86
S. Scalbi et al.
Indeed, one of the main purposes of the LIFE Clim’Foot project was to disseminate
in European countries outside the project consortium, a common approach for calculating the CFO with standardized and high-quality databases and the project partners
are committed to support replicability initiatives beyond the end of the project (see
also Sect. 4.4).
4 Application of the Approach in the Italian Context
4.1 The Italian National Database of EFs
Data currently available to perform a CFO study (such as the EF Database by IPCC)
have been mostly developed to fulfill the accounting duties set by the EU legislation at Member State level and for those organizations that contribute most to GHG
emissions (i.e. the most polluting industries), but they do not match the needs of
the totality of EU organizations. Several EFs are provided only with reference to an
international scale (in terms of geographical representativeness), an aspect that raises
a two-fold issue. On the policy side, the lack of national EFs limits the implementation of policies fostering the CFO accounting and reduction. On the organizations’
side, the use of international EFs lowers the accuracy of the results of the CF and
discourages mitigation actions. As a consequence of the current data availability, the
CFO is mostly applied by those organizations able to afford the cost of a deep investigation on EFs, with the support of consultants and/or with the use of commercial
DBs (e.g. LCI DB developed for Life Cycle Assessment).
The Italian DB includes 150 European EFs and 198 country-specific EFs (Table 5).
The DB structure, currently in excel format, is designed to allow the import of data
in a relational DB to improve its replicability and transferability.
4.2 Toward a Growing Use of CFO by the Organizations: The
Voluntary Program for a Bottom-Up Process
The Italian database of contacts included 150 public and private organizations. The
call launched to officially involve the potential end users into the project has received
19 expressions of interest to join the voluntary program. The Italian partners prepared
and sent a survey to identify the key drivers for the participation of the 19 organizations to the voluntary program and to map their expectations. Public organizations
showed interest in the project due to the opportunity to participate in collaborative networks, to exchange ideas and experiences toward a more environmentally
friendly organization. For the private sectors, the project was a good opportunity
to share experiences, and to learn more on climate change and its management to
establish new potential business relationships and to increase competitiveness.
S. Scalbi et al.
Indeed, one of the main purposes of the LIFE Clim’Foot project was to disseminate
in European countries outside the project consortium, a common approach for calculating the CFO with standardized and high-quality databases and the project partners
are committed to support replicability initiatives beyond the end of the project (see
also Sect. 4.4).
4 Application of the Approach in the Italian Context
4.1 The Italian National Database of EFs
Data currently available to perform a CFO study (such as the EF Database by IPCC)
have been mostly developed to fulfill the accounting duties set by the EU legislation at Member State level and for those organizations that contribute most to GHG
emissions (i.e. the most polluting industries), but they do not match the needs of
the totality of EU organizations. Several EFs are provided only with reference to an
international scale (in terms of geographical representativeness), an aspect that raises
a two-fold issue. On the policy side, the lack of national EFs limits the implementation of policies fostering the CFO accounting and reduction. On the organizations’
side, the use of international EFs lowers the accuracy of the results of the CF and
discourages mitigation actions. As a consequence of the current data availability, the
CFO is mostly applied by those organizations able to afford the cost of a deep investigation on EFs, with the support of consultants and/or with the use of commercial
DBs (e.g. LCI DB developed for Life Cycle Assessment).
The Italian DB includes 150 European EFs and 198 country-specific EFs (Table 5).
The DB structure, currently in excel format, is designed to allow the import of data
in a relational DB to improve its replicability and transferability.
4.2 Toward a Growing Use of CFO by the Organizations: The
Voluntary Program for a Bottom-Up Process
The Italian database of contacts included 150 public and private organizations. The
call launched to officially involve the potential end users into the project has received
19 expressions of interest to join the voluntary program. The Italian partners prepared
and sent a survey to identify the key drivers for the participation of the 19 organizations to the voluntary program and to map their expectations. Public organizations
showed interest in the project due to the opportunity to participate in collaborative networks, to exchange ideas and experiences toward a more environmentally
friendly organization. For the private sectors, the project was a good opportunity
to share experiences, and to learn more on climate change and its management to
establish new potential business relationships and to increase competitiveness.