Carbon Free Boston: Offsets Technical Report

Part of a series of reports that includes: Carbon Free Boston: Summary Report; Carbon Free Boston: Social Equity Report; Carbon Free Boston: Technical Summary; Carbon Free Boston: Buildings Technical Report; Carbon Free Boston: Transportation Technical Report; Carbon Free Boston: Waste Technical Report; Carbon Free Boston: Energy Technical Report; Available at http://sites.bu.edu/cfb/OVERVIEW: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency defines offsets as a specific activity or set of activities intended to reduce GHG emissions, increase the storage of carbon, or enhance GHG removals from the atmosphere [1]. From a city perspective, they provide a mechanism to negate residual GHG emissions— those the city is unable to reduce directly—by supporting projects that avoid or sequester them outside of the city’s reporting boundary. Offsetting GHG emissions is a controversial topic for cities, as the co-benefits of the investment are typically not realized locally. For this reason, offsetting emissions is considered a last resort, a strategy option available when the city has exhausted all others. However, offsets are likely to be a necessity to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050 and promote emissions reductions in the near term. While public and private sector partners pursue the more complex systems transformation, cities can utilize offsets to support short-term and relatively cost-effective reductions in emissions. Offsets can be a relatively simple, certain, and high-impact way to support the transition to a low-carbon world. This report focuses on carbon offset certificates, more often referred to as offsets. Each offset represents a metric ton of verified carbon dioxide (CO2) or equivalent emissions that is reduced, avoided, or permanently removed from the atmosphere (“sequestered”) through an action taken by the creator of the offset. The certificates can be traded and retiring (that is, not re-selling) offsets can be a useful component of an overall voluntary emissions reduction strategy, alongside activities to lower an organization’s direct and indirect emissions. In the Global Protocol for Community-Scale Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventories (GPC), the GHG accounting system used by the City of Boston, any carbon offset certificates that the City has can be deducted from the City’s total GHG emissions.http://sites.bu.edu/cfb/files/2019/06/CFB_Offsets_Technical_Report_051619.pdfPublished versio

Transverse momentum and pseudorapidity distributions of charged hadrons in pp collisions at (s)\sqrt(s) = 0.9 and 2.36 TeV

Measurements of inclusive charged-hadron transverse-momentum and pseudorapidity distributions are presented for proton-proton collisions at sqrt(s) = 0.9 and 2.36 TeV. The data were collected with the CMS detector during the LHC commissioning in December 2009. For non-single-diffractive interactions, the average charged-hadron transverse momentum is measured to be 0.46 +/- 0.01 (stat.) +/- 0.01 (syst.) GeV/c at 0.9 TeV and 0.50 +/- 0.01 (stat.) +/- 0.01 (syst.) GeV/c at 2.36 TeV, for pseudorapidities between -2.4 and +2.4. At these energies, the measured pseudorapidity densities in the central region, dN(charged)/d(eta) for |eta| < 0.5, are 3.48 +/- 0.02 (stat.) +/- 0.13 (syst.) and 4.47 +/- 0.04 (stat.) +/- 0.16 (syst.), respectively. The results at 0.9 TeV are in agreement with previous measurements and confirm the expectation of near equal hadron production in p-pbar and pp collisions. The results at 2.36 TeV represent the highest-energy measurements at a particle collider to date

Transverse-momentum and pseudorapidity distributions of charged hadrons in pppp collisions at s\sqrt{s} = 7 TeV

Charged-hadron transverse-momentum and pseudorapidity distributions in proton-proton collisions at $\sqrt{s} = 7$~TeV are measured with the inner tracking system of the CMS detector at the LHC. The charged-hadron yield is obtained by counting the number of reconstructed hits, hit-pairs, and fully reconstructed charged-particle tracks. The combination of the three methods gives a charged-particle multiplicity per unit of pseudorapidity \dnchdeta|_{|\eta| < 0.5} = 5.78\pm 0.01\stat\pm 0.23\syst for non-single-diffractive events, higher than predicted by commonly used models. The relative increase in charged-particle multiplicity from $\sqrt{s} = 0.9$ to 7~TeV is 66.1\%\pm 1.0\%\stat\pm 4.2\%\syst. The mean transverse momentum is measured to be 0.545\pm 0.005\stat\pm 0.015\syst\GeVc. The results are compared with similar measurements at lower energies.Charged-hadron transverse-momentum and pseudorapidity distributions in proton-proton collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV are measured with the inner tracking system of the CMS detector at the LHC. The charged-hadron yield is obtained by counting the number of reconstructed hits, hit-pairs, and fully reconstructed charged-particle tracks. The combination of the three methods gives a charged-particle multiplicity per unit of pseudorapidity, dN(charged)/d(eta), for |eta| < 0.5, of 5.78 +/- 0.01 (stat) +/- 0.23 (syst) for non-single-diffractive events, higher than predicted by commonly used models. The relative increase in charged-particle multiplicity from sqrt(s) = 0.9 to 7 TeV is 66.1% +/- 1.0% (stat) +/- 4.2% (syst). The mean transverse momentum is measured to be 0.545 +/- 0.005 (stat) +/- 0.015 (syst) GeV/c. The results are compared with similar measurements at lower energies