Pursuing Credibility Through Standardization: The Potential for Canadian Product Category Rules to Enhance the Comparability of Greenhouse Gas Emissions Claims of Alberta’s Oil Sands

Abstract

The accuracy, transparency, and comparability of life cycle estimates are central to the controversy over the use of life cycle assessment to support policy. This thesis examines the potential for a Canadian formal voluntary standard to create product category rules for crude oil products. Such a standard would be developed at the Canadian Standards Association, and may enhance the credibility and improve the comparability of greenhouse gas emissions claims of Alberta’s oil sands products. A case study is developed as a narrative of key stakeholders in the proposed standard’s development, and interview findings are compared with hypotheses derived from standards literature. Challenges facing consensus in life cycle assessment were found to parallel those facing standards development organizations. Novel findings indicate widespread disagreement with the use of life cycle assessment to support regulation, substantial differences in the desired prescriptiveness of the standard, and a heavy focus placed on its revision post-implementation.