Meaning of carbon dioxide-equivalent | Babel Free

Definitions

A unit of measure of global warming potential denoting the mass of carbon dioxide that would have the same global warming effect as that of a given mass of some other given gas.

uncountable

Examples

“The global warming potential of twenty tons of N₂O is over five kilotons CO₂-eq.”

“Once methane or other greenhouse gases are converted, using GWP or other methods, they can be expressed in a common unit of measurement: carbon dioxide-equivalent (CO₂-eq. or CO₂e). CO₂e both takes into account the potency of each gas and expresses the quantity of the gas. Carbon dioxide-equivalent has been adopted as a principal unit of measurement to aggregate or make comparisons across greenhouse gases. CO₂e expresses the tons of a greenhouse gas in the equivalent effect of tons of CO₂ on climate change (more specifically, on “radiative forcing”).²¹ Once all gases are converted to CO₂e, they can be compared or added together. ²¹ “Radiative forcing” is defined as the change in the difference between incoming and outgoing radiation at the top of the troposphere. CO₂e is not exactly equivalent to radiative forcing, but it is similar and easier to understand for policy purposes than the main alternative, watts per square meter (W/m²).”

CEFR level