency Reports, and considered in further policy development including future NDC enhancement. If relevant, impacts of air pollution abatement policies on GHG emissions should be also assessed. 

The document shall provide practical guidance on how countries can consider air pollution within the assessment of climate change policies and measures and offer examples of how some countries have integrated SLCP and air pollutant mitigation into national MRV systems, and the benefits that they have achieved from it. The target audience for this guide are planners and technical staff within Ministries of Environment and, as appropriate other sectoral ministries, who would be in charge of the national MRV system and those who would undertake related inventory work and assessments of air pollution impacts of climate change policies, and therefore the guide aims to provide methods and steps to achieve this. The guide shall draw on examples from low, middle and high-income countries to outline the benefits of integrating SLCP and air pollutant mitigation in national MRV systems and the practicalities of applying this approach. The guide will be piloted in existing CCAC SNAP projects and in ICAT country projects.

Expected outcome

In the above context the selected grantee is expected to draft a guide on the inclusion of SLCPs and air pollutants in climate change MRV frameworks.

Specific activities to be funded are detailed in the 'ICAT Grant Call for Proposals - CFP-11875-2021-02 - Air Pollutants Guide' document attached herewith.

Entities interested in submitting proposals in response to this CFP are hereby invited to prepare proposals in accordance with the requirements and procedure set out in this CFP by 9 February 2021, 17:00 CEST.

Returnable forms (Annex A and Annex B attached herewith) are to be submitted to icat@unops.org.