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o The layout plan of the proposed Ozone village, Ogun State
Govt awards Ozone village development contract Contract
The Ozone Village, located in Irolu-Remo, Ogun State, will serve as a By ChInodum lJwae8buIam technology development and training centre, boosts of CFC and Halon A HEAD of the deadline to rlfreeze the consumption destruction facility, conference hall, hotel accommodation, administraof hydro fluorocarbons tive block and Halon bank and hydrocarbon plant, as well as warehouse (HCFCs) by lanuary I, 2013, the Federa Government and recreational facility, has awarded contract for the development of a multi facility complex to house the nation's stride in the. phase-out of Ozone Deilleting Substances (ODS) in the country. The Federal Ministry of Environment is promoting the complex, rocated in Irolu-Remo, Ogun State, known as Ozone .•Village. The contract for the development has been awarded to Messrs Pamaque Nigeria
Limited, an indigenous firm. The village is expected to serve as a technolo~ development and trainmg centre. It would house locally fabricated prototype ozone friendly machines, including a box foaming machine, CFC recovery and recycling machine and hydrocarbon refrigerant production machine. Among facilities proposed in the Ozone Village are CFC
and Halon destruction facility, conference hall, hotel accommodation, administrative block and Halon bank and hydrocarbon plant, as well as warehouse and recreational facility. The Guardian gathered that the contractor has moved to site recently. The Managing Director, Pamaque, Chief Olatunji aye fuga said that the project is on course.
The Minister of Environment, Mr. John Odey, disclosed recently that the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) as globally competitive has certified the box foam machine. He however, called for the support of the organisation to. consider the hydrocarbon production machine as a pilot demonstration project, under the HCFC pnase out programme.
On the ozone layer, the minister said tnat the world has made tremendous progress in its efforts to protect it. He stated that it has been a qUiet revolution in t!).e international chemicals management agenda. The box is said to be globally competitive and the initiative has been Ilresented to the Multilateral Fund of the Montreal protocol under the HCFC programme to consider as a pilot demonstration project for a Hydro carbon production machine. The Montreal Protocol requires countries to also start freeze the consumption of hydro fluorocar-
bons (HCFCs) by 1st January, 2013 and some countries started have already restricting the importation of HCFCs to enable them meet the 2013 target. HCFCs have a high potential of global warming. Unlike for the CFCs where the phase out plans were only meant to address the ozone depleting potential, we now want to also consider the value added to the mitigation of the climate change. From past experience in CFC phase out, there was an influx in import of equipment using HCFCs towards African countries as other parts of the world will be grappling to get rid of their unwanted
Climate change growing risk {Of;,. insurers, say operators ldiIil_ INSURERS are struggling to lassess the risks from climate change, industry officials say, with the floods in Australia and Brazil highlighting the potential losses from greater extremes of weather. Scientists say a warmer world will cause
more intense
drought, floods, cyclones as well as risin~ sea levels and the
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Two men 11ft the~ boat 0V0f a fence as they travel through flooded streets, In a commercial area of Brisbane. Photo: ReuterslTlm Wlmbome
disasters has already soared over the past several decades. Adding to the risks is a growIng human population, more people moving Into cities, particularly in ASia, and more property In the path of Increasingly volatile weather. This makes it harder to tease out a direct climate change link in ever- rising losses,
With the increasing losses all over the world due to biting climate change, the risk experts, particularly, insurers, are beginning to feel uneasy over rising profile of damage, which some experts see to be inimical to the insurance industrv. experts s~y. Lack of long-term weather data in some parts of the world is also clouding the picture. Another problem is the narrow time horizon insurers typ-
ically focus on. Reinsurers, for instance, renew their contracts annually based on past losses, meaning they are not so concerned about trends decades in the future. "There is stiD a fair amount of uncertainly as to climate change and the attribution of climate change to natural events or man·made and
therefore it has not translated yet into the pricing," Yves Guerard, secretary-general of the Ottawa-based International Actuarial AsSociation, told Reuters. Some insurers are seeing a cli-
mate change link and rising risks. "Ignoring ~Iobal warming will risk an Increasing exposure and therefore insured losses will escalate," said Scott Ryrie. CEO of Allianz SE Reinsurance Asia-Pacific in CONTINUEO ON PAGE 49