More topics

Public sector Climate Change Accountability Reports

Last updated on June 27, 2024

The public sector Climate Change Accountability Reports (CCAR) are annual reports that all provincial public sector organizations (PSO) must publicly post to be carbon neutral.

CCAR reporting provides a record of each PSO’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, offset purchases and reduction plans and actions. The CCAR offers a valuable idea bank for organizations seeking to reduce their own energy use and carbon footprint.

View the PSO CCARs and annual summary reports.

2023 highlights

  • PSOs generated 732,834 tonnes of total GHG emissions from their operations
  • Some PSOs are transitioning away from fossil fuels to biogenic sources to reduce their emissions. 51,335 tonnes of GHG emissions came from use of biogenic sources, which are renewable material such as wood waste and renewable natural gas
  • PSOs saw a 5 percent decrease in total emissions in 2023 compared to 2022, likely due to milder temperatures resulting in less energy to heat and cool buildings
  • Over the past 14 years, public sector emissions from fossil fuel use decreased by 147,420 tCO2e or 18 percent, which primarily came from two areas:
    • a 19 percent drop in building emissions
    • a 10 percent reduction in fleet emissions, largely attributed to BC Transit beginning to transition to renewable natural gas

B.C. public sector emissions

The table summarizes the emissions reported by PSOs over the 2023 calendar year and compares them with the 2010 baseline. Emissions are expressed in tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2e).

Public sector emissions
  2010 emissions (tCO2e)
(baseline)		 2023 emissions (tCO2e) % reduction
Total emissions 833,964 732,834 12
Offset exempt emissions1 78,844 60,294 24
Bio-CO2 emissions2 5,044 51,335 n/a
Net offsettable emissions 750,076 621,205 17
Total fossil fuel emissions3 828,920 681,499 18

Footnotes:

1 In accordance with the Carbon Neutral Government Regulation, emissions from school and transit buses must be reported, but are exempt from offset requirements

2 Bio-CO2 emissions are produced from the combustion of biogenic fuels (for example, wood waste for heating, renewable vehicle fuels) and are also offset exempt

3 Fossil fuel emissions exclude all Bio-CO2

Additional notes:

  • In addition to the 621,205 offsets required for 2023, an additional 2,026 offsets were retired to reflect adjustments to previously reported years to ensure all regulated emissions were accounted for
  • Due to rounding, numbers presented above may not add up to precisely to the totals reported