Introduction

The most basic way to describe the UNFCCC Common Reporting Format (CRF) is to call it the standardized database companion to the National Inventory Report (NIR). The NIR can be considered the user manual for a Party’s emissions data. The CRF contains the numbers, while the NIR describes how those numbers were produced.

The most important characteristic of the CRF is indicated by the first word in its name: “Common.” The CRF ensures that there is one standardized reporting format (including consistent categories and definitions) that all Parties use. Without the CRF it would be almost impossible to compare emissions from
Parties except at a national aggregate level.

The CRF includes 53 separate tables (some tables are broken up into multiple sheets because of their size). Each set of CRF tables includes data for one inventory reporting year (except for Table 10 on Emission Trends). In addition, Parties normally submit a set of tables for each reporting year (e.g., 1990 to 2007). Therefore a complete CRF submission in 2008 for a Party may include up to 901 tables (53 tables times 17 years).

Like their simpler predecessor, the IPCC Reporting tables, the CRF include data on all IPCC sectors in addition to a number of summary tables. The source and sink definitions are based upon the IPCC categorization scheme, which is also used to number scheme from the IPCC (i.e., the Energy Sector Table in Figure 2).