Development or Environmental Jeopardy: The Carbon Footprint of Hotels in Juba South Sudan

Abstract

Climate change and global warming have been identified as major threats to the development of South Sudan due to greenhouse gases (GHGs) emission responsible for the rising temperatures and erosion of existing ecosystem services that support local livelihoods. Mitigating GHGs emissions has become an urgent global policy trajectory with countries acceding to related Treaties and setting national targets. Despite having submitted its initial communications to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), outlining specific sectors for GHGs reduction, the rapidly growing hotel industry has not been identified among the sectors and no GHGs emission reporting has been undertaken. Therefore, this study aimed to assess, quantify and report on the GHGs emission potential of the hotel industry in Juba-South Sudan, examine existing GHGs emission reporting mechanisms and propose a reporting framework. Using a standard quantitative methodology, the carbon footprint of twenty-seven hotels was assessed. The results showed that the hotel industry is one of the leading emitters of GHGs emission amounting to 14,624.9-ton CO2eq/year. The study also found no existing GHGs reporting systems in South Sudan and proposed a reporting framework and identified potential emissions reduction strategies for the hotel industry to deal with climate change and carbon emission issues of the hospitality industry. It recommends that further research be initiated to 1) assess the applicability of the identified strategies in the context of South Sudan and 2) to quantify GHGs emissions from cooling appliance within the hospitality industry as well as emissions from other growing sectors like the transportation.