A ferry about to dock on the tiny Caribbean island of Nevis, whose volcano is being tapped for geothermal energy. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
LIMA, Dec 2 2014 (IPS)

The road towards a green economy is paved with both reward and risk, and policymakers must seek to balance these out if the transition to low-carbon energy sources is to succeed on the required scale, climate experts say.

“I think what is important is that in most of these processes you will have winners and losers,” John Christensen, director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Centre on Energy, Climate and Sustainable Development, told IPS.“Right now we need to talk about what will happen if countries don’t move along. Like all islands, you will be facing increased flooding risks. So in the green transition, countries need to look at how to make themselves more resilient." -- John Christensen of UNEP

“So you need to be aware that there are people who will lose and you need to take care of them so that they feel that they are not left out.

“You need to find other ways of engaging them and help them get into something new because otherwise you will have all this resistance from groups that have special interests,” said Christensen, who spoke with IPS on the sidelines of the 20th session of the United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP 20) which got underway here Monday.

The climate summit convenes ministers of 194 countries for the annual Conference of the Parties to negotiate over 12 days the legally binding text that will become next year’s Paris Protocol.

It will provide an early insight into what may be expected from the agreement with regard to the long-term phase-out of coal-fired power plants, the rate of deployment of renewable energies, and the financial and technological support for the vulnerable and least developed countries.

Nevis, a 13-kilometre-long island in the Caribbean, recently announced that it was “on the cusp of going completely green.” Deputy Premier and Minister of Tourism Mark Brantley outlined the Nevis Island Administration’s vision for tourism development and in particular, replacing fossil fuel generation with renewable energy resources.

“Besides reducing a country’s carbon footprint, concern about waste management is a particularly challenging issue for all nations” he said, sharing Nevis’ initiative to create an environment-friendly solution for its waste management with the Baltimore firm, Omni Alpha.

Brantley said the waste to energy agreement will be coupled with the construction of a solar farm to ensure that a targeted energy supply is met.

“It is these developments, along with the progress that has been made on developing our geothermal energy sources, that promise to make Nevis the greenest place on earth,” he told IPS.

Christensen said as they embark on the road towards green economies, Caribbean countries could take lessons from his homeland, Denmark.

“You had shipyards for years and years and they couldn’t compete with Korea and China when they started building ships so the government for a long period kept pouring money into them to try and keep them alive instead of trying to transition them into something else,” he explained. “Now they are producing windmill towers and other things that are more forward-looking.”

Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, at the COP20 talks in Lima. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

For the countries in the Caribbean, Christensen said a lot of them now use fuel oil or diesel for power production plus a lot of petrol for cars, all of which is imported.

But he said few of the islands have the necessary financial resources for the yearly fuel import bill, which is “quite expensive.”

He said these countries should capitalise on their geographical location, which offers “lots of sunshine, potential for biomass and wind.”

He pointed to Cuba, which “has made quite a transition using solar energy in the energy sector,” adding that other countries in the Caribbean have moved to forest conservation and are using more of the resources from the environment that wasn’t considered of value.

“Right now we need to talk about what will happen if countries don’t move along. Like all islands, you will be facing increased flooding risks. So in the green transition, countries need to look at how to make themselves more resilient, look at water for your agriculture,” he said.

“I think there are ways of improving efficiency because it’s getting warmer and because of where you are [you need to] look for new opportunities in the green economy that can also protect you against future climate change,” Christensen added.

The Climate Technology Centre and Network (CTCN), the operational arm of the UNFCCC Technology Mechanism, promotes accelerated, diversified and scaled-up transfer of environmentally sound technologies for climate change mitigation and adaptation, in developing countries, in line with their sustainable development priorities.

The CTCN works to stimulate technology cooperation and enhance the development and transfer of technologies to developing country parties at their request.

“We see CTCN as a motor, a vehicle for helping countries achieve green economies,” Jason Spensley, Climate Technology Manager, told IPS.

“One specific request which is forthcoming in the following days will be from Antigua and Barbuda, a request on renewable energy development, specifically wind energy development,” he said. “The government of Antigua and Barbuda has set green ambition commitments; the price of energy [there] is very high.”

Spensley said the Dominican Republic is also in discussions with CTCN on submission of a request on renewable energy production.

In recent times, the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), the region’s premier lending institution, has been stepping up efforts to attract investment in green energy and climate resilience projects in the Caribbean.

The Bank’s president Dr. Warren Smith said much of the eastern Caribbean – the smallest Caribbean countries – have large amounts of geothermal potential, allowing them to dramatically reduce their fossil fuel imports and put them in a position where they could become an exporter of energy because of the proximity of nearby islands without these resources.

Smith is confident the countries are buying into the idea of transforming the region into a prosperous green economy that reduces indebtedness, improves competitiveness, and starts to tackle climate risk.

As countries get down to the business at hand here in Lima, Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, urged the 12,400 attendees to aspire to great heights, drawing several critical lines of action.

“First, we must bring a draft of a new, universal climate change agreement to the table and clarify how national contributions will be communicated next year,” she said.

“Second, we must consolidate progress on adaptation to achieve political parity with mitigation, given the equal urgency of both.

“Third, we must enhance the delivery of finance, in particular to the most vulnerable. Finally, we must stimulate ever-increasing action on the part of all stakeholders to scale up the scope and accelerate the solutions that move us all forward, faster,” Figueres added.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The writer can be contacted at destinydlb@gmail.com

Turbines at WindWatt Nevis Limited. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
CHARLESTOWN, Nevis, May 26 2013 (IPS)

When it comes to generating clean energy and reducing costs, the tiny Caribbean island of Nevis considers itself the leader within the nine-member Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS).

But the island of 12,000 residents is finding it difficult to convince other islands to buy into its model."In the event of a hurricane approaching, we would have the turbines down in a couple of hours." -- Dexter Bowrin of WindWatt Nevis Limited

In 2010, the 13-kilometre-long island launched the first-ever wind farm to be commissioned in the OECS, with a promise to provide local jobs, a reliable supply of wind energy, cheaper electricity and a reduction in surcharge and the use of imported oils.

“The fossil fuel, the diesel that the Nevis Electricity Company (NEVLEC) uses, I think it’s somewhere in the region of about 32-33 cents per kilowatt. We are selling them power for less than half of that so the numbers will add up that there must be considerable savings to the consumer,” Dexter Bowrin, director at WindWatt Nevis Limited, told IPS.

The WindWatt Wind Farm (WindWatt Nevis Limited), an independent power producer, is a joint venture between Canadian and Nevisian firms which commenced operations in 2010. The company has secured a 25-year contract with NEVLEC, the state-owned electricity company, to produce and sell it power.

It uses eight wind turbines to produce a maximum capacity of about 2.2 megawatts, which works out to approximately 20 percent of the tiny island’s total energy needs.

But in spite of what company officials say is clearly a success story and a desire to “expand and set up wind farms in other Caribbean countries”, Bowrin told IPS Nevis’ neighbours are not lining up to go the route of wind energy.

“We would love to expand but that’s not left to us. We’ve gone to several of the other islands as close as St. Kitts, down to St. Lucia and St. Vincent trying to sell the idea. However, it has not been an easy sell,” he said.

“In places like St. Lucia there are issues with land space. Most of those lands are privately owned so these are not negotiations for us but for the government of the country and the land owners. We are just bringing the technology.”

He added that there is usually a misconception that if you set up a wind farm, it will be a financial windfall, but “it doesn’t really work like that”.

In neighbouring St. Kitts, the larger island of this two-island Federation, Bowrin said even though nothing has been done, “there are competitors and we haven’t been able to establish another wind farm.”

While wind energy is not catching on that quickly in the Caribbean, most countries in the region have either expressed a desire to or have invested in solar energy.

Earlier this month, the Dutch Caribbean Community (CARICOM) country of Suriname announced that it would invest in solar energy to bring electricity to remote communities.

Gunzi, a Maroon village in the upper Suriname River region, will serve as test site for the project.

Alternative energy company WTEC from the United States was contracted to execute the project, in close cooperation with the Ministry of Natural Resources, national electricity company EBS and the Anton de Kom University of Suriname.

More than three-quarters of Suriname’s landmass is blanketed by thick rainforest and most of the country’s inhabitants live in the capital Paramaribo. As a result, several villages in the sparsely populated hinterland have not been hooked up to the EBS grid and make do with noisy diesel-powered generators that are only switched on at night.

Natural Resources Minister Stanley Betterson underscored that bringing electricity to the remote villages will benefit education, industry and development of these areas.

Last month, the government scrapped a proposal to execute a hydropower project in the hinterland. The TapaJai project would call for submerging 240 kilometres of land along the upper Suriname River and installing a new series of turbines which would ultimately generate 275 megawatts of power. Residents of the surrounding Maroon villages objected to that project.

WTEC Director Brian Singh said solar energy is a cost-effective alternative, as Suriname has plenty of sunlight and the prices for solar panels are dropping worldwide.

Singh announced that his company was donating the 75,000-dollar plant that will be set up as a pilot in Gunzi. University students will monitor the Gunzi project for a year and their findings will be used to optimise its use and execute the project in other villages.

Environment Coordinator John Goedschalk said that government is investing in an in-depth research to find the ideal mix of alternatives to supply energy. He said the criteria for this mix are accessibility, cost effectiveness and least impact on the environment.

Bowrin told IPS concerns for the environment were also at the forefront of the minds of the principals of WindWatt Nevis Limited noting that, prior to the commencement of operations, an Environmental Impact Assessment was done to determine the noise level and other impacts on the environment.

“We didn’t just put up turbines. We leave a very small environmental footprint. The eight turbines that we have in place we are only using two and a quarter acres of land and we still have the flexibility or the ability to have cows and other animals grazing in the area,” he said.

“Another big issue is people often say if you have migrating birds, the turbines would hurt or kill them. We haven’t had that experience here and I don’t know of any place that has had that experience.”

Cognizant of the yearly hurricane season which runs from June to November, Bowrin said the two-blade system turbines are very small and it takes only 40 minutes to take one down.

“We monitor the weather on a daily and weekly basis so in the event of a hurricane approaching we would have the turbines down in a couple of hours and it’s just as easy to put them back up,” he said.

“The Nevis Island administration has demonstrated its commitment to using sustainable and renewable energy through continued investment for geothermal energy and wind energy,” Premier Vance Amory told IPS.

“We will also add in a real way in the not too distant future the harnessing of solar energy so that we can look at a reduction in our dependence on fossil fuel for the generation of our energy.”

With its working wind farm, a series of solar panel projects, and a planned geothermal project, St Kitts and Nevis has been among the region’s green energy pioneers.

While the geothermal project has experienced delays, Prime Minister Dr. Denzil Douglas said current projections foresee locally-generated geothermal energy “in two years”.

Coastal erosion exposes columns for lights leading to the runway of Vance Amory International Airport in Nevis. Credit: Desmond Brown/IPS

By Desmond Brown
CHARLESTOWN, Nevis, May 19 2013 (IPS)

The Caribbean does not have the luxury of time for decisive action on climate change and global warming. In fact, it is on the brink of calamity, according to a prominent scientist.

Conrad Douglas, a Jamaican scientist who has published over 350 reports on environmental management and related matters, has warned that “urgent action at all levels [is] required now”, cautioning the region against complacency in dealing with climate change.

Noting that earlier models forecast that an atmosphere of 350 parts per million (PPM) of carbon dioxide would place the planet at a catastrophic tipping point for climate change, Douglas cited new information which put the new tipping point at 450 PPM.

“There are 445 million PPM of carbon dioxide, which is a mere five PPM of carbon dioxide away from the…limit that was projected for catastrophic global tipping points,” he told IPS.

With the projected loading rate at 2.5 PPM per year, Douglas said that within two years, the earth would reach a point where even more catastrophic events would wreak havoc on the planet, its societies and its economies.

“We’ve gotten to a juncture at which the entire planet is facing a precarious situation,” Douglas said. “We are heading towards a dangerous place on planet Earth.”

“Potentially irreversible consequences”

Last year was the warmest in recent history, including the highest temperatures since temperatures began to be recorded in 1895."We are heading towards a dangerous place on planet Earth."
-- Dr. Conrad Douglas

“We know about Hurricane Sandy…and the destruction which it caused in our region and the eastern seaboard of the United States,” Douglas said, noting that parts of the United States and the Caribbean are still recovering from that storm.

Douglas’ colleague, John Crowley, said that the planet’s nitrogen cycle had been severely thrown out of balance because of the massive overuse of inorganic fertilisers.

“That, according to the specialists, is having catastrophic and potentially irreversible consequences that require a major rethink of agricultural systems, including but not limited to fertiliser use,” he told IPS.

Both scientists are among dozens who gathered here from May 15 to 16 for a UNESCO-sponsored sub-regional meeting on environmental policy formulation and planning in the Caribbean region.

“It was clear already in 2011 when we [first took stock of] these issues that the knowledge about climate change in the Caribbean is insufficient and insufficiently connected to the real dynamics of Caribbean societies,” said Crowley, a UNESCO representative.

In 2009, a group of Jamaican artists launched a national public education campaign on climate change. It was part of a project implemented by Panos Caribbean, a regional organisation that helps journalists cover sustainable development issues, and Jamaica’s National Environment Education Committee (NEEC).

The artists produced a package of information designed to educate the Jamaican public. It consisted of a theme song titled “Global Warning”, a series of public service announcements, a mini album of songs on climate change, and a music video for the theme song.

A global issue

Even as deliberations continue here today, the general assembly of the United Nations in New York is meeting on sustainable development and climate change.

“I think we have finally awakened to the urgency of the situation, that we have tested and exceeded the globe’s capacity for absorbing and assimilating the pollutants that we make and discharge,” Douglas said.

“What we need now is nothing less than a Manhattan type project to rescue the planet.”

Marcus Natta, senior project analyst in the Ministry of Sustainable Development in St. Kitts, told IPS the meeting was very timely.

“What is important about this particular conference is that we are focused on action. I think unlike many other meetings, if we could truly achieve the action part after the planning and get the implementation, then we would have really achieved success,” he said.

The tiny island of Nevis is described as one of the few remaining unspoiled touches of paradise and one of the little-known wonders of the Caribbean. Douglas hoped that actions taken at the meeting would help preserve it as such.

“We hope that in the context of what faces us today – the phenomenon of climate change – that its beauty and charm will be preserved long into the future as we take wise and timely action to protect the habitat of mankind and all living creatures,” he urged his colleagues.

“This we must strive to do as we protect ourselves from ourselves. It’s our attitudes and values, our failure to change our behaviour that has led us to this critical point,” he warned, adding that the current path mankind is treading “threatens at the very least to plunge us into a perpetual cycle of poverty and misery”.