Estimating the Costs of Unconditional Mitigation Measures to Support the Implementation of Mexico’s NDC

Following the ratification of the Paris Agreement by Mexico in December 2016, a process was carried out to estimate the cost of implementing the unconditional Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) target. The NDC target was defined by the Mexican Ministry of Environment (SEMARNAT) and the National Institute of Ecology and Climate Change (INECC) based on the results of a participatory process.

As a starting point, 30 mitigation measures were chosen to achieve the unconditional GHG mitigation component that had been identified. With support from the Mexico-Denmark Climate Change Mitigation and Energy Programme, the Green Growth Coordination Unit (CGCV) within INECC led the process of estimating the costs of the 30 mitigation measures. A team of external sectoral experts was hired to work in-house in close consultation with the sectoral secretariats of energy, transport, housing, industry and agriculture. The process was complemented with sectoral public private dialogues to add the inputs from relevant stakeholders. As a final step, the results from this analysis were cross-checked with other modelling results to guarantee consistency. The final results showed that the implementation of all 30 mitigation measures would result in savings of up to 17 billion USD in comparison the business-as-usual (BAU) scenario for the period 2014-2030 (SEMARNAT & INECC, 2018).

Mexico’s costing exercise is considered a good practice as it has been a technically comprehensive effort that was carried out by local experts for each sector. It has been well documented and is readily available for planning and decision-making. Information needed for the calculations was provided by official entities and close sectoral coordination was prioritised. The process has furthermore been characterised by a high-level of stakeholder participation.