Comments on issues related to Articles 5, 7 and 8
Government of Japan
In response to a request by the SBSTA at its twelfth session, Japan submits its views on guidelines under Articles 5, 7 and 8.
In Japan's view, the COP6 decisions should clearly define what obligations under Articles 5,7 and 8 will be imposed to each Annex I Party, as well as how these Articles, the Kyoto Mechanism and Compliance will be inter-linked. Japan believes that such decisions are essential for Parties to move forward their ratification of the Protocol.
| Comments on guidelines under Article 8 | |
| General approach to review | |
| Review prior to the first commitment period | |
| Whether and how the review prior to the first commitment period should be conducted is closely linked to how each Party's "mechanisms eligibility" should be reviewed, and therefore, relevant provisions of the guidelines under Article 8 should be elaborated taking into account the discussions of the mechanisms group. | |
| Nevertheless, according to the provisions of the protocol, each Annex I Party has some obligations prior to the first commitment period, including | |
| a) | to have in place, no later than one year prior to the start of the first commitment period, a national system for the estimation of anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks, in accordance with Article 5.1; |
| b) | to have made demonstrable progress in achieving its commitments under the Protocol, in accordance with Article 3.2. |
| In relation to such obligations, each Annex I Party might have to undergo review under Article 8 for, at least, the following elements: | |
| a) | a national system for the estimation of anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks, in accordance with Article 5.1; |
| in relation to the obligation with Article 3.2 above, | |
| b) | the annual inventory of anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks for 20051; and |
| c) | the national communication under the Convention |
| In addition, the initial assigned amount of each Annex I Party should be calculated by each Party, and be established through the review under Article 8 before the start of the commitment period, as the early establishment of initial assigned amount would provide each Party with the concrete target, and would contribute to stable operation of the Kyoto Mechanisms. | |
| Japan also notes that there might be other information to be reported under Article 7.2 prior to the commitment period. Such information, if any, should be subject to review following submission of the information by a Party. | |
| The timing of the review of each of the above-mentioned elements will depend on the timing of submission by a Party, and need further consideration. | |
| Annual review | |
| The in-country visit should be conducted once during the commitment period, in conjunction with the periodic review for each Annex I Party. However, the ERT for the in-country visit would consist of two parts; one is for national communication, and the other is for inventory related information. Any changes in the national system and national registry should only be subject to the annual review if a Party reports the changes. In such a case the secretariat should select experts for the review of such information as members of the ERT for that Party. Such information should be reviewed together with other elements to be reviewed annually. | |
| Annual compilation and accounting of emissions inventories and assigned amounts | |
| In our view, the purpose of this process is to provide the COP/moP with aggregate information on emissions and assigned amounts for all Annex I Parties for each year of the commitment period | |
| Japan considers that the inventory-related and assigned amount information of each Annex I Party, including cumulative emissions and adjustments, should be included in the report of individual review, which would be forwarded to the compliance body. Thus the annual compilation and accounting for each Party would be duplicative and unnecessary. | |
| We envisage that annual compilation and accounting would be conducted as follows: | |
| - | for every year of the commitment period, the secretariat would compile and account the cumulative emissions for the years from 2008 up to that year and assigned amounts of all Annex I Parties following the completion of review of such information submitted under Article 7, paragraph 1, by each Annex I Party. The report of the annual compilation and accounting of emissions inventories and assigned amount would be prepared by the secretariat and would be forwarded to the COP/moP. |
| - | for the final year of the commitment period, such compilation and accounting would be initially conducted following the completion of review of such information submitted under Article 7, paragraph 1, by each Annex I Party. After the 'true-up' period (to be defined in the compliance text), the secretariat would revise the compilation and accounting based on the information of each Party's activities during the 'true-up' period. The report of the revised annual compilation and accounting would be prepared by the secretariat and would be forwarded to the COP/moP. How to report the information on each Party's activities during the 'true-up' period, and how to review such information before the revision of the compilation and accounting should be further elaborated. |
| Reporting | |
| All final review reports2 should be forwarded to the compliance body and the COP/moP through the secretariat. It is the compliance body that determines if the Party is in compliance or not based on the reports. | |
| Expert review team | |
| The Article 8 review would require huge amount of work by experts, hence 'ad-hoc' ERTs would not be appropriate. We support the establishment of a standing body of experts to conduct reviews under Article 8, in particular the annual review. Such a body would be supplemented by experts from the roster maintained by the secretariat to be used on an ad-hoc basis. While expert review teams should have access to information necessary to conduct the technical review under Article 8, any confidential information should be protected properly. We suggest adding the following text, which is similar to the sentence included in the Mechanisms text. | |
| Expert review teams shall ensure the confidentiality of any information that was marked by the provider as proprietary or confidential, where such information is not otherwise publicly available. | |
| Review of national inventory submission | |
| Identification of question of implementation | |
| According to the provisions of the protocol, the 'question of implementation' under Article 8.3, which is also referred to in Article 6.4, should be identified through the Article 8 review process and indicated in the review report. Thus it is not necessary to involve the compliance body to identify the 'question of implementation'. The guidelines under Article 8, therefore, should provide guidance on how such 'question of implementation' is identified by expert review teams. We suggest the following procedure. | |
| When any questions are found in the review in accordance with Article 8, the Party should be provided with the opportunity to answer such questions, clarify issues or provide additional information. Such questions should not be considered as "questions of implementation" under Article 8.3. | |
| If the expert review team finds the answer and any additional information from the Party unsatisfactory, and also finds that there is sufficient information to raise the questions officially, it should mention it in its draft report with the information, and send the draft to the Party. | |
| Then, the Party should have an opportunity to express its views and to provide explanatory text to be included in the report. If the team still finds that there is sufficient information to support the questions, the team should forward its final review report with the explanatory text provided by the Party, through the secretariat to COP/moP and the compliance body, indicating that the team still finds the questions to be pursued. Then, the questions should be considered as "questions of implementation" under Article 8.3. | |
| What constitutes 'question of implementation' could be linked to the classification of 'first order' problems, and needs to be further discussed. | |
| Procedures for adjustments in accordance with Article 5.2 | |
| As we expressed in June session, we would like to add another option on the procedures for adjustments under Article 5.2. | |
| 1) | An adjustment may be calculated by an Annex I Party in accordance with the recommendations of an expert review team; |
| 2) | The expert review team shall decide whether to accept or reject the adjustment; |
| 3) | If the Annex I Party's adjustment is rejected by the expert review team, the expert review team shall calculate an adjustment and recommend it to the Annex I Party; |
| 4) | The Annex I Party shall decide whether to accept the adjustment; |
| 5) | If the Annex I Party disagrees with the expert review team's recommendation, this shall be notified to the compliance body through the final review report. The compliance body shall consider the report and determine whether the adjustment recommended by the review team shall be applied. |
| Time-scale for each step of the review process | |
| The annual inventory review for each Annex I Party should be completed as expeditiously as possible, and there should be timeframes for each step of the review process. However, the time-scale allowed for a Party to respond should be sufficient for collecting additional information and for the internal co-ordination. We should consider such time-scales taking into account the experience gained through the technical review of annual inventories on a trial basis and language difficulty of Parties. | |
| Review of national registries | |
| This part of the guidelines should be elaborated once any guidelines on national registries, or at least, elements of such guidelines are agreed. Nonetheless it should be noted that it is impossible for a Party to establish accounts for 'all' legal entities within its national registry, and that a Party should have discretion on whether and which legal entities within its jurisdiction should be involved in each of the Kyoto mechanisms. Therefore, one of the purposes of the review of national registries would be to review if each legal entity authorized by a Party to hold units of assigned amount has established a separate holding account within the Party's national registry. | |
| Review of Information related to Article 6 | |
| To be elaborated after a discussion in the Mechanism Group.
| |
| Comments on guidelines under Article 7.1 | |
| Information related to Articles 3.3 and 3.4 | |
| Detailed guidelines for reporting inventory information related to Articles 3.3 and 3.4 should be developed based on the COP decisions on LULUCF and on any good practice guidance for this sector to be developed by IPCC following the invitation of the SBSTA at its twelfth session. Such guidance should take into account the characteristics of this particular sector, including technical appropriateness of frequent measurement, and what Articles 3.3, 3.4 and 3.7 explicitly require. | |
| The changes in assigned amount under Article 3.3 must be reported as changes between 2008 and 2012, and need not to be reported for each year of the commitment period. It is because the COP decided in its Decision 9/CP.4 regarding Article 3.3 that "the adjustment to a Party's assigned amount shall be equal to verifiable changes in carbon stocks during the period 2008 to 2012." Each Annex I Party is required to report any changes in assigned amount under Article 3.3 for the years of the commitment period for which, in case, such changes were added to or subtracted from the Party's assigned amount by the Party. The same rules should be applied to the reporting relating to Article 3.4. | |
| 1 | We consider that it is not necessary to apply a complete set of guidelines for Article 8, in particular those for adjustments, to the review of this information, since the obligation under Article 3.2 is different from those of Article 3.1. |
| 2 | For the final year of the commitment period, in addition to the report of annual review for each Annex I Party, a review report of information on the Party's activities during the 'true-up' period should be forwarded to the compliance body and the COP/moP through the secretariat. |