Reducing greenhouse gases through emissions trading

German companies have contracted the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH – German Technical Cooperation – to facilitate their access to emissions credits. The basis for such transactions is an arrangement, agreed in the Kyoto Protocol and the European emissions trading system, that allows industrialised countries and companies operating in those countries to supplement their efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through projects in developing and emergent countries. The emissions reductions achieved in this way are then quantified and documented in certificates that may be used as credits to enable the companies to meet their reduction obligations. What makes this possibility attractive is that greenhouse gas emissions can often be reduced in developing countries at less expense than in industrialised countries. Positive spin-offs of such projects are the technology transfer involved and the promotion of sustainable local or regional development.

Specifically for purposes of this private-sector contract, GTZ has created a central contact point, the "carbon procurement unit" or CPU, in Gurgaon near the Indian capital New Delhi. "The CPU is starting up at just the right time, because the market is growing by leaps and bounds. Together with China, India has the largest number of projects to generate emissions certificates," says Markus Kurdziel, a GTZ climate expert. At the start of 2008, 302 of 803 emissions-credit projects throughout the world were to be found in India. The first customer for the GTZ contact point was RWE Power AG in Essen, Germany, which will be permitted to expend 90 million of the certificates before 2012 to meet its greenhouse gas reduction obligations. A major proportion of these credits are to come from India.

"We use the CPU to form contacts between German customers and projects that reduce greenhouse gases and are eligible for the corresponding emissions credits," says project manager Kai Berndt. "The principle involved is simple. If RWE, for example, is obligated to reduce the CO2 emissions of a coal-fired power plant in Germany, the company can obtain certificates from a new hydroelectric power station in India," Berndt explains. It is a win-win situation. RWE can continue to operate its power plant in Germany, the Indian electric utility receives additional financing for its emissions-free hydroelectric plant, and globally speaking, the emission of greenhouse gases is reduced.

But hydroelectric plants are only one example. The CPU in India is currently pursuing some 100 projects of various magnitudes, one of which is the world's largest project for electric power from biogas and biomass. The project spans eight of the Indian states and will supply more than 700 megawatts of electric power when completed. Additional projects use renewable energy such as wind power or aim to avoid methane gas emissions. The CPU also works together with India's largest electric utility for private consumers on a programme promoting the exchange of old-fashioned light bulbs for modern energy-saving ones.
"The CPU is there for each step right up to final certification. We identify potential projects at an early stage, provide advisory services to the project owners and conduct economic and technical feasibility studies," explains Kurdziel. In addition, GTZ's own appraisers and independent assessors from certification organisations such as the TÜV – the German technical control boards – ensure that the projects do in fact bring about the anticipated reduction of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.

As an international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations, the federally owned Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH supports the German Government in achieving its development-policy objectives. It provides viable, forward-looking solutions for political, economic, ecological and social development in a globalised world. Often working under difficult conditions, GTZ promotes complex reforms and change processes. Its corporate objective is to improve people’s living conditions on a sustainable basis.

The killing follows a series of attacks and threats against humanitarian organisations and health workers during the past months. In June, an MSF aid worker, Elsa Serfass, was killed by rebel gunfire in the northwest, leading to a lengthy reduction of MSF operations.

A woman was shot dead in an MSF ambulance when an unidentified gunman fired on the vehicle in Vakaga province in the northeast of the Central African Republic (CAR) on March 10.

As a result, MSF has suspended its mobile clinic activities outside the main towns in the region.

This is the second person to be killed in an attack on MSF in the past nine months in Central African Republic. The ambulance was carrying a mother and her baby who had been discharged from the MSF health centre in Gordil. The 32 year old woman leaves behind six children.

"We are shocked and outraged that our patient's mother was shot," says Nicole Henze, MSF Head of Mission. "This attack is unacceptable. Our ambulance was clearly targeted, making us reconsider our activities in remote areas and our presence in the country. All armed persons are obliged to respect humanitarian aid. This includes medical personnel and, above all, our patients."

The killing follows a series of attacks and threats against humanitarian organisations and health workers during the past months. In June, an MSF aid worker, Elsa Serfass, was killed by rebel gunfire in the northwest, leading to a lengthy reduction of MSF operations.

Until this attack, throughout northern CAR, MSF was providing basic health care to populations in remote areas, as well as referral and access to secondary care in more serious cases. However, MSF considers that the necessary conditions for its medical teams to provide aid to these isolated populations do not currently exist.

Large parts of the civilian population in northern CAR are subject to roadside banditry, abuse by armed actors and repeated displacement. Villages have been attacked, pillaged and burned, forcing people to flee into inhospitable forest and severely restricting their access to health care.

In northeastern Vakaga province, MSF provided assistance to a population of about 35,000 through mobile and fixed clinics in Birao and Gordil. MSF teams work in seven other locations in Ouham-Pendé, Ouham and Nana-Grébizi in the northwest of the country.

From its health structures MSF carries out emergency surgery, provides primary and secondary health care and treats patients for tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS and sleeping sickness. MSF has been working in the country since 1997.

A new film prize at the 2008 Zanzibar International Film Festival for films relating to development policy issues

The Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH, in cooperation with the Zanzibar International Film Festival (ZIFF) and Southern Africa Communications for Development (SACOD) will be awarding the Ousmane Sembène Films for Development Award for the first time in 2008. The prize will be awarded to a film that takes a particular look at topics of development cooperation. It carries prize money of US $5,000 and is designed to help the winner in his or her future film-making career. The Festival will be held in Zanzibar/Tanzania from 11–20 July 2008.

The focus of the film selection in 2008 will be on HIV/AIDS, with topics such as gender, the environment and ecology, education and poverty following in the years to come. “HIV/AIDS poses a threat to people and societies throughout the world, particularly in the large majority of African countries, which are home to two-thirds of all people living with HIV. Future development in the countries of Africa depends to a large extent on whether the societies particularly hard hit by HIV manage to cope with this pandemic. That’s why we’re focusing on HIV/AIDS in the first year of the prize,” said Thomas Kirsch-Woik, GTZ expert on HIV/AIDS.

On behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), amongst others, GTZ is shaping the German contribution to the global AIDS response and is developing further approaches in the fields of HIV/AIDS prevention. GTZ is also steering the German input to the European hospital-twinning  Alliance ESTHER, the aim of which is to improve access to high quality treatment, care and prevention of HIV and AIDS in developing countries. Moreover, GTZ is further developing promising approaches to prevent mother to child transmission of HIV in Kenia and Tanzania .

As an international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations, the federally owned Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH supports the German Government in achieving its development-policy objectives. It provides viable, forwardlooking solutions for political, economic, ecological and social development in a globalised world. Working under difficult conditions, GTZ promotes complex reforms and change processes. Its corporate objective is to improve people’s living conditions on a sustainable basis.

After six years of active music in the West, the Gambia’s reggae dancehall sensation, Rebellion D’Recaller is due in the country in mid-February to present his latest album called “Movin On” .

Recorded at IM Music Studios in Germany, Recaller’s new CD album comprises of sixteen sound tracks, which features one of the world’s finest reggae artists, the Jamaican mega-star Chuck Fender.

Basically, the new album boasts of a high quality sound mixed in one of the world’s most renowned recording studios.

Meanwhile, one of the hit-tunes in the album “Is It True” was recorded in Jamaica. The young reggae dancehall hearth-throb left Banjul in February 2002 for France, and since then, has held major concerts in various parts of Europe. Rebellion is also a member of the “Inspired Delegation Crew”, a group based in Brikama comprising of young-talented artists.

In another development, the chief executive officer (CEO) of Super Sonic Sounds, based in Berlin,Germany, Freddy Palzer is also expected in The Gambia on February 5. Watch out for Rebellion D’Recaller’s newest album soon.

With the Climate Conference in Bali having come to a successful conclusion, Sean Heron interviewed Christoph Bals from the German NGO Germanwatch on his opinion of the outcome, and an outlook on the future negotiations. Christoph is the Senior Political Executive of Germanwatch, Co-Autor of the Climate protection-Index and did lobby work on Bali.

The interview

Introduction to Germanwatch

Wikinews: Could you explain what defines the organization Germanwatch and what your targets are?
Christoph Bals: Germanwatch is a non governmental organization (NGO) that has the environment and north south justice/fairness as its main topics. We don't actually execute any projects in the south, but lend issues that are of relevance to the south - the so called developing nations - a voice towards politics, the economy and on the financial market.
WN: Could you go into more specifics on what it is you do on climate change?
CB: Climate Change is one of our main topics. Both the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and adaptation to climate change is important. For these two issues we engage ourselves both with regard to Germany and the least developed countries (LDCs). We are intensively involved in national and international political processes, building up pressure on politicians and economic players and/or working constructively with them, depending on how greater achievements are to be made.

The Negotiations in Bali
WN: The next question, which is very much at hand, is of course how Germanwatch views the outcome of the negotiations? Have your expectations been fulfilled?
CB: We haven't been able to write in the reduction targets that we would have needed. But these targets can still be achieved in the negotiating framework that the Roadmap has put down. The biggest obstacle here were the United States. It won't be possible to agree to targets with this administration, but hopefully, in two years and with the next administration, we'll be able to agree to the necessary global targets.
WN: Would you have expected this outcome yesterday? Or a year ago?
CB: A year ago I would have found the current outcome almost revolutionary. Compared with my expectations before the negotiation it's different though; I then still had the hope that there would be more extensive progress at the end of this climate year. If you look at the packages that have been agreed on: technology transfer and development, adaptation to climate change, financial mechanisms, forest protection; then you can see that quite a substantial process has been started. So a lot has been achieved, but the biggest hurdles are still in front of us.
What could cause some dynamics is that you need money for all these packages, and you can only really get that through strong reduction targets. Be it Climate charges or taxes, auctioning of emission certificates, or a sort of Tobin tax on international emissions trading. That leads to those nations that want money out of the packages having an incentive to work for stronger reduction targets. It is to be hoped for that movement for strong emission targets as well as for the financing of technologies, forest protection and adaptation measures develops. And that a coalition of progressive industrial nations, least developed countries (the so called LDCs) and newly industrialized countries - for example China, Mexico, South Africa, India - support this. There were first signs for such a development in Bali.

Outlook on the next two years
WN: How do things continue after this conference? What's the course of events until the Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark 2009?
CB: The four packages climate protection targets, adaptation to climate change, accelerated commercial launching of the necessary technologies and financing of technology, forest protection and adaptation have to be negotiated in detail now. Next year there will be four rounds of negotiations. The final conclusion is to be reached by the end of 2009, at the climate summit in Copenhagen.
WN: What needs to happen in this period of time in your opinion? What do the agreements that are hopefully to be reached need to look like?
CB: The reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, so that a warming of more than 2°C (35.6 F) is averted, is central. The global average temperatures mustn't rise above 2°C in comparison with pre-industrial levels. We call this the aversion of the uncopeable, as the risks of such a warming would be simply too great.
To achieve this goal a reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 50-85% by 2050 is necessary. For the middle term this means that the peak of global emissions needs to be reached in 10-15 years and that the output is cut considerably year after year from then onwards. The group of industrialized nations have to reduce their emissions by 25-40% till 2020 (compared to 1990 baselines) on average to make this possible.
Regarding adaptation, what we call coping with the inadvertable, the scale of funding is going to have to change. Roughly 50 billion Dollar a year are going to be required.
WN: What do you see as (the biggest) obstacle(s) on the way to such an agreement? You've already mentioned the current U.S. administration.
CB: We shouldn't think that the problem is just in the U.S., even if it is to be seen most clearly there. Many of us [Germans / Europeans] don't realize what the necessary emission cuts mean. If we really want to achieve greenhouse gas reductions of the magnitude I have just described, we first need to become conscious of the fact that the wealth of the industrial nations is build on CO2. From the steam engine over coal power plants, the chemical industry up to cars and airplanes, the whole model of wealth is built up on fossil fuels and thus also CO2 emissions. Up until now more wealth also meant more emitted CO2. We now need to move towards an almost emission free model of wealth in large steps. And the role of leader seems to fall to Europe. If Europe manages to show it, the chances of the large newly industrialized nations following that lead rise enormously.

Possibilities for individuals to act
WN: Finally I, and perhaps the readers as well, are interested in how people at home can take a positive influence on the process?
CB: Well first, there is the possibility to engage yourself politically, working in an NGO like Germanwatch being the only option in that. What is encouraging in this area are the notable things that have already been achieved by an informed public. To name an example, the planning of multiple coal power plants has been stopped in recent times, just as well thanks to public pressure.
It should also be clear to everyone, that every banknote is also a ballot paper, with which you can decide for more or less emissions. For almost any way of spending money - be it groceries or mobility - there are climate compatible and non compatible choices. I can fly or take the train, or - if the later is not possible - at least compensate the warming effects via sites such as atmosfair.de .
But even when I save money, it's up to me if it works for or against climate sustainability. For every investment possible, by now there are also options that support the protection of the climate - often without needing to to forgo returns. The money I put on the bank is used for investments and projects that contribute to or undermine the sustainability of our economic system.
WN: Does that mean the demand for a climate compatible life style ?
CB: It's not about one climate compatible life style. It's more of a case of a climate compatible variant needing to be developed for each of the different life styles that exist in our society. The people in our society don't need to become uniform. Some will focus on protecting the climate through technical innovations and will bring their house up to the most recent level of efficiency, and massively use renewable energies. Others will see an increase in wealth in not having a car, instead buying a "Bahncard 100" [This is a flat rate for a years rail travel in Germany, at a cost of 3500 Euro, ed.] which also lets you take your kids along for free, and focus on a slower more concious life. We don't need to prescribe one life style, what is necessary is to advance every life style variant in a climate compatible way
WN: Thank you for the interview and your time.

Sustainable production of bioenergy

Schwäbisch Hall, Germany

No child labour, no clearing of rainforests and no pollution: The public utility Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH have teamed up to refine social and ecological standards for the production of vegetable oils, because there is as yet no internationally recognised certification system for bioenergy and vegetable oils. The partnership is part of an extensive GTZ project on the sustainable use of biomass under a contract from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall already uses vegetable oil in its block-type thermal power station for the environmentally friendly generation of electricity and heat for its customers. “But we only want to use vegetable oils that are produced using environmentally sound methods and do not lead to exploitation and poverty in developing countries,” Johannes van Bergen, managing director of the public utility, explained. In the medium term, the partnership will help establish an international certification system; this is to form a basis upon which developing countries can set up certification institutions with specially trained experts at national level.

Mr van Bergen said that his company had chosen GTZ as a partner because the organisation had already had plenty of experience with certification systems and with developing social and ecological standards for timber, coffee and cotton. The sustainability standards drawn up jointly by GTZ and Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall will be applied to producers of vegetable oils in Africa, Asia and Latin America to see whether they work in practice. Training measures are to help ensure that producers meet the requirements of the certification process and are subsequently able to have the oil they export certified as being produced using socially and environmentally sound practices. The partnership thus makes a contribution towards market-oriented development and also helps combat environmental degradation, exploitation and poverty.

“An international certification system for vegetable oils will benefit all those who want to ensure that they only use sustainably produced vegetable oil,” said Daniel May, bioenergy expert at GTZ. “We will be taking great care to ensure that our development projects do not cause any environmental damage or have any negative social impacts through the production of bioenergy. The environmental life cycle assessments must be clearly positive, crops must be grown in line with internationally recognised social standards, and there must be no negative effects on food production.” Cornelia Richter, Director General of GTZ’s Planning and Development Department, added that GTZ was mainstreaming the sustainability concept in its activities, otherwise it would not implement these kinds of projects.

About GTZ: As an international cooperation enterprise for sustainable development with worldwide operations, the federally owned Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) GmbH supports the German Government in achieving its development-policy objectives. It provides viable, forward-looking solutions for political, economic, ecological and social development in a globalised world. Working under difficult conditions, GTZ promotes complex reforms and change processes. Its corporate objective is to improve people's living conditions on a sustainable basis.

About Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall: Stadtwerke Schwäbisch Hall GmbH is a public utility company that provides not only power, gas, water and district heating networks but also high-quality energy services. It already produces more than 60 percent of the total power required in Schwäbisch Hall using combined heat and power generation. Twenty-three percent of the total power is now generated using renewable energy sources.

West Afrikan German Project e.V. has once again rendered its helping hand to another Gambia Child with the name July Secka.

July Secka, a 7 ½ month old, was born with a congenital heart disease known as Ventricular Septal Defect. The families of July contacted “Project West Afrikan German Project e.V.”, an organisation focussed on delivering medical assistance to children in West Africa, as the little child was admitted in RVTH battling between life and death.

Momodou Secka, the father, and Haddy Jonga, the mother of July, both living in Fagikunda Gambia were then contacted by the project from Germany.

Presently mother and the child are in Germany .Thorough medical and diagnostic check is already been conducted and it is concluded that July is fit for surgical correction of this deformity.

This is already the third child in the last two years that benefit from the project.

The project is responsible for the travelling and operation cost. Upon return to the Gambia, July will also benefit from a six year medical insurance from the Project.

West Afrikan German Project e.V. would like to express their sincere appreciation goes to all that made the project a success.

For more information about the West Afrikan German Project e.V. and July’s condition please visit http://www.wagpev.de or contact Mrs. Gabriele Zachau, the Chairperson, at sekretariat@wagpev.de