Australian researchers have unveiled the world’s inaugural public tool for assessing the climate impact of fossil fuel projects, with a Canadian offshore oil venture as a test subject. The newly developed Carbon Impacts Tracer can gauge how proposed mines, offshore oil platforms, or similar energy initiatives will influence global warming, glacier melt, and potential human fatalities.
Sarah Perkins-Kirkpatrick, a climate science professor at the Australian National University, mentioned during a virtual press briefing that the tool can link emissions from individual fossil fuel projects to their warming effect on the planet, subsequently determining specific impacts resulting from this warming.
This online tool utilizes carbon dioxide emission data from projects, usually sourced from proponents’ environmental assessments, to predict their impact on global temperature escalation. It then extrapolates the real-world consequences of this temperature increase, such as coral reef degradation, reduced food production, and job displacement.
The platform was launched with case studies on five Australian projects, one in the U.K., and the proposed Bay du Nord offshore oil project in Canada, situated approximately 500 kilometers east of St. John’s. The Bay du Nord project, led by Equinor, a Norwegian energy company, is anticipated to tap into over 430 million barrels of oil reserves. The tool estimates that the project’s CO2 emissions could reach 188 megatonnes over two decades, resulting in a minute 0.00008°C temperature increase globally.
Additionally, it projects that this level of CO2 emission could expose more than 111,000 individuals to extreme heat and lead to 25 heat-related deaths in Europe alone. The tracer suggests that the Bay du Nord project might trigger a 4.6-square-kilometer glacier loss, elevating sea levels by 0.025 millimeters. It also anticipates around 2,100 job losses due to pollution from the project, pushing roughly 9,800 people into severe poverty.
Equinor did not provide an immediate response to requests for comments on Monday. Joel Finnis, a climatologist from Memorial University in Newfoundland and Labrador, not directly involved in the tracer project, emphasized the tool’s ability to consolidate various study findings into one comprehensible platform for the general public.
Maria Nawaz, heading the climate change accountability project at the University of New South Wales’ Australian Human Rights Institute, expressed optimism that the tracer would be widely adopted by governments, regulators, and the public to evaluate new projects pitched in their regions. She believes it will bolster climate litigation efforts to hold governments and corporations accountable for their emissions.
Nawaz envisions insurers using the tool to assess project risks, while economists could leverage it to forecast economic repercussions. The current version of the site focuses on estimating the impacts of proposed projects rather than existing oil wells or mines, with plans to include more upcoming developments as data becomes accessible.
