Source - Business Day Website (Eng)
May 08, 2006


AFP
HYDERABAD, India – The Asian Development Bank (ADB) can boost the
fight against climate change by curbing funds for fossil fuel projects and
supporting renewable energy, environmental watchdog Greenpeace
International said Thursday.

In a report titled “Irrelevance or Leadership,” Greenpeace said if
the ADB continued to fund coal-based projects it could fail in its mission
to reduce poverty and promote development.

“The main cause of climate change is our reliance on fossil fuels
– coal, oil and gas – to produce energy and the solution is to shift to
clean, renewable energy such as biomass, geothermal power plants and wind
power,” it said.

According to the Global Wind Energy Council, a body promoting wind
power, the industry clocked 14 billion dollars in sales in 2005 but less
than 10 percent of it was in Asia, the world’s fastest growing power
market.

“Coal consumption in the Asia-Pacific region is increasing
massively ... it is not surprising that 2005 registered one of the largest
temperature increases on record according to data from National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration,” Greenpeace said.

Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere stood at their highest “in
650,000 years” and rapidly growing nations such as China and India need to
bring down their emissions soon, said the report released during the ABD
annual meeting in this southern Indian city this week.

Renewable energy projects need financial and policy support to
create a sustainable market, it said.

The total amount ADB invested on nine Asian fossil fuel projects
during the last six years was 1.54 billion dollars or 26 percent of its
energy portfolio while renewable energy and energy efficiency got only 4.1
percent, Greenpeace said.

India joined the 1997 Kyoto Protocol of the UN Framework
Convention on Climate Change in August 2002 to cut greenhouse emissions.
It is the only international accord that aims at reducing volumes
of “greenhouse gas” pollution, the carbon by-product of burning fossil
fuels that is storing up solar heat in the atmosphere.

Britain wants to see a world-wide consensus on global warming that
goes beyond the disputed protocol and puts China and India -- both
economically booming – at the heart of the issue.

The Greenpeace report urged the ADB to encourage developing member
nations to set “binding, ambitious renewable energy and energy efficiency
targets” and said continued financing of fossil fuel power plants will
undermine the bank’s efforts to achieve sustainable development.
The ADB on Wednesday said it would earmark one billion dollars by
2008 to fund renewable energy projects.

“The ADB energy portfolio must be directed soley to renewable
energy projects and energy efficiency,” it said.

“At this historic crossroads, with the energy-driven impacts of
climate change poised to hit Asia’s poorest the hardest, which direction
will the ADB take?” it said. “The time for leadership is now.”

K. Srinivas, climate change campaigner at Greenpeace India, said
there were only two mistakes one could make in fighting climate change.
“Not starting and not going all the way. The ADB is guilty of
both,” Srinivas said.

Source: http://www.biz-day.com

< Back