United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat)
Call for Expressions of Interest (EoI) for Cooperation Partners for Agreement of Cooperation
Supporting African Cities in Inventorying Greenhouse Gas Emissions
Date first published: 14 December 2016
Deadline for submissions of EoIs: 13 January 2017
1. Background
The United Nations Human Settlements Programme, UN-Habitat is the United Nations programme working towards a better urban future. Its mission is to promote socially and environmentally sustainable human settlements development and the achievement of adequate shelter for all. Cities are on the front-line of climate change. On the one hand, cities are responsible for roughly 70 percent of global energy-related carbon dioxide emissions ; on the other hand cities are vulnerable to the adverse impacts of climate change. The New Urban Agenda adopted at Habitat III highlights the role of cities in climate change mitigation and adaptation . The New Urban Agenda commits to promote international, national, sub‐national, and local climate action, including climate change adaptation and mitigation. It further commits to support building resilience and reducing emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG).
UN-Habitat carries out several projects to support climate change adaptation and mitigation. For instance, UN-Habitat’s Cities and Climate Change Initiative (CCCI) seeks to enhance the preparedness and mitigation activities of cities in developing countries. CCCI supports city activities in countries such as Ecuador, Philippines, Mozambique, Uganda, Indonesia, Namibia, Burkina Faso and others. It also develops a suite of tools to support city leaders and practitioners in addressing the impact of climate change (adaptation) and to help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (mitigation).
Funded by the European Commission, UN-Habitat and Local Governments for Sustainability (ICLEI) implemented the “Promoting Low Emission Urban Development Strategies in Emerging Economy Countries (Urban-LEDS)” project to enhance the transition to low emission urban development in emerging economy countries by offering selected local governments in Brazil, India, Indonesia and South Africa a comprehensive methodological framework (the GreenClimateCities methodology) to integrate low-carbon strategies into all sectors of urban planning and development.
2. Project Introduction
With the support from Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), UN-Habitat is implementing a global project “Developing and Financing City Climate Action Plans”, with some activities planned in Africa. One of the objectives of this project is to help cities in Least Developed Countries that have signed up to the Compact of Mayors to comply with the Compact. The Compact of Mayors cities (as of 21 June 2016) include twenty five cities from Least Developed Countries (twenty cities in Africa and five cities in Asia and the Pacific). At present Moroni and Mutsamudu in Comoros are the leading candidates for this assistance.
The Compact of Mayors, on whose Management Committee UN-Habitat sits, was launched at the 2014 Climate Summit. To commit to the Compact, a city must commit to (1) reduce GHG emissions and address climate change risks; (2) inventory and report their CO2 emissions from stationary energy and inboundary travel and report on current and future climate hazards within one year; (3) set reduction targets and assess vulnerability within two years; (4) inventory and report their GHG emissions (CO2, CH4, N2O) from stationary energy, inboundary travel and waste and establish an action plan within three years.
Step two is to inventory and report GHG emission and report on climate related hazards within one year. Cities are strongly encouraged to report emissions of all three GHGs from all three sectors as soon as they are able to. A city needs to build and complete a GHG inventory and report it via the CDP or carbonn Climate Registry reporting platform. The GHG inventory should follow the GHG Protocol standard for cities, also known as Global Protocol for Community-Scale Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventories (GPC). This standard is created by the World Resources Institute, C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group and ICLEI together with various supporting partners including UN-Habitat. (More info for GPC: http://www.ghgprotocol.org/city-accounting)
3. Scope of Agreement of Cooperation
UN-Habitat invites Expressions of Interest from academic or research institutions, Not-for-Profit Organizations, Governmental and Inter-Governmental organizations for an Agreement of Cooperation (AOC) that will cover the following task:
- To carry out baseline GHG inventories in two Sub-Saharan African cities, using the GPC standard, and report it via the CDP or carbonn Climate Registry reporting platform successfully.
The GHG inventories should contain a breakdown of emissions into stationary energy, inboundary travel and waste sectors. Additional sectors are optional but welcome: transboundary travel, industrial processes and product use and agriculture, forestry and land use. Emission data needs to be reported by sub-sector and scope, and in metric tonnes of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalents) as set out in the GPC Emissions Report table . The inventories should contain the emissions data of CO2, CH4 and N2O, Additional GHGs are optional but welcome: HFCs, PFCs, SF6 and NF3.
The partner is responsible for supporting the participating cities in meeting the Compact of Mayors compliance requirements on GHG inventories, including in relation to data quality, coverage, etc.
The partner’s responsibilities include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Review the GPC standard, the CDP or carbonn Climate Registry reporting platform and follow their methodology and requirements;
- Per UN-Habitat guidance, carry out initial meeting with/or initial scoping missions to the target cities, meeting with key focal points;
- Identify sources of information and methods for collecting primary and secondary data and gather data;
- Develop short inception report. The heart of the report should be a timeline of activities showing expected missions to the participating city/cities. It should also explain how you will involve local officials in various steps of the process, build capacity, discuss and come to agreement with the beneficiary city/cities and UN-Habitat on the way forward. The inception plan can include comments and any suggested modifications to the present TORs;
- Liaise with relevant authorities/organizations on urban development, planning, transportation, energy and other related issues, which could contribute to the GHG Inventory;
- Build and complete baseline GHG inventories with a breakdown of emissions for required sectors/emission sources, using the GPC standard and reporting it via the CDP or carbonn Climate Registry reporting platform successfully.
The EOI should contain, but not be limited to the following:
- Institutional and technical information.
- Overall experience of the organization in the area of GHG inventories, experience in doing GHG inventories in cities in Sub-Saharan Africa is greatly preferred and highly desirable.
- Resumes of the proposed personnel that will be assigned to work on the programme, certification from City Climate Planner Certificate Program or equivalent is greatly preferred and highly desirable (http://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/climatechange/brief/city-climate-planner-certificate-program) ;
- A short conceptual proposal on how the organization plans to develop the GHG inventories in two cities in Sub-Saharan Africa including nature of work, elements of work plan and timeline, budget plan, any challenges, obstacles and solutions;
- The support/contribution of the submitting organisation for the project in both - cash and in kind (contribution in terms of staff time, office space and equipment and other support in cash and in-kind should be expressed in monetary terms), if applicable.
Note: the following supporting documents are essential for clearing and approving Agreements of Cooperation. It is not necessary to provide the following documents at this Call for EoI stage, but please confirm that you can provide them in a timely manner (within 10 days).
- Certified true copy of original certificate of registration/Incorporation or Charter in cases of educational institutions
- Certified true copy of original Audited Account Statement for the last two years
- Annual reports of the last two years
- Certified true copy of proof of non-Profit
- Copy of the Constitution or by-laws
4. Indicative Budget
The proposed budget should not exceed market rates for similar work in Sub-Saharan Africa. The proposed budget will form the basis for the negotiation of the final budget which will form part of the Agreement of Cooperation. Please assume this project will be in Moroni and Mutsamudu. The final budget will depend on the final cities selection. UN-Habitat will contribute financial resources towards this Agreement of Cooperation. UN-Habitat may hire one consultant to assist the partner with the above tasks. The financial resources UN-Habitat will contribute towards this Agreement of Cooperation will reduce accordingly if such consultant is hired.
5. Overall Timeframe
The work outlined in this EOI is scheduled to commence by 7 February 2017 and completed within four months.
6. Contact Information and Application Deadline
Expression of Interest must be delivered in electronic format no later than 13 January 2017 to the e-mail addresses given below:
elizabeth.okongo@unhabitat.org
cc yali.wang@unhabitat.org
7. Other
Please note that this EOI notice does not constitute a solicitation. UN-Habitat reserves the right to change or cancel this requirement at any time in the Expressions of Interest/or solicitation process.
Submitting a reply to an EOI does not guarantee that a Cooperation Partner will be considered for receipt of the solicitation when issued and only Cooperation Partners who are deemed qualified by UN-Habitat upon completion of evaluation of submission, will receive the final solicitation document.