The New Nation - Internet Edition

Muhammad Selim Hossain

Global Warming is craving tool causing global transmogrification through climate change and sea level rise that have loomed as threats to human being and other floral and faunal kingdoms on the blue planet. People from every corner of the globe are coming in global warming in different ways they can. Still and all, human retorting ways to global warming can be arrayed under two headings including mitigation and adaptation. Mitigation is more sustainable way to deal with global worming than adaptation. A convention on climate change was agreed at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio, 1992 that the green house gases in the atmosphere at a level that would avert parlous changes to the climate. To date, 186 countries have ratified the convention. To put the conference into operation, a protocol was out lived in Kyoto in 1997. The most telling aspect of the Kyoto Protocol is its legally binding commitment for 39 developed countries to mark down their Green House Gases (GHGs) emission by an average of 5.2% relative to 1990 levels. This emission reduction must be achieved by 2008-2012. The Protocol lets on the developed countries to reach their targets in different ways through 'Flexibility Mechanisms'. CDM for Clean Development Mechanism is one of the most flexible and sustainable mitigation mechanisms. The CDM was established by the Article-12 of the Kyoto Protocol and refers to climate change mitigation project functioned by both developing and developed countries where the developing countries kick off projects, donor agencies or developed countries make capital outlay to the projects which eventually cause emission reduction of GHGs, mainly carbon. The emission reduction is measured according to internationally agreed methods and will be quantified in standard units, to be known as 'Certified Emission Reduction (CER)'. The CER credits are sold to the developed countries. In the process, the host developing countries and donor agencies can play a role in emission reduction of GHGs and can also be economically benefited through the projects. On the other hand, the developed countries can enjoy a flexible mechanism to fulfill the obligation of GHGs emission reduction bestowed on them by Kyoto Protocol. So, a successful CDM project fetches benefit to both host developing countries and patronizing developed countries and ultimately it helps to meet the target of Kyoto Protocol GHGs emission abatement from atmosphere.

The CDM has two key goals including to assist developing countries who host CDM projects to achieve sustainable development and to provide developed countries with flexibility for achieving their emission reduction targets, by allowing them to take credits from emission reducing projects taken up in developing countries. That is, the CDM does for developing countries in achieving sustainable development and emanation reduction, while giving industrialized countries some flexibility in how they satisfy their emanation targets. The projects qualify through a rigorous, public process designated to ensure real, measurable and verifiable emission reduction that are additional to what would have occurred without the projects. The mechanism is overseen by the CDM Executive Board, answerable ultimately to the countries that have ratified the Kyoto Protocol. CDM projects have both global and local-national effects. As global effects, it attracts foreign direct investment, reduces GHGs and complies with MDGs (Millennium Development Goals). And as local-national effects, it reduces solid waste management cost of municipalities and ground and surface water pollution thus reducing health hazard, enhances the life of the dumpsites, improves the quality of life of the city, raises public awareness on solid waste management and recycling, provides safe and better working condition for the informal sector, and reduces poverty by creating jobs for urban poor.

Through the CDM mechanism, GHGs discharge can be lowered in three major sectors namely, waste, forestry and energy, both supply side and demand side. Yet, land based project is of great magnitude here. Because land-based ecosystems can playact an important role both positively by acting as a 'Sink' for sequestering carbon through photosynthesis and negatively as a 'Source of carbon' through deforestation, decomposition, soil erosion, etc. However, tackling climate change will call for huge shifts in investment flows to low carbon technologies. Market-based mechanism like the CDM will be key to achieving these shifts.

Since its provenience, the mechanism has already registered and in the pipeline totals over 4600 - well above what was really envisioned by countries when they launched the mechanism and the projects are anticipated to produce CERs amounting to more than 3 billion tones of CO2 equivalent in the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol, 2008-2012. Among them, about 54.35% are large scale projects and the rest are small scale ones (The New Nation, May 4, 2009). The year 2008 discerned continued strong flowering in the CDM projects and a milestone was reached with the international transaction log administered by UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change). The mechanism also experienced continuing challenges. The CDM projects are unevenly distributed over the developing world. This distributional pattern has given rise to a question of whether this mechanism is delivering value to the countries it was set up to help. Again where forest goods and services are scarce, technologies and investment are lacking, or employment opportunities are few, CDM land-use projects could benefit communities - especially if there are agreements to ensure access to these benefits by the needy part of the community. But such projects can also have negative impacts on local food security and development options.

A market mechanism like the CDM will be crucial when the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol will run out by the end of 2012. The future of the global market will depend largely on the demand for CDM projects from companies and countries in the north. Without the USA participating in the Kyoto CDM market, the demand is likely to be substantially constrained, reducing capital available for the development of these projects. With the continuing aid of the developed world and donor agencies, the CDM can run on delivering sustainable, clean development. In the global perspective, the potential sectors in CDM are - waste, energy forest, mining, buildings (res. comm. and govt.), agriculture, transport, industry and manufacturing.

The mechanism provides a means for developing countries, whose emissions are not capped, to take part in this growing trade. It can offer developing country governments the opportunity to promote and attract investment in sustainable forestry, land restoration, energy efficiency and renewable energy projects. For a project developer, it may proffer the additional input required to make a project financially viable.

For a local farmer, it may provide an additional source of income, or access to technical support. It allows developing country entrepreneurs and others to get investment fund for doing projects. At present, developing countries have no obligation to constrain their GHGs emission. But they are still able, on a voluntary basis, to augment global emission reduction by hosting projects under the Clean Development Mechanism.

In 1997, Costa Rica became the first developing country to jump off a national carbon sequestration programme. The Private Forest Programme (PFP) heartens land owners to opt for forestry-related land use by providing direct payment for environmental services CO2-fixation, water quality, biodiversity and landscape beauty. However, the first batch of carbon credits (200,000 tons of carbon) was sold to a Norwegian Consortium at US $ 10/tc, for a total of US $ 2, 0000,000 (IIED, 2002). Now developing countries can significantly contribute to the flourish of CDM and they have numerous options to optate for their own betterment and for the well-being of the habitable planet as well. The ways in which the CDM rules and procedures open up will depend on numerous factors, many of which can still be impressed by developing country stakeholders. Although decisions will be made at international level, two advisory groups including Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will prepare advice and guidance. Developing country agencies are still able to kick in this process. The GHGs emission reduction mechanism will also have considerable impact on the developing countries. Yet, the impact that the CDM will have on developing country stakeholders will vary depending on the objectives and priorities of those stakeholders, the planning and regulation in place to ensure that projects address these objectives and priorities, the current land use and organizational framework upon which CDM projects will be built. In the land-use sector, an emphasis imposed directly or indirectly by the donor agencies or CERs buyers on project hosting countries on forestry projects will outlast predominantly because of the relatively high rate of carbon uptake and ease of measurement of carbon in trees relative to crops. But widespread forestry projects will be strongly vied by agriculture as they may have impact on local food security.

Till today, the real scenario is that only the first line developing countries are being ameliorated from CDM. To date, the lion's share of CDM projects has gone to a handful of developing countries. Latin America was an early beneficiary. As a soon caught up - China and India have both espied an exponential growth in CDM project since 2005 and China is now the world's largest CDM host. But other regions, including South-East Asia, other countries of South Asia and Sub- Saharan Africa, have yet to take advantage of it (Zhang, 2009).

What has acted behind it? China's experience clearly indicates that the capacity building and the strengthening of local institutions are the key to jumpstarting CDM projects. Extensive investment between late 2001 and 2006, including from many donor agencies, has helped China. For example, an Asian Development Bank Project supported small-scale CDM energy projects, while the UN Development Programme built capacity in large scale industries with three pilot projects in the areas of renewable energy, energy efficiency and coal bed methane. Besides, the Chinese government has entrenched clear institutional structures, transparent CDM procedures and sound governance with clearer lines of responsibility to facilitate the smooth development of CDM projects (Zhang, 2009). Besides, another limitation that the most of the developing countries face is the funding problem. To start a project, it initially needs a considerable amount of lump' sum money and then the donor agencies make an investment but many project entrepreneurs of maximum developing countries encounter funding problem. However, to get expected benefits from the growing trade of CDM project, capacity building and strengthening of local institutions all over the developing world must be achieved to the satisfactory level. To accomplish this troublesome business, the host countries must initially take wide spread steps in a planned way and necessary support must come from developed countries and multilateral institutions like World Bank, Asian Development Bank, IMF, and UNDP etc. Moreover, in this respect, specific commitments can be made from the part of donor agencies and developed countries in the post-2012 climate agreement. Rather against the existing uneven distribution of CDM projects over the developing countries, a solution has been proposed by the European Union to impose quantitative restrictions on overall CDM credits. But this may slowdown the emission-reduction projects and also may parent impediment to the overall development and popularity of the mechanism.

With a view to participating in the growing trade of Kyoto Protocol CDM project, the government of Bangladesh has set down a two tier Designated National Authority (DNA) through a government notification on 13 October 2003 although the attempt has been taken much later in comparison to other developing countries. Because in the meantime, a number of developing countries including Costa Rica, Brazil and other South American developing countries have developed CDM projects. However, the lower tier, located at the Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF), is the secretariat or operational body of the DNA. It is performing all CDM related activities including giving preliminary approval of CDM project and the upper tier, known as the CDM Board, gives the final endorsement of the approved project. Prime Minister is the principal secretary to the CDM Board. Apart from setting up of DNA, the government has also enrooted national procedures for evaluation and approval of CDM projects, developed sustainable development criteria for the evaluation of CDM projects and finalized the CDM strategy (Waste Concern, 2008).

Since the dayspring of CDM process, Bangladesh possesses two completely registered projects. More 5 projects have just got DNA approval. About 4 projects are under processing and one project is in concept stage. It is poultry waste management (Hossain, 2009). Of the two registered projects, one has already been prepared on "Landfill Gas Recovery in Dhaka" under the recently completed project entitled "Capacity Development for Clean Development Mechanism in Bangladesh" under the MoEF's SEMP (Sustainable Environment Management Programme) project with the support from UNDP. Waste Concern, a leading NGO of the country, is involved in the design, implementation and now monitoring of the project. World Wild Recycling (WWR) of the Netherlands is investing in afore mentioned CDM project. Two projects including SHS (Solar Home System) with Grameen Shakti and CFL's to replace incandescent light bulbs with Grameen Shakti and Energy Pac. BCAS (Bangladesh Center for Advanced Studies), an outstanding NGO of Bangladesh is the responsible authority for the preparation of the projects through the assistance of the Netherlands Government. Another two CDM project entitled, "Electricity Demand Side Management and Industrial CHP Projects are under consideration (DoE, 2009).

There has much potentiality of growth of CDM projects in Bangladesh. Because there are three major sectors in which GHGs emission can be reduced maturating CDM projects. They include waste, forestry and energy, both supply side and demand side. Yet, the potential sectors for the development of CDM project in Bangladesh are waste and forestry ones. In waste sector, Bangladesh can develop a number of projects because Bangladesh, especially urban Bangladesh, spawns a huge amount of waste everyday. Currently urban waste generation in Bangladesh is more than 14000 tones per day and it is estimated that if the present trend continues, the figure will reach to 47,064 tones per day in 2025 (Enayetullah, 2009). The waste sector options for Bangladesh can be landfill, poultry waste, human excreta and waste water treatment. The CDM projects in waste sector can be beneficial to ensure job creation, health insurance, environmental development, soil quality improvement and higher yield of agriculture in the open dumping area of waste disposal.

The options in the forestry sector can be both afforestaton and reforestation. There may be large or small scale, single or multiple species, pure forestry or on farm systems such as - reforestation of marginal areas with native species through planting and natural regeneration e. g. riverine areas, along the coastal belt, steep slopes, around and between existing forest fragments where deforestation has occurred over time; new, large-scale, industrial plantation; establishment of biomass plantation for energy production and the substitution of fossil fuels; plantation in and around homestead; small-scale plantation by land owners; introduction of trees into existing agricultural system (agroforestry) and rehabilitation of degraded areas through tree plantation or assisting natural regeneration.

The Energy sector options for CDM project in Bangladesh are numerous. They include switching from carbon intensive fuels to less carbon intensive fuels such as- replacing coal by natural gas in brickfields, replacing diesel buses by CNG buses and solar home systems; replacing an inefficient device by an efficient one such as-incandescent bulbs to compact fluorescent lamps, efficient air conditioners; increasing the efficiency of an existing device such as- retrofitting boilers and motors; modifications of a process so that it consumes less fossil fuel such as- pulping using continuous digesters in place of batch digesters; Greenfield projects such as- Vertical Shaft Brick Kiln (VSBK) for brick making(Waste Concern, 2009). We know Bangladesh's overall energy consumption is very low in comparison to that of other developing countries. As CDM is a project based mechanism, it should be no barrier. Besides, CDM is concerned with emission that will occur in the future, and in that regard, the prospect of CDM is bright because Bangladesh's commercial energy consumption is increasing at 6% per year.

In a developing country with a small geographic area but burdened with population explosion, resource limitation, unemployment problem, extreme poverty, pollution problem and political instability like ours, worth mentioning growth in CDM projects is imperative. Development and successfully implementation of sufficient number CDM projects can ensure overall environmental development, thus reducing health hazard specially in urban Bangladesh, mitigation of energy crisis and economic growth of the country but the reality is that the country is yet to get any benefit from the growing trade of CDM projects because CDM here has experienced numerous circumscriptions since its provenance. The major limitations that the country has experienced over the time are stated here along with some actions that can be taken into account to avail this look-in.

· The fundamental rules, procedures and strategies of CDM naturally go for the front line developing countries to be highly benefited from it. As a result, China, India, Brazil and Malaysia are the top beneficiary countries of CDM process. They have better technical capability, large number of entrepreneurs, will-defined and high quality base line and sufficient number of CDM experts. The developing counties like Bangladesh don't have such facilities and accordingly they are deprived of the chance. This is why; these countries should unitedly talk the CDM Executive Board into formulating rules, procedures and strategies that support them in this concern.

· CDM project implementation process is so complex. The govt. administration has been strongly involved in it that has made project implementation so lengthy. The emergent countries like Bangladesh should apply to CDM Executive Board to relax and simplify the process for the sake of smooth growth of CDM over the whole developing world.

· Bangladesh lacks of both entrepreneur and optimum fund in this operation. To spring a project, the project developer has to invest a large amount of money and only then the donor agencies come forward to invest. On an average, about 75% of the project expenditure has to be carried out by the project developer who can profit maximum 10%-20%. The govt. should mature sufficient number of entrepreneurs through inspiration and motivation and then the banking sector should be called for raising fund for project development.

· There are still many irregularities in energy sector. Large energy consuming institutions adopt the way of corruption and accordingly they don't have to pay the exact bill. Most of the industries pay half of the exact bill. Besides, energy price in Bangladesh is not so costly. The reason why, no large energy consuming farm authority comes forward to develop a CDM project to save energy. To solve this problem, mind setup of big energy consuming farm authorities need to be changed. On the other hand, the rules and regulations in energy sector that are not complying with CDM flourish must be amended (Hossain, 2009). One of the two registered projects namely "Landfill Gas Extraction and Utilization at Matuail Landfill Site" has not been handed over the responsible authority- Waste Concern that has tarnished the country's image in the global CDM market although just to a small extent. Hence, enhancement of govt. cooperation to make CDM initiative a successful story in Bangladesh is a must. The govt. should clearly declare the CDM business facilities offered from govt.'s part.

· There is enough lack of baseline data. The govt. should establish a well-defined base line for CDM taking the help of the country's expert level people. And at the same time the govt. should inform all ministries and other concerned govt. and non-govt. bodies of the govt.'s willingness about the sectors identified for CDM project development.

· Capacity and strength level of private and public institutions in Bangladesh is very low. Main target should be to build capacity of the staffs and officials of public and private sectors about CDM project and to strengthen local institutions. Now China is the world's largest CDM host. China's experience clearly indicated that capacity building is the key to jumpstarting CDM project. Yet, to accomplish this troublesome job, constant cooperation from the donor agencies like ADB, IDB, UNDP and WB is clamant. To draw the attention of the donor agencies, different motivational and convincing attempts must be made.

· The govt. should establish clear institutional structures, transparent CDM procedure such as- one stop approval process, and sound governance with clearer lines of responsibility to facilitate the smooth implementation of CDM project.

· Many projects such as- composting, biogas, improved stove, forestry can be implemented having pro-poor elements.

· Low level of awareness and capacity amongst the public, private and financial sectors about CDM opportunities is one of the most under lied obstacle to CDM thrive in Bangladesh. Awareness building and related information dissemination should be done through seminar, symposium, and advertisement in mass media and other means of propaganda and motivation.

· There are many investors keen to invest in projects which has both mitigation and adaptation benefits. We should clearly identify such kind of projects which have both the mitigation and adaptation advantages.

· We should identify promising project types assessing their potential in terms of carbon flows and associated social, economic and environmental impacts.

· Offer information about CDM opportunities in the country can be disseminated to draw the attention of donor agencies and other foreign investors through participation in trade fair, exhibition and websites of national institutions.

· Prospective investors, country institutions or local NGOs all should be permitted in identifying opportunities for CDM projects.

· As the country has lacking in financial resources to implement CDM projects, we need to find out economic opportunities in sectors that will be beneficial to the country for CDM projects.

· We should carefully observe the CDM project process of other developing countries as to how they are being profited and use that knowledge and experience in CDM project development in Bangladesh considering the country's present perspective.

· The CDM projects should contribute to the improvement of the environment and national development of the country as a whole.

CDM has experienced rapid growth, beyond expectation since its inception in 1997. This success has led to challenges also including uneven development of CDM over the developing world that has appeared a question on the horizon about the mechanism as to sureness of equal access and benefit. At the same time, a great deal is riding on the success of the mechanism including people's aspiration for sustainable, green development. Yet, futurity of global CDM market depends on post-2012 climate agreement and co-operation of the donor agencies and developed countries specially the participation of USA in CDM process.

Bangladesh has much potential for exponential development in CDM market especially in waste and forestry sectors. But due to lack of building capacity, institutional strength, sufficient co-operation from govt., donor agencies, developed countries and private entrepreneurs and complex and lengthy implementation procedure, it has not been able to make use of the profitable opportunity.

As a result, environmental degradation is being gradually aggravated and the wheel of country's economy hasn't experienced momentum. So, private-public joint initiatives and adequate attention are needed to tale advantage of CDM in the country.

(Muhammad Selim Hossain is an M.S. student, Department of Geography and Environment and a young researcher and writer on Geographic and Environmental issues.)