United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)

Executive Secretary's Message

“Every country, business and organization needs to do their utmost to tackle the climate crisis. UN Climate Change has been on its own journey of sustainability since 2012 and I look forward to ensuring that our practices are aligned with global best practice and our stakeholder’s expectations”.

Mr. Simon Stiell, Executive Secretary, UNFCCC

Mission

“UN Climate Change, or UNFCCC, is the United Nations entity supporting the global response to climate change and is the parent treaty of the 2015 Paris Agreement. The main aim of the Paris Agreement is to keep a global average temperature rise this century well below 2 degrees Celsius and to drive efforts to limit the temperature increase even further to 1.5 degrees Celsius.” 

ALIGNMENT WITH THE STRATEGY FOR SUSTAINABILITY MANAGEMENT IN THE UNITED NATIONS SYSTEM, 2020–2030

The UN Climate Change secretariat is in the process of designing an Environmental Management System that will comply with ISO 14001, and aspires to go for certification in the not too distant future.  It has contributed to the development of the 2020-2030 UN Environmental Sustainability Management Strategy and will align its policies  and EMS with it, focusing on the Procurement, Travel, Events and ICT management functions. 

Emissions Reduction

The UN Climate Change secretariat has been monitoring the greenhouse gas emissions from its headquarters and travel operations and taking measures to reduce them for many years already. 

At its headquarters, the secretariat’s offices are powered by electricity solely from renewable sources – which is key to any effective emission reduction. Together with a number of energy and resource-saving measures, this has led to a sharp cut in emissions from office operations to less than 5% of the secretariat’s overall carbon footprint up until 2019. 

The remaining 95% of the footprint used to be generated by the travel of secretariat-funded participants coming to UN Climate Change meetings and of secretariat staff. This is an inevitable challenge, given that support to the intergovernmental negotiations is at the core of the secretariat’s mandate. Measures taken to address this have traditionally included avoidance of travel especially by secretariat staff, facilitated also by the UN Climate Change Parties’ decision to hold as many UN Climate Change meetings as possible at the seat of the secretariat. Where travel was unavoidable, preference was given to less carbon-intensive ways of travelling such as by train or in economy class. 

Owing to the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, virtual formats of UN Climate Change events replaced physical conferences and meetings, thus reducing secretariat funded travel activities to almost zero between March 2020 and October 2021. The secretariat is further developing its virtual conferencing tools, with the aim of maintaining a lower travel volume also in the future.  

As the final step towards climate neutrality, the UN Climate Change secretariat has offset, on an annual basis since 2012, the balance of emissions from its unavoidable activities by purchasing and cancelling Adaptation Fund Certified Emission Reductions. Instrumental in this has been the budgetary authorization from UN Climate Change Parties to fund reduction and offsetting efforts. 

Beyond its own boundaries, the secretariat has been able to effectively advise and assist governments who host large UN Climate Change Conferences in measuring and reducing these events’ footprints. Also, since 2005, it has become standard practice for many host countries to offset the remaining balance of related emissions, including that of all participants’ travel to the venue. 

The overall environmental performance of several COPs has been externally certified under ISO 20121 (COP 21,COP 22 and COP 25) and EMAS, the European Union Eco-Management and Audit Scheme (COP 23, COP 25), covering aspects such as energy and resource efficiency, legal compliance and stakeholder engagement. The How COP 25 is Being Made More Sustainable article gives many examples of good practices implemented at Climate Change conferences. A video on the sustainable organization of UN Climate Change Conferences is available here. 

In addition, the UN Climate Change secretariat has advocated emissions reduction and offsetting measures within the UN system, and helped many other UN agencies become climate-neutral, including, most recently, the UN Secretariat HQ and Field Missions. Since 2015, the secretariat has offered a platform for every individual or organization around the world to become Climate Neutral Now! and through its engagement in the IAMLADP Task Force on Sustainable Meetings, it has spread the word and supported other UN bodies with the organization of sustainable meetings. 

EMS and Reduction efforts

The Climate Change Secretariat is in the process of adopting an Environmental Sustainability Policy that provides also for establishment and implementation of an EMS and aims at achieving an internationally recognized standard.

Headquarters operations:

• 100% electricity from renewable sources 
• HQ building built and operated to high environmental standards: partly “zero emission”, hydro-geo-thermal energy supplemented by district heating, solar power, local natural, smart building technology control systems, etc. 
• Construction of New HQ Extension building is aiming at certification under the German Assessment System for Sustainable Building 
• Ongoing replacement/upgrade and use of office equipment to higher energy efficiency: lighting, cars, bicycles, shared printers… 
• Materials and waste: No-plastic policy (ban of plastic bottles and containers); 100% recycled or certified paper; written-off IT equipment donated for reuse before recycling; waste separation, recycling, incineration of residuals, no landfilling 
• In 2019, as part of its efforts to further reduce and recycle solid waste, staff were invited to give up the general waste bins in their offices and separate waste in central locations.  An initiative very well received by staff with a high participation rate 
• Replacement of hardcopy with on-line publications and official documents 
• Sustainable Procurement: Vendor and product sustainability are obligatory selection criteria; e.g., local transportation provider offsets all its emissions.  UN Climate Change piloted HCLM-Procurement Network’s sustainable procurement project 
• Ongoing awareness-raising among staff 
• Preferential tickets for staff to use public transportation to commute to work (“job ticket”) 

Travel activities:

• Avoidance of staff travel by organizing UN Climate Change meetings at the seat of the secretariat as a default 
• Strict limit on number of staff representing the secretariat at external meetings
• Avoidance of travel through tele-, video- and on-line conferencing, e.g., for most job interviews, many training activities, some meetings of constituted bodies, etc.
• Travel policy conducive to emission reductions through most efficient mode of travel, most direct routing, incentives for voluntary downgrades
• Train travel compulsory for all trips of less than 6 hours’ duration (approx. 500 km)
• Economy class air travel compulsory for all trips of less than 11 hours’ duration 
• Regardless of travelling time, flights between UN Climate Change HQ and 12 major destinations are in economy class only, including New York, Washington, New Delhi, Addis Ababa, Nairobi, Johannesburg, Beijing 
• Maximum train and/or economy class travel of staff to conferences, training, etc., irrespective of duration of travel. 
• Further development of virtual conferencing platform to reduce the need for staff and participants to travel 

Conference activities:

• Standard provision on environmental sustainability in host country agreements for conferences
• Systematic support to host countries in measuring and reducing the carbon footprint of UN Climate Change Conferences 
• Offsetting the remaining balance is standard practice for many host governments, including participants’ travel 

General:

• Approval of use of budgetary resources for emission reduction investments and offsets 

Each year, as part of the Greening the Blue Report on Environmental Governance, each participating UN entity’s progress on the development of an Environmental Management System (EMS) is evaluated according to the UN system’s EMS criteria (these criteria are available on the Methodology webpage). Upon this evaluation the entity is then rated Exceeds, Meets, Approaches, or No response. For the 2022 reporting year, UNFCCC’s progress on the EMS is rated as: Does not meet.

ENVIRONMENTAL & SOCIAL SAFEGUARDS AND STANDARDS IN POLICIES, PROJECTS AND PROGRAMMES

For the 2022 reporting year, UNFCCC’s status of implementing environmental and social safeguards and standards in their policies, projects and programmes is: Yes.

ENVIRONMENTAL TRAINING FOR PERSONNEL

Environmental training, including various courses produced throughout the UN system, is made available to all staff on the Climate Change Secretariat’s learning platform.

For the 2022 reporting year, UNFCCC’s status on providing training on environmental sustainability is: Yes, and it is voluntary.

ENVIRONMENTAL INVENTORY APPROACH

The Climate Change Secretariat’s inventory includes all categories foreseen by the common methodology and is based on measured data.

The Climate Change Secretariat is also measuring all GHG emissions from travel to its annual COP, which are offset by the host government. It further plans to measure GHG emissions also from its other, smaller offsite events using the new UN Green Events Tool.

Offsetting

In 2012, the UN Climate Change secretariat launched its offsetting scheme and thereby became one of the first five UN agencies to achieve full carbon neutrality! 

After avoiding carbon-intensive headquarters and travel activities and reducing the footprint of the remaining ones, the secretariat still generates between ca. 2,500 and 6,000 tons CO2eq per year. To offset this balance, it purchases and cancels Adaptation Fund CERs on an annual basis. 

Adaptation Fund CERs were selected because they serve two important goals. First, they originate from the widest cross-section of all CDM projects, globally and indiscriminately. Second, the Adaptation Fund finances work in those countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change. In effect, Adaptation Fund CERs are the only credits that benefit efforts to both mitigate climate change and adapt to it. 

In addition, host countries of UN Climate Change Conferences of Parties have established the practice of compensating for the carbon footprint of all COPs since 2005. The UN Climate Change secretariat also assists many UN agencies in offsetting their footprints and provides a convenient way to offset for everyone everywhere.  

Waste management

Water and Wastewater Management

The UN Climate Change secretariat follows the UN methodology for measuring and reporting on water consumption.  Water saving systems are installed in bathrooms. Thanks to the geographical location of the headquarters, outdoor areas only exceptionally need watering. 

Owing to increased remote working arrangements resulting from the response to the Covid-19 pandemic, less water has been consumed and waste water generated at UN Climate Change office facilities.

NEXT STEPS

In the years to come, the UN Climate Change secretariat will maintain its climate neutrality. It will continue to cut emissions so that as little as possible remains to be compensated through the offsetting scheme with the Adaptation Fund. 

The focus of reduction efforts will be in the area of travel where most emissions are generated. Next steps include increasing the use of virtual meeting, communication and collaboration tools to avoid travel; and further concentrating UN Climate Change meetings and workshops at the seat of the UN Climate Change secretariat to minimize travel by secretariat staff. 

Emphasis will remain on a systematic approach to reducing and offsetting emissions and environmental impact related to UN Climate Change Conferences and meetings, including smaller ones that are not yet fully climate neutral. 

The UN Climate Change secretariat is in the process of designing an Environmental Management System that will comply with ISO 14001, and aspires to go for certification in the not too distant future. 

As a hub where UN and international efforts to combat climate change are bundled, the UN Climate Change secretariat cannot help but reach out beyond its boundaries, too.  It will enhance and promote its offers to the UN system, but also to businesses and individuals around the globe, to achieve the goal of climate neutrality.  One such initiative is the design of a Sustainable Events Tool to support event organizers globally to increase the sustainability of its meetings and conferences. The NAZCA platform has recently been relaunched, which will certainly increase its reach.  Furthermore, the secretariat’s Global Climate Action team continues to engage non-State actors through additional initiatives such as Momentum for Change, Action for Climate Empowerment and the Marrakech Partnership.