2.3.2.4 Activities and Projects
Chapter 5 defines a project as a planned scheme that
integrates one or more types of activity, aimed at reducing GHG emissions or
enhancing GHG sinks in the LULUCF and related sectors. A project is confined
to a specific geographic location, time period, and institutional framework
to allow GHG impacts to be adequately monitored and verified. Although Parties
are free to select the projects they wish to report under Articles 6 and 12,
Article 3.3 requires that the effects of ARD activities "shall" be reported
everywhere they occur within the country. The approach to reporting any additional
activities adopted under Article 3.4 is to be decided by the COP.
An important relationship exists between Article 6 projects and Article 3 activities.
Article 3.11 requires Parties that host Article 6 projects to subtract from
their assigned amounts all emissions reduction units (ERUs) transferred to other
parties. If an Article 6 project in the LULUCF sector does not consist only
of Article 3.3 or 3.4 activities, the host Party will not be able to make an
adjustment to its assigned amount corresponding to the ERUs transferred by the
project. Furthermore, because Article 6 projects must provide a reduction or
removal that is "additional" to any that would otherwise occur, Article 3.3
or 3.4 activities used in such projects must be additional to business-as-usual.
Any ambiguities about what is an applicable activity under Articles 3.3 and
3.4 would raise an important compliance question. An international verification
system would have a reasonable chance of detecting unreported decreases in stocks
but might have considerably more difficulty identifying whether this decrease
resulted from an applicable activity. Governments and private entities have
a greater incentive to report activities that give rise to removals than those
that give rise to emissions. Removals contribute to the fulfillment of obligations,
whereas emissions make fulfillment more difficult. This factor may lead the
Parties to resolve any ambiguities about what may be an applicable activity
by overreporting activities that result in removals and underreporting activities
that result in emissions. For the purposes of compliance, the Parties may want
to adopt a rule that presumes that decreases in stocks result from applicable
activities and increases in stocks do not result from such activities, unless
the Party concerned demonstrates otherwise. Alternatively, for each activity,
Parties might be required to specify in advance-as well as monitor and report
on-the land base to which the activity could potentially apply. Parties would
be required to report all increases and decreases occurring on these specified
land bases.
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