Introduction

The Voluntary Reporting of Greenhouse Gases Program, required by Section 1605(b) of the Energy Policy Act of 1992, records the results of voluntary measures to reduce, avoid, or sequester greenhouse gas emissions. For the 2005 reporting year, 221 U.S. companies and other organizations reported to the Energy Information Administration (EIA) that they had undertaken 2,379 projects to reduce or sequester greenhouse gases in 2005. The reported greenhouse gas emission reductions for the projects included 294 million metric tons carbon dioxide equivalent (million MTCO2e) of direct reductions, 67 million MTCO2e of indirect reductions, 8 million MTCO2e of reductions from carbon sequestration, and 13 million MTCO2e of unspecified reductions (Table S1). Total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2005 are estimated at 7,147.2 million MTCO2e.

The number of entities (221) reporting to the Voluntary Reporting Program for 2005 is slightly lower than the number that reported for 2004 (232). The number of reporters for 2004 has been revised upward to include six additional entities that filed late reports after the closing of the 2004 database. Unlike previous years, EIA will not make a similar upward revision in the number of 2005 reporters in next year’s report to reflect late reporters for the 2005 reporting cycle. Revised guidelines for the program became effective on June 1, 2006, and as a result EIA has terminated reporting under the original October 1994 guidelines for the program and will not accept late reports for the 2005 data year. EIA currently is developing a new reporting form to meet the revised guidelines and has submitted the form for approval by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act. EIA expects to have the new reporting form approved and new reporting software developed to allow the reporting of 2006 data in the latter half of 2007.

Since the inception of the program in 1994, the number of entities reporting has grown by 105 percent. The number of reported projects has grown at a more rapid rate than the number of reporters. The 2,379 projects reported for 2005 represent an increase of 275 percent over the 634 projects reported in 1994.

Of the 221 organizations reporting for 2005, 118 provided entity-level reports, including estimates of emissions and/or emission reductions for their entire organizations. In addition, 69 of the reporters for 2005 recorded commitments for future actions to reduce emissions.

Of the 118 organizations reporting at the entity level, 111 estimated their 2005 entity-level greenhouse gas emissions. These entities reported direct greenhouse gas emissions of 947.6 million MTCO2e, equal to about 13 percent of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2005. They also reported 86.5 million MTCO2e of indirect emissions, equal to about 1 percent of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions in 2005. Of the 118 entity-level reporters, 111 also reported emission reductions, including 209.0 million MTCO2e of direct emission reductions, 27.6 million MTCO2e of indirect emission reductions, and 7.7 million MTCO2e of emission reductions resulting from carbon sequestration projects.

Who Reported?

Reports for the 2005 data year were submitted by 221 participants in 24 different industries or services (defined by two-digit Standard Industrial Classification codes), a decrease from the 25 different industries represented among 2004 reporters. In comparison, 108 participants in 9 different industries or services submitted reports for the 1994 data year, the first year of the program (Table S2).

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In the early years of the program, reporting was dominated by the electric power sector. In the first reporting year (data year 1994), the 95 submissions from electric power producers represented 88 percent of the 108 reports received (Figure S1). Since then, the program has seen an influx of new participants from outside the electric power sector, representing a diverse set of industries. In addition, several mergers and acquisitions involving reporters to the program have reduced the number of reports received from electricity producers. As a result, only 44 percent of the organizations reporting to the program for data year 2005 were from the electric power sector.

Although the number of reporters from other individual industries remained relatively small, in many cases, key companies in those other industries submitted reports, including: General Motors, Ford Motor Company, DaimlerChrysler Corporation, Nissan North America, Inc., and Toyota Motor North America, Inc., in the automotive products industry; Noranda and an operating division of Alcan in the metals industry; BP America, Sunoco, Inc., and Chevron Corporation in the petroleum industry; Johnson & Johnson and The Dow Chemical Company in the chemicals industry; Rolls Royce in the aerospace industry; Bristol-Myers Squibb Company and Pfizer Pharmaceuticals, LLC, in the pharmaceuticals industry; and IBM in the electronic equipment industry. A complete listing of all 2005 reporters is provided in Table S3.

What Was Reported?

The Voluntary Reporting Program permits three distinct types of reporting:

• Project-level reporting, defined as the reporting of the emission reductions or carbon sequestration achieved as a result of a specific action or group of actions

• Entity-level reporting, defined as the reporting of emissions, emission reductions, and carbon sequestration for an entire organization, usually defined as a corporation

• Commitment reporting, defined as the reporting of pledges to take action to reduce emissions in the future.

Of the 221 reports received for 2005, 188 (85 percent) were submitted on Form EIA-1605 (the long form) (Figure S2). The long form allows reporters to create an in-depth, multi-year, public record of emission reduction efforts for an entire organization and/or for specific actions or projects. Reporting on the long form can include information on activities conducted outside the United States and commitments to reduce future greenhouse gas emissions. The remaining reports were submitted on Form EIA-1605EZ (the short form), which allows reporters to provide only brief summaries of greenhouse gas projects for the current reporting year. The short form does not allow entity-level or commitment reporting, nor does it allow for the reporting of activities outside the United States or of future emission reduction commitments. The proportion of reporters using the short form has decreased from 32 percent in the first year of the program (1994 data year) to 15 percent in the 2005 data reporting cycle. EIA believes that reporters are choosing the long form in order to document their emission reductions more thoroughly.

For the 2005 reporting year, 74 participants reported at both the entity and project levels, 100 submitted only project-level reports, 45 reported only entity-level information, and two designated their reports as confidential. In addition, 69 reporters provided information on their commitments to reduce emissions or to increase sequestration in the future.

Many reporters indicated that their projects were affiliated with one or more Government-sponsored voluntary programs. Among the projects reported, the following U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) programs were cited: EPA’s Landfill Methane Outreach Program (398 projects); various DOE/EPA ENERGY STAR programs, including ENERGY STAR Buildings, ENERGY STAR Computers, and ENERGY STAR Transformers (122 projects); EPA’s Natural Gas STAR Program (24 projects); EPA’s Sulfur Hexafluoride Emissions Reduction Partnership (15 projects); EPA’s WasteWise (11 projects); DOE’s Compressed Air Challenge (9 projects); and EPA’s Coalbed Methane Outreach Program (5 projects). Other voluntary programs cited by reporters included EPA’s Climate Leaders, SmartWay Transport Partnership, Green Lights, and Voluntary Aluminum Industrial Partnership Programs, as well as DOE’s Motor Challenge, Rebuild America, Cool Communities, and Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Information and Training Programs. Not all participants in the various voluntary programs provided information to the Voluntary Reporting Program.

Sources of greenhouse gas emissions and emission reductions reported to the Voluntary Reporting Program are characterized as direct, indirect, sequestered, or unspecified. The unspecified category includes all reductions and sequestration reported on the short form, because the short form does not allow a reporting entity to specify whether an emission reduction is direct or indirect. Because of concern about possible double counting of emissions and reductions, particularly between direct and indirect emissions, EIA does not aggregate reported emissions or emission reductions across these four categories.

Summary Tables

Notes and Sources