Carbon Economy and Carbon Footprint

Climate change is a global concern caused by human activities, notably since the industrial revolution. Observed climate changes and evidences of its impacts on natural and human systems have been increased in the last decades, making climate emergency a priority for a growing number of governments, businesses, organizations and individuals. From the 80s of last century, science has supported key political decisions, in particular within the multilateral framework under the United Nations Framework Convention of Climate Change. The Paris Agreement, adopted in 2015, is the central piece to strengthen the global response to tackle climate change, by keeping the global average temperature to well below 2 °C above pre-industrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 °C at the end of this century. This long-term global temperature goal requires a balance between anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of greenhouse gases around 2050. The transformation of all human activities towards carbon neutrality demands for high innovation and dedicated instruments and tools. Carbon pricing mechanisms promoting clean technologies and processes, and carbon footprint tools quantifying and delivering emissions reduction from products, organizations, cities and individuals, are explored in this chapter.