Developing a Citywide Greenhouse Gas Inventory in Providence, RI

This past spring, with a grant from the Initiative on Cities, Earth and Environment Associate Professor Lucy Hutyra and Postdoctoral Researcher Conor Gately completed a comprehensive inventory of greenhouse gas emissions for the City of Providence, Rhode Island. The City of Providence had approached the team as part of an initiative coming out of the Compact of Mayors, a partnership of over 400 cities dedicated to improving urban sustainability and reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. A requirement of the Compact is that partner cities perform regular inventories of the city’s greenhouse gas emissions to assess progress toward emissions reductions goals.

After completing the City’s first greenhouse gas inventory, Hutyra and Gately also provided Providence with detailed methodology documents and training in best-practices to support future development and updating of the GHG inventory.

To complete this project, Hutyra and Gately used DARTE, the Database of Road Transportation Emissions (DARTE), a system that displays CO2 data for the contiguous United States on the finest scale available—a one-kilometer grid. Gately developed DARTE by analyzing 33 years of traffic data and with grants from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the National Science Foundation (NSF), and the Department of Energy (DOE).

Available for DARTE is available for free download.

View more projects funded through our Early Stage Urban Research Awards