Policies to effectively abate GHG emissions are needed at all levels of government: national, state, and local. An example of a national policy might be vehicle fuel efficiency standards. And example of state policy might be the Missouri Renewable Electricity Standard passed by state initiative in 2008. Examples of local policies might include building code standards and smart land use policies.

For these reasons, in addition to national and state GHG inventories, counties and municipalities also conduct GHG inventories. These inventories focus not only on the emissions of the community within the boundaries of the county or municipality, but also on emissions from activities of the local government itself.

Columbia and Kansas City were the first municipalities in Missouri to conduct a GHG inventory, followed by Creve Coeur. Since then, in alphabetical order, Clayton, Kirkwood, Lee’s Summit, Richmond Heights, and St. Louis County have conducted GHG inventories and published the reports. The City of St. Louis completed an inventory in March, 2012, and has published pie graphs showing total emissions, but does not seem to have published the report itself. (If you know of additional GHG inventories I’ve missed, please send me an email and let me know.)

I’m going to do a series of posts on these local inventories. First, I’ll do a post about the results of each inventory. Then I’ll make comparisons and do a little analysis.

In Illinois, Edwardsville has also completed a GHG inventory, and in Kansas, so has Johnson County. I’m going to limit my blogging to Missouri, but they are right across the border, so here’s a shout-out to them as well.