POLICY SUPPORT


REFERENCES

Support to LULUCF reporting in Luxembourg

Under the current energy and climate policy, the EU has set mitigation targets to reduce Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions by 20 % in 2020 and by at least 40 % until 2030 compared to 1990. In this context the Land use, land use change and forestry (LULUCF) sector is special, as it is the only sector whose activities can address emissions and removals of carbon. The LULUCF Regulation introduces an important change towards a harmonisation of reporting and accounting approaches as it refers to “land-based accounting”, i.e. it encourages the countries to apply higher level approaches for their reporting.

During the first half of 2020 space4environment implemented a feasibility study to develop a methodology for supporting the national LULUCF reporting in Luxembourg. The method makes use of existing national geospatial data between 1989 and 2018 and is open for inclusion of upcoming data. 
In a follow-up project in 2021, the developments were rolled out to the whole country and a first estimation of spatial data based LULUCF land use categories and related carbon stocks and changes were provided. 
The method is based on a regular grid which stores the land use categories, the underlying soil associations and the resulting carbon estimates.

Results and estimations have been published in a report which can been read here.


Support to the preparation of the national soil protection plan Luxembourg

In 2020, space4environment was tasked with supporting the Luxembourgish Environmental Administration (Administration de l'Environnement) in the preparation of the new national Soil Protection Plan for the implementation of the Soil Protection Act that was brought forward as a bill. Together with another soil expert, we prepared a report that provided key information on the importance of soil resources, the status of soils in Luxembourg and the existing national and international policy and legal frameworks. The final aim was to develop a rationale and key objectives for a holistic soil protection approach.


Ecosystem extent and condition accounting

On behalf of the National Statistical Office space4environment analysed the feasibility of the development of ecosystem extent, service, and condition accounts for Luxembourg. The first objective of the project was to review existing data sets which could support the calculation of indicators on ecosystem accounts as defined in a proposal by the Eurostat Task Force on ecosystem accounting. The second aim was to develop a methodology to implement and calculate the respective indicators, including wherever possible geospatial data. For each of the indicators, we present an “indicator fact sheet” which recapitulates the objective, the methodology, potential limitations, and results.