Back to search

DIV-INT-Annet internasjonalt samarbeid

The Global Carbon Budget and Carbon Atlas

Awarded: NOK 0.70 mill.

The Global Carbon Project assists the international carbon community in providing objective scientific knowledge in support of the policy process to limit the growth of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. A key contribution of the Global Carbon Project is the annual publication, communication, and dissemination of the Global Carbon Budget. The budget has become a widely renowned and respected activity providing credible scientific information on the latest trends in carbon dioxide emissions and the global carbon cycle to researchers, policy makers and civil society. CICERO plays a key role in the preparation of the annual releases of the budget, in close collaboration with international partners in Australia, France, the UK, and the USA. The objective of the MILUTV-ARENAER project is to support the quality and accessibility of the budget deliverables, communication and dissemination and to support core carbon-cycle networking activities. The MILUTV-ARENAER project supported the release of two budgets (2014 and 2015). The Global Carbon Budget 2014 was released 20 September 2014, after the People's Climate March but before the UN Climate Summit. The Global Carbon Budget 2015 was released 7 December 2015 during the Paris climate conference. The full data and methods (open access), together with detailed figures and presentations (open access), was supported by articles published in the journals Nature Climate Change and Nature Geoscience (commentaries, a review, and research articles). The Global Carbon Atlas was updated with the latest data, translated into different languages, and country specific tabs were developed (open access). The media coverage was strong with Google News generating thousands of hits (10,000s in 2015) with coverage on TV and radio (e.g., NRK, ABC, BBC), international newspapers and agencies (e.g., New York Times, Washington Post, BBC, The Guardian, Reuters), key regional newspapers, and a strong online presence particularly via Twitter. The Future Earth offices provided strong support and advice on the media activities. Additional activities within the MILUTV-ARENAER project mainly related to carbon-cycle networking. In June 2015, CICERO hosted the annual Scientific Steering Committee meeting of the Global Carbon Project and bringing top carbon-cycle researchers to Oslo. Several activities built on the "Managing Global Negative Emissions Technologies" (MaGNET) initiative, mainly relating to organising workshops, organising a Special Focus in Environmental Research Letters, drafting high-level commentaries, and drafting future activities. The MILUTV-ARENAER project has allowed CICERO to put resources on traditionally hard-to-fund activities. Considerable effort been placed on developing professional graphics, robust data management, automation, and facilitating open access. These efforts ultimately lead to a greater uptake of the Global Carbon Budget, and our data and figures are often found in scientific presentations, teaching material, and civil society publications. Numerous people and organisations contact us for data and figures, and this has driven much of our automation and online activities. The MILUTV-ARENAER project also allows efforts to be placed on coordinating communication and dissemination activities with partners, and this coordination partly explains the broad and continued uptake in the media. And finally, the MILUTV-ARENAER project allows resources to be spent on high-level networking activities, involving partners from multiple and diverse countries, to ensure the next round of Global Carbon Project activities remain relevant for researchers, policy makers and civil society.

The Global Carbon Project (GCP) assists the international carbon community in providing objective scientific knowledge in support of the policy process to limit the growth of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. A key contribution of the GCP is the annual pu blication of the Global Carbon Budget, and soon, the Carbon Atlas. The Budget has become widely renowned and respected activity providing credible scientific information to researchers, policy makers and civil society. As expectations increase more supp ort is needed to continue the GCP's activities, particularly in light of potential changes with the transition to Future Earth. From 2012 to 2017 CICERO is represented on the Scientific Steering Committee (SSC) of the GCP, and has so far played a key role in annual updates of the Budget. The objective of this project is to solidify CICERO's role updating, communicating, and disseminating the Global Carbon Budget and the soon-to-be-released Carbon Atlas, and to strengthen international networking within th is area. This will ensure Norway and CICERO has a crucial position in the global change community.

Funding scheme:

DIV-INT-Annet internasjonalt samarbeid