Peru’s public and private sectors join forces with cooperation agencies to reduce short-lived climate pollutant emissions

Since joining the Climate and Clean Air Coalition, Peru’s Ministry of Environment has promoted many actions to reduce emissions of Short Lived Climate Pollutants (SLCPs). An important first milestone is the development of a preliminary national inventory of emissions derived of SCLPs and other pollutants.

With technical support from the United Nations Environment Programme, the Ministry of Environment carried out a consultative process, bringing together experts from several sectors to provide data and technical feedback.

The inventory uses 2010 as its base year, and models emissions until 2050, in order to develop possible scenarios and mitigation measures. Using official data and those provided by sectoral experts, the Long Range Energy Alternatives Planning system-Integrated Benefits Calculator (a tool also known as LEAP-IBC) was used to help estimate the impacts of SLCP emissions on health (by estimating premature deaths), crop loss and climate change.

A workshop was held on July 5, 2017, to enrich preliminary results and finalize the information analysis. Participants included: the Ministry of Energy and Mines, Ministry of Production, Ministry of Agriculture, Ministry of Housing, Building and Sanitation, the National Centre of Strategic Planning, and a number of departments within the Ministry of Environment, including waste management, climate change, meteorology, and glaciers and mountain ecosystems.

Eight private sector and cooperation agencies also took part including the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture, the Swiss Cooperation and Secretariat of Economic affairs, the German cooperation agency, Practical Action, the Netherlands Development Organisation (SNV) and Microsol.

Experts from these participating institutions helped complete the emissions inventory report by providing technical feedback on the methodology and process. A detailed analysis was conducted for every sector including energy, transport, waste management, and agriculture.

Based on this analysis, there were suggestions to improve the inventory by using new sources of information and projections. The input will help the Ministry of Environment’s SLCP Unit finalize the inventory and promote its use as an official tool to analyze and identify mitigation measures. The final report will also help improve sustainable planning in key sectors.

SLCP mitigation measures are part of a group of national level strategies in Peru, including air quality improvement and climate change mitigation, and are aligned with the global sustainable development goals (SGDs).