The Initiative for Climate Action Transparency (ICAT) has developed and collaborated with partners to roll out a suite of free and practical tools and methodologies to effectively support transparency efforts. Highlights from the ICAT toolbox, examples of applications in different countries, and resources to facilitate learning and implementation are presented below.
The ICAT toolbox contains more than 40 tools and guides, with the ICAT series of policy assessment guides at its core, a set of ten state-of-the-art methodologies to support countries in assessing the impacts of climate policies and actions. The resources in the ICAT toolbox are available to countries, organizations, and independent users seeking to apply them in institutional, professional, or research contexts. Their use is intended to strengthen frameworks and systems for climate data management and use, as well as to support the assessment and improvement of policy development and implementation.
Over the years, ICAT tools have been applied by numerous countries, research organizations, institutions, and other interested parties. Their value has been repeatedly proven instrumental for strengthening transparency frameworks and supporting evidence-based climate action.
In many cases, ICAT tools and guides have been embedded within national institutions, adapted and adopted as nationally owned systems. They have also contributed to the development of stronger, data-based policies in key sectors.
ICAT works with developing countries across the world to develop policy-focused, priority-driven projects to strengthen national frameworks and capacity for climate action transparency. Since ICAT’s inception, 64 ICAT country projects have made use of the ICAT toolbox to achieve this.
Countries have received support and the capacity-building necessary to apply selected tools to develop their climate data frameworks, including for greenhouse gas emission inventories, projections, NDC tracking and policy impact assessment. For many of these countries, the tools were tailored to the national context and introduced as national tools intended for systematic, long-term use.
For example, ICAT supported Kyrgyzstan to set up a framework for NDC tracking, greenhouse gas emission projections and impact assessment of selected policies and measures in the energy and transport sectors. The country used several resources from the ICAT toolbox, including the Renewable Energy Methodology, theTransport Pricing Methodology and the GHG Abatement Cost MOdel (GACMO).
ICAT supported training on the two methodologies and the GACMO tool through hands-on workshops, where national experts used Kyrgyzstan-specific data. To ensure knowledge transfer during the ICAT project, international experts trained national staff to apply the methodologies and to adapt GACMO to the national context and use it for analysis, target tracking, and reporting. Participants from multiple ministries and agencies engaged in capacity-building activities, which included building marginal abatement cost curves and evaluating mitigation scenarios.
In line with the project’s objectives, the activities were aligned with the NDC update process, ensuring that the frameworks developed reflected a policy-relevant context. The country recognized that the ICAT toolbox supported the NDC update process, specifically using GACMO-enabled calculations on greenhouse gas reductions to feed into Kyrgyzstan’s NDC 3.0 targets.
At the heart of the ICAT toolbox is a series of ten policy assessment guides, covering various aspects that countries should consider when designing and implementing their climate policies and actions. The guides can be applied by countries, but also by non-governmental actors, including research institutions and grassroots organizations.
Assessments can cover expected and/or achieved changes in greenhouse gas emissions, socioeconomic impacts, and the contributions of subnational and national actors to national climate targets, among other dimensions. Organizations can use these findings to gain a clearer understanding of the effects of policies and actions, and to develop evidence-based recommendations that inform and influence decision-making.
A highlight of such an application comes from Eswatini, where ICAT collaborated with the University of Eswatini to apply the ICAT Renewable Energy Methodology in assessing the greenhouse gas emissions impacts of the country’s National Energy Policy.
Experts from the University of Eswatini’s Center for Sustainable Energy Research independently applied the methodology’s stepwise approach, which included policy review, baseline and policy scenario development, and impact quantification. Intensive stakeholder engagement provided practical insights from key institutions, delivering a collaborative and context-specific assessment. The assessment report also underwent expert review facilitated through ICAT, further strengthening the robustness of the analysis.
The results of the assessment revealed that renewable energy deployment can lead to significant greenhouse gas emission reductions. This can support the achievement of the national 50% renewable energy target by 2030, while also reducing dependence on electricity imports and enabling a lower coal capacity. The study highlighted competitive renewable energy auctions as a reliable pathway for timely, high-quality energy project delivery, while also questioning plans for a much larger coal plant, citing high costs and grid limitations that may limit near-term feasibility.
Overall, the assessment by the University of Eswatini provides policymakers with clear, evidence-based guidance on how to balance energy security, costs, and climate goals, making it a valuable resource for informing and orienting government action. The assessment was highly relevant for Eswatini’s Ministry of Natural Resources and Energy, which used the results in the development of Eswatini’s NDCs.
The ICAT toolbox is designed as a suite of resources available for independent use, including outside the context of specific projects or support activities. To facilitate this, ICAT provides a range of supporting materials to guide interested users, including:
All supporting resources are available through the ICAT website. If you need support locating or accessing any toolbox-related resources, please contact the ICAT secretariat, and we’ll be happy to assist you.
Have you used an ICAT tool or methodology and would like to share your experience? Please contact the ICAT secretariat and tell us more about it! We can explore the option of giving you the opportunity to share highlights and lessons learned at upcoming conferences and events, such as COP31 in Antalya, Türkiye.
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