The Carbon Trust and Defra identified a need to engage with a large number of stakeholders during this process. Two opportunities for stakeholder consultation were proposed – engagement through a Key Stakeholder group and through a Review Panel.
(i) Key Stakeholders
The Key Stakeholders was a representative group of stakeholders, part of the Review Panel, identified by the Steering Group, the Sponsors and invited by BSI to review the first draft of the PAS. The main purpose of this initial consultation was to gather and build on existing best practice by engaging with stakeholders with experience in the application of relevant methods. It included stakeholders in the UK and internationally.
(ii) Review Panel
The PAS Review Panel was a wide formation of organisations and individuals representing those stakeholder groups that may be affected by the implementation of the PAS, nominated by the PAS Steering Group, the Sponsors and BSI to comment on a PAS draft in writing.
The Review Panel:
- Represented as wide a range of interests as possible, even if they are only peripherally affected by the PAS
- Was accordingly larger, more than 700 organisations (UK and international) were represented on this virtual panel.
Since June 2007 the development of PAS 2050 has benefited significantly from an extensive stakeholder engagement process, which has included a first consultation in October 2007 and a second consultation in March 2008 (see consultation statement below). Following the latest consultation on PAS 2050 (which closed on 28 March 2008) and a meeting of the PAS 2050 Steering Group, the project plan has been updated and the new publication date for the specification is now September/early October 2008. Currently, the latest draft of PAS 2050 is being revised in accordance with the results from the consultation and the additional technical work carried out by the Carbon Trust.
PAS Development - Decision-making and Consensus Building
BSI British Standards announces consultation on GHG emissions standard
22 February 2008 - BSI British Standards today announced the second stage of a consultation to continue the development of the Publicly Available Specification for the assessment of the life cycle greenhouse gas emissions of goods and services. The standard, PAS 2050, is co-sponsored by the Carbon Trust and Defra.
This consultation is the second of a broad two-stage stakeholder consultation process on PAS 2050 and offers approximately one thousand UK and international organizations and individuals across a wide range of industries the opportunity to contribute to the development of the standard. Comments resulting from the consultation, which takes place over six weeks, will be reviewed by the PAS Steering Group and Project Team and may contribute to the final text of PAS 2050.
The wide stakeholder consultation on PAS 2050 draws on existing best practice to create a single standard that will enable a consistent approach to measuring the embodied greenhouse gas emissions from products and services across their lifecycle, and is applicable to a wide range of sectors and product categories. It is anticipated that this work could be a first step towards an internationally agreed standard for measuring greenhouse gas emissions.
The first stage of the consultation, which took place in October 2007, built on the experience in this subject area of approximately two hundred stakeholders. The results informed the further development of the standard.
In addition to the wide consultation stages, PAS 2050 has benefitted from input from expert work groups, support via commissioned research and
insights arising from the Carbon Trust’s piloting of the draft standard with a range of organizations.
The development of PAS 2050 is being overseen by an independent Steering Group chaired by Jim Skea, Director of the UK Energy Research Centre, with members from businesses, NGOs, government and academia. PAS 2050 is due to be published in June 2008.
