Irish Environmental Protection Agency

Aether supports the Irish Environmental Protection Agency with the preparation and submission of Ireland’s National Emissions Inventory of Greenhouse Gases (GHG) under the EU Monitoring Mechanism and Air Quality Pollutants under the National Emissions Ceiling Directive (NECD). Aether also supports the compilation and preparation of the National Air Quality Inventory and associated Informative Inventory Report (IIR) in line with the Convention for Long Range Transfer of Air Pollutants (CLRTAP), as well as the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory and report required by the UNFCCC.

Aether also provides technical support to the EPA for the compilation and quality assurance of GHG projections, policies and measures (PaMs), and the reporting of air pollution policies and measures under the NECD.

The challenge

Ireland is required to report air emissions data following the reporting schedule in the table below. Considerable resources and expertise are required to meet these reporting needs. The EPA identified a need for supplementary expertise to support their team.

Ireland is required, under the Monitoring Mechanism Regulation (MMR), to submit a Greenhouse Gas (GHG) inventory and projections to the European Commission (EC). Ireland is also required to submit a greenhouse gas inventory to the UNFCCC. Alongside these submissions, Ireland is required to provide additional information in the form of a National Inventory Report (NIR), a summary of this report (short NIR), a number of reporting templates providing the EC with additional information, and an Informative Inventory Report (IIR) under the CLRTAP.

Ireland is required to report on their national climate mitigation policies and measures (PaMs) biennially under the MMR. From 2019, Ireland is also now required to report periodically on their national additional air pollution mitigation PaMs considered to meet their emission reduction commitments under the NECD.

The solution

Aether specialises in the planning, preparation, management and review of emissions inventories. Our team has a wealth of expertise in the compilation and reporting of air quality and GHG emission inventories, projections and PaMs, including experts with over 20 years’ experience in this field. As such, we were able to provide the EPA with a highly qualified team of experts to support their compilation tasks. We understand the importance of flexibility, and Aether was able to provide the EPA with experts that could work from their offices in Monaghan and Wexford alongside Ireland’s experts. We were also able to ensure that these experts were available during the critical periods of inventory compilation. One of our key aims is to ensure that we transfer skills and knowledge to the people that we work with.

The result

For over six years, Aether has provided the EPA with a highly skilled team of inventory experts able to work in-country across the core inventory compilation period. Using our expertise, we have provided innovative solutions to the inventory development whilst supporting the maintenance of a high-quality inventory system. We have provided a flexible solution to ensure that the EPA are able to get the support they need when required.

We have now reached a point where the Irish EPA has an expanded team of knowledgeable experts, who are more than capable of producing the high-quality outputs on an annual basis. This is great to see, and whilst our input will no doubt decline in the coming years, we recognise that we have played a part in developing processes that will continue in our absence.

Our support has more recently shifted to focus on specific technical inventory expertise, quality assurance of projections, and preparation of climate and air pollution PaMs information. We have developed a database for the estimation of GHG savings from Ireland’s energy efficiency climate policies which are reported under the MMR. Additionally, we have used our expertise in National Air Pollution Control Programmes and air pollution PaMs to support Ireland in the preparation and submission of their air pollution PaMs under consideration under the NECD.

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