North American Carbon Atlas

The North American Carbon Atlas was announced as one of the outcomes of discussions on a North American Carbon Capture and Storage Partnership, which was announced at the conclusion of the North American Leaders Summit which was held in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico on August 9-10, 2009. The summit comprised the leaders of Canada, the United States and Mexico.

The summit outcomes
In the media release announcing the summit outcomes, the leaders announced that "the three nations have committed to produce a North American Carbon Atlas that will result in uniform mapping methodology and data sharing in the area of large sources of carbon emissions and potential storage sites in North America. We will also explore ways to collaborate on research and development and demonstration (RD&D) projects related to carbon capture and storage. The overall effort will.

The leaders also stated that they would "facilitate the sharing of information in order to foster and enhance data exchange on carbon sources and sinks in support of a geographical information system, which is typically used to convey information in map form. The aim is to create a distributed database, rather than a central repository, where data from different states, provinces or organizations can be accessed via a common portal and in similar format." .

They also stated that they would "form a consensus on the methodology to be used in estimating the CO2 capacity of various types of CO2 storage systems in North America. This will be particularly relevant for cross-border storage to eliminate international "fault lines" and ensure compatible estimates of storage capacity in North America." .

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 * Kyoto Protocol
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