Archived: Technical guidance on reporting greenhouse gas emissions: glossary

Glossary of Terms

The following words and terms used in this guidance document shall have the indicated meaning:

Biomass means plants or plant materials, animal waste, or any product made of either of these, including wood and wood products, charcoal, and agricultural residues and wastes (including organic matter such as trees, crops, grasses, tree litter or roots); the portion of biologically derived organic matter in municipal and industrial wastes; landfill gas; bio-alcohols; black liquor; sludge digestion gas; and animal- or plant-derived oils.

Carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂ eq) is a unit of measure used to allow the addition of or the comparison between gases that have different global warming potentials (GWPs). Since many greenhouse gases (GHGs) exist and their GWPs vary, the emissions are added in a common unit, CO₂ eq. To express GHG emissions in units of CO₂ eq, the quantity of a given GHG (expressed in units of mass) is multiplied by its GWP.

CAS Registry Number, or CAS Number, is a unique numerical identifier in the Chemical Abstracts Service Registry that is given to every chemical that has been described in the literature. The Chemical Abstracts Service, a division of the American Chemical Society, assigns these identifiers.

CO₂ emissions from biomass decomposition are releases of CO₂ resulting from aerobic decomposition of biomass and from the fermentation of biomass.

Contiguous facility means all buildings, equipment, structures and stationary items that are located on a single site or on contiguous or adjacent sites; that are owned or operated by the same person and that function as a single integrated site; and include wastewater collection systems that discharge treated or untreated wastewater into surface waters.

Emissions are direct releases from sources that are located at the facility.

Facility means a contiguous facility, a pipeline transportation system or an offshore installation.

Flaring emissions means controlled releases of gases from industrial activities, from the combustion of a gas and or liquid stream produced at the facility not for the purpose of producing energy, including releases from waste petroleum incineration, hazardous emission prevention systems (whether in pilot or active mode), well testing, natural gas gathering system, natural gas processing plant operations, crude oil production, pipeline operations, petroleum refining, chemical fertilizer and steel production. Flaring emissions excludes releases from flaring of landfill gas.

Fugitive emissions means uncontrolled releases of gases from industrial activities, other than releases that are venting or flaring emissions, including releases resulting from the production, processing, transmission, storage and use of solid, liquid or gaseous fuels.

GHGs means greenhouse gases.

GWP means global warming potential. It is calculated as the ratio of the time-integrated radiative forcing (i.e., the amount of heat-trapping potential, measured in units of power per unit of area, e.g., watts per square metre) that would result from the emission of 1 kg of a given GHG to that from the emission of 1 kg of CO₂. For example, the GWP for nitrous oxide (N₂O) is 298, which means that 1 kg of N₂O emissions is equivalent to 298 kg of CO₂ emissions. By convention, the GWP values being  used are those that apply to a 100-year time horizon.

HFCs means hydrofluorocarbons.

Industrial process emissions means releases from an industrial process that involves chemical or physical reactions other than combustion, and the purpose of which is not to supply energy.

Offshore installation means an offshore drilling unit, production platform or ship, or sub-sea installation and that is attached or anchored to the continental shelf of Canada in connection with the exploitation of oil or gas.

On-site transportation emissions means any releases from machinery used for the on-site transportation of substances, materials or products used in the production process.

PFCs means perfluorocarbons.

Pipeline transportation system means all pipelines that are owned or operated by the same person within a province or territory and that transport processed natural gas, and their associated installations including storage installations but excluding straddle plants or other processing installations.

Reporting company means a person who operates one or more facilities that meet the reporting threshold as set out in Schedule 3 of the Canada Gazette notice.

Stationary fuel combustion emissions means releases from non-vehicular combustion sources, in which fuel is burned for the purpose of producing energy.

Venting emissions means controlled releases to the atmosphere of a gas, including releases of casing gas, a gas associated with a liquid (or solution gas), treater, stabilizer or dehydrator off-gas, blanket gas, and releases from pneumatic devices which use natural gas as a driver, and from compressor start-ups, pipelines and other blowdowns, and metering and regulation station control loops.

Waste emissions means releases that result from waste disposal sources at a facility that include landfilling of solid waste, flaring of landfill gas and waste incineration.

Wastewater emissions means releases that result from wastewater and wastewater treatment at a facility.