Greenhouse Gas Inventories

Key takeaways from the most recent report: the 2024 Greenhouse Gas Inventory

The 2024 Community-Wide and Municipal Operations Greenhouse Gas Inventory, a collaboration between the City of Bloomington Department of Economic and Sustainable Development and ClimateNav, was published in July 2026.

• Grid-supplied electricity is the clear bright spot, with carbon neutrality projected by 2041, but stationary fuel combustion lags well behind. Duke Energy’s ongoing transition to renewable generation has driven rapid decarbonization in the electricity sub-sector, putting it far ahead of the reduction targets. Stationary fuel combustion, by contrast, is not on pace to meet either the 2030 or 2050 goals, highlighting a growing divergence between the two components of stationary energy.
• On-road transportation accounts for 24.5% of total emissions and is not on track to meet either of the City’s reduction targets. As the second-largest source of community-wide emissions, this sub-sector represents one of the widest gaps between the current trajectory and the required reduction path. Closing this gap will require coordinated action across vehicle electrification, transit expansion, and land use strategies aimed at reducing vehicle miles traveled.
• Solid waste presents a proportionally larger decarbonization challenge than its share of total emissions would suggest. Although it ranks fourth among sub-sectors by absolute emissions, the ratio of its current reduction rate to the rate required for carbon neutrality is the worst of any sub-sector. This reflects the inherent difficulty of abating landfill methane and other waste-related emissions, and signals that the City will need to explore more ambitious diversion, capture, or offset strategies to bring this sub-sector into alignment with its targets.
• The City is on track to meet its 2030 target to reduce community-wide emissions by 25% of the 2018 baseline (per the 2021 Climate Action Plan).
• The City is not on track to meet its 2050 carbon neutrality goal and must significantly grow the rate of annual GHG emissions reductions. The linear trend from 2008 to 2024 yields an average annual reduction of roughly 28,962 MTCO2e, but the path to carbon neutrality by 2050 demands approximately 46,934 MTCO2e per year—a gap of nearly 18,000 MTCO2e annually. Our 2021 Climate Action Plan, like many climate plans, assumes that future technological advances will speed up the rate of emissions reductions.

History of GHG Inventories in Bloomington

One of the first actions recommended by the 2018 Bloomington Sustainability Action Plan was to develop a greenhouse gas inventory in alignment with the Global Protocol for Community-Scale Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventories (GPC) standard.

The City of Bloomington completed its first standardized greenhouse gas inventory in 2018, aligned with the Global Protocol for Community-Scale Greenhouse Gas Emission Inventories (GPC) standard, as a significant stride towards completing the recommended actions laid out in the City’s 2018 Sustainability Action Plan. Since the 2018 inventory, the City has continued to strive towards upholding its commitment to sustainability with a number of initiatives, including passing the official Climate Action Plan in 2021, and setting community-wide emissions reduction targets. 

With the 2018 inventory serving as the emissions baseline, the City is committed to reducing its emissions 25% by 2030, and reaching carbon neutrality by 2050. In order to continue tracking progress towards these goals, the City completed another greenhouse gas inventory in 2023, which encompasses community-wide emissions for 2019, 2020, 2021, and 2022.  

Both inventories were presented to the City Council by City staff with assistance from Gnarly Tree Sustainability Institute, who collaborated with the City on the 2022 inventory. A recording of the presentation can be found below. 

The City of Bloomington partnered with ClimateNav to produce the 2023 and 2024 Community-Wide and Municipal Operations Greenhouse Gas Inventory, published in early 2025 and July 2026 respectively. The 2024 report includes the second inventory of the City’s municipal government carbon footprint. The City plans to provide updated GHG inventories on an annual basis using a new streamlined process going forward.

Review the greenhouse gas inventory Frequently Asked Questions (2022), or reach out to [email protected] for additional information.