I. Why Do Parties Do Inventories?

Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), by signing, make commitments “to develop, periodically update, publish and make available…national inventories of anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of all greenhouse gases not controlled by the Montreal Protocol, using comparable methodologies…” (Article 4.1a of the UNFCCC). These annual inventories are to be submitted to the UNFCCC Secretariat and are subject to review under the procedures agreed to by the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the UNFCCC. In other words, Parties have agreed to prepare and submit inventories under international law.

However, there are many other uses for inventory information, including scientific, policy making, and educational. Most Parties utilize inventory information for domestic policy-making purposes.

In addition, international commitments such as the Kyoto Protocol require estimating emissions and removals as part of ensuring that Parties are in compliance with emission limits, that they have a national system for estimating sources and sinks of greenhouse gases, that they submit an inventory annually, and that they formulate national programs to improve the quality of emission factors, activity data, or methods.