SPECIAL ENERGY
WORLD ENVIRONMENT
WORLD ENVIRONMENT MAGAZINE
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SPECIAL ENERGY
Bilbao 09: European Future Energy Summit
SAUDI ARABIA
A Solar Future SPAIN
Leading Europe’s Green Revolution No 03 / June 2009
Fre eC op y
WIND ENERGY AS A KEY CLIMATE SOLUTION
LEARNING TO THINK ECOLOGICALLY THE WORK OF THE UNESCO CHAIR IN SUSTAINABLE URBAN DEVELOPMENT
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European Future Energy summit Bilbao, June 2009
Bis millah alrahman alrahim,
Ladies and gentlemen;
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s occupants of this planet, it is our duty and responsibility to make sure that we do not leave this planet behind in a mess for the coming generations. In today’s society we have realized that it is essential to create a more sustainable world for us and for future generations. Global warming, increasing CO2 emissions and a fragile environment are reasons why we must act now, and not later. Renewable energies, reducing CO2 emissions and waste recycling are just some of potential solutions. That is why we have all gathered here today to talk about these problems and to make our world a cleaner place. There is no shortage of sun in the GCC, therefore Saudi Arabia’s plans is to invest in solar and photovoltaic technologies to create alternative energies, rather than relying on fossil fuels. The country enjoys excellent location on the planet, where solar energy is one of the best in the world. Japan is one of the very active countries in Photovoltaic energy. As a country; it is very close to the environment and therefore tries to give back to our planet what it has been taking from it. Sweden is the leader in Europe in environmental friendliness. The trend towards environmental concern is very important because research has shown that if people do not change their way of living and thinking on how to preserve their natural environment, it will have catastrophic outcomes. The GCC has not enjoyed living a positive example so far when it comes to carbon credits, this is about to change. Even so Saudi Arabia has still plenty of its natural resources oil, it wants to give back to the world, by using its fortune and invest in the renewable energy solar.
Starting from delivering energy to the local communities, over covering whole Saudi Arabia, till exporting solar generated energy to South of Europe and North Africa through grids is our plan. After 20 years the investment will have paid off and considerable profits will be gained. Saudi Arabia believes that if it starts the ball rolling in the GCC with solar energy, other countries within the GCC will jump on the bandwagon and also invest in renewable energies. Leading a good example and education other countries and cultures has proven itself successful over many years. Technologies learned and developed in other countries can be used to improve its own techniques, because we understand that it is absolutely important to keep improving ourselves. Achieving a more sustainable environment and world for our children our children’s children to live in should be in everybody’s agenda. What kind of society would it be if we don’t react and correct the mistakes we have been and are doing? Therefore we are proud to announce that as Saudis we are trying to make a difference. Especial thanks to my brother HH Sheikh Mohamed Ben Zayed El Nahyan, for his creativity in the Environmental world and his generous initiative to Masdar. Finally, I would like to thank the Saudi Ambassador in Spain, HRH Prince Saoud Ben Nayef Ben Abdelaziz, for his support and encouragement and to the Spanish goverment and the Basque authorities for their hospitality. Prince Faisal Bin Turki AL-FAISAL 3
WORLD ENVIRONMENT MAGAZINE WORLD ENVIRONMENT
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Number 03 | June 2009
CHAIRMAN Andrea Tucci a.tucci@worldenvironment.tv EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Cathy Chami Tyan c.tyan@worldenvironment.tv EDITORIAL PROJECT COORDINATOR Marc Wiliam Lowe m.lowe@worldenvironment.tv CONTRIBUTORS Faisal Bin Turki Al-Faisal, Samir Anwar Al-Gamal, Tala Al-Khatib, Christopher Boyes, Piercarlo Crachi, Lara Fahs, Alya Kebiri, Steffen Lehmann, Mark William Lowe, Fiorella Minicucci, Gabriella Porilli, Jonathan F.P. Rose, Simba Russeau, Mai Samaha, Elsa J. Sattout, Steve Sawyer, Cathy Chami Tyan, Klaus Wenzel CONCEPT & DESIGN
PHOTOGRAPHY APJM, A Sea Change, Garisson Institute, GWEC, Mike Hales, Ibsar, Shark Alliance, Med-Enec, SPNL, Studio Crachi, Tom Di Mauro, UNESCO Chair Asia/Pacific. SALES AND ADVERTISEMENTS adv@worldenvironment.tv PUBLISHED BY World Environment Group Avenue Mongi Bali Imm. El Misk 4000 Sousse, Tunisia PRINTING RAIDY | www.raidy.com
SPECIAL ENERGY > 12 Future Energy Policy > 16 Spain Leading Europe’s Green Revolution > 20 Germasolar: 171 million Secured to Fund Germasolar
COPYRIGHT The articles become part of the magazine’s archive. Further publishings on other issues must be authorized by the editor following the author’s consent.
> 24 Saudi Arabia: A Solar Future
REGISTERED UNDER INNORPI, Tunis, Tunisia ET080360 March 26, 2008
> 38 Med Enec: Implementation Gap for Energy Efficiency in Buildings
> 28 Saudi Future Energy Company > 32 Zayed Future Energy Prize > 34 Archimede Solar Energy
> 42 Scotland’s Developing Energy Policy > 44 Wind Energy as a Key Climate Solution
WORLD ENVIRONMENT MAGAZINE’s policy is to use papers that are natural, renewable, recyclable and made from wood grown in sustainable forests. In addition, all waste is sent for recycling 4
Contents
WORLD Energy >11
>3
Editorial: Prince Faisal Ben Turki Al Faisal
>6
Editorial: It’s never too late
>8
Agenda: Future Environmental Events
>54
The Work of the UNESCO Chair in Sustainable Urban
Sustainable Development:
Development for Asia and the Pacific
Sustainable Development >54 Global Warming: >58
Climate-Induced Conflict Risks Over Shared Water Resources in Africa,
Global Warning >58
Water: >66
Africa: Protecting Watersheds Saves Billions
>70
Egypt: Water Pricing; a Viable Solution for Egypt’s Water Crisis
Waste Management:
Water >66
>76
Waste Not, Want Not
>78
Promoting the Eco Print Attitude
>82
The Greenhouse
>84
Conservation and the Indigenous People
>90
Ibsar: Sustaining Education Through Tree Power
>94
Jabal Moussa: A Surprisingly Rich Mosaic
>98
Shark: Indian Ocean Shark Finning Ban Defeated
Biodiversity:
Waste management >76
>102 Save Your Logo: A Revolutionary Fundraising Approach
Biodiversity >84 Ecoliving: >104 Learning to Think Ecologically >108 The Green Party of Lebanon >112 Eco-Innovation: The Key to Europe’s Competitiveness
Eco-Living >104
>116 A Sea Change: Imagine a World Without Fish
Eco Tourism: >118 Siwa: Adrere Amellal Ecolodge >122 Lebanon: Qoleileh Marine Hima
Eco-Tourism >118
>126 Lybia: Future Inauguration of Lybia’s New Museum
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June, 2009
It is never too late
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espite the economic crisis and following the success of the World Energy Summit this past January in Abu Dhabi, 5000 World leaders will be gathering at the European Future Energy Forum in Bilbao to debate, demonstrate, and discover the most efficient ways to develop the future of Energy. Why Spain? Why Bilbao? Because Spain such as the Gulf countries is strongly committed to the development of renewable energies, and with it unlimited business opportunities. The wind power energy market in Spain will grow this year by almost 50% in terms of sales. The business in solar-photovoltaic and thermoelectric-energy will reach 470 million Euros (an increase of 125%). In 2008, the sales of both kinds of energies generated a business of more than 3,600 million Euros. The Basque region is energy rich and has invested over ₏4 billion in combined-cycle power plants, cogeneration, and a variety of renewable energy sources aiming to triple its electricity generation. This Special Energy issue not only tackles the state of Energy in the world, but it also tries to find solutions to the major problems our planet is facing: from global warming, to water scarcity, rapid urbanization, exhaustion of landfill capacities, deforestation and loss of biodiversity. While this magazine is dedicated to all environment lovers, to decision-makers and businessmen in the environment field, it is a call to all those who feel they need to do something to protect their environment and don’t know where or how to start. To them, we say, it is never too late to act. There is always a beginning. Our planet needs us. As we are printing this third issue I would like to thank all those who believed in this adventure and encouraged us through their unconditional support. A special thank you note to Prince Faisal Ben Turki al Faisal a visionary leader who through his work and commitment for this planet deeply believes in social and environmental change. Many thanks to our sponsors; the Global Strategic Studies Institute (GSSI), the Saudi Strategic Studies Institute (SSSI), Farhan Al Farhan (F&F), and the First Energy Bank. Cathy CHAMI TYAN
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FUTURE ENVIRONMENTAL EVENTS June 1st, 2009
International Forum on Integrated Water Management
Sherbrooke, Canada
June 2, 2009
2009 International Symposium on Environmental Science and Technology
Shanghai, China
June 3, 2009
Waste Conference and Exhibition
Brisbane,Australia
June 14, 2009
ICLEI World Congress 2009
Edmonton, Canada
June 15, 2009
http://www.greenenergy-jo.com/
Amman, Jordan
June 15, 2009
http://www.energyexpo.bh/ Bahrain
Bahrain
June 21, 2009
2009 ISIE Conference: 5th International Conference on Industrial Ecology
Lisbon, Portugal
June 23, 2009
Energy and Sustainability 2009
Bologna, Italy
June, 24 2009
EESD 2009 - International Conference on Energy, Environment, Sustainable Development
Paris, France
June 28, 2009
ISA-RC-24- International Conference on Water, Environment, Energy and Society
Firozabad, Agra India
June 30, 2009
Advances in Wastewater Treatment and Reuse
Tehran, Iran
July 5, 2009
Global Conference on Global Warming 2009
Istanbul, Turkey
July 6, 2009
The IASTED International Conference on Environmental Management and Engineering (EME 2009)
Banff, Canada
July 7, 2009
The 15th International Interdisciplinary Conference on the Environment
Daytona Beach, Florida USA
July 10, 2009
8th Global Conference: Environmental Justice and Global Citizenship
Oxford, United Kingdom
July 20, 2009
Air Pollution 2009
Tallinn, Estonia
July 20, 2009
3rd National Conference on Ecosystem Restoration (NCER '09)
Los Angeles, CA USA
August 9, 2009
Energy and Sustainability 2009
Newark, Delaware - USA
August 16, 2009
10th International Congress of Ecology
Brisbane, Australia
August 26, 2009
4th Annual Georgia Environmental Conference
Savannah, Georgia
August 26, 2009
ICEE 2009 - International Conference on Energy and Environment
Singapore, Singapore
September 3, 2009
CEST2009 - 11th International Conference on Environmental Science and Technology
Chania, Greece
September, 7th 2009
AMIREG 2009 - Towards sustainable development: Assessing the footprint of resource utilization and hazardous waste management
Athens, Greece
September 8, 2009
8th International Conference on Corporate Social Responsibility
Cape Town, South Africa
September 13, 2009
Healthy Buildings 2009
Syracuse, New York
14 September 14, 2009 The Second International Environmental Best Practices Conference
Cracow, Poland
September 21, 2009
Environmental Health Risk 2009
New Forest, UK
September 23, 2009
ICESE 2009 - International Conference on Environmental Sciences and Engineering
Toronto, Canada Amsterdam, Netherlands
September 23, 2009
EESD 2009 - International Conference on Ecosystems, Environment and Sustainable Development
Toronto, Canada Amsterdam, Netherlands
October 19, 2009
International Conference on Emerging Technologies in Environmental Science an Engineering
Aligarh, India
October 25, 2009
Young Earth-Scientists Congress 2009
Beijing, China
October 27, 2009
The Energy Exchange, http://www.theenergyexchange.co.uk
Tunis, Tunisia
October 28, 2009
ICESE 2009 - International Conference on Environmental Systems Engineering
Chicago, USA
October 28, 2009
ICCEE 2009 - International Conference on Civil and Environmental Engineering
Chicago Other, USA
October 29, 2009
ICESE 2009 - International Conference on Environmental Systems Engineering
Venice, Italy
November 2, 2009
Sustainable Infrastructure and Built Environment in Developing Countries (SIBE 2009)
Bandung, Indonesia
November 2, 2009
Congress on Alternative Energy Applications
Kuwait
November 7, 2009
Opportunity Green Business Conference 2009 at UCLA
Los Angeles, California
November 9, 2009
International Conference on Solid Waste Management: Technical & Socio-economical Context
Khulna, Bangladesh
November 12 2009
Green Conclave
Delhi, India
November 12, 2009
The Integration of Sustainable Agriculture and Rural Development in the Context of Climate Change, the Energy Crisis and Food Insecurity
Agadir, Morocco
November 23, 2009
East Asian Seas Congress 2009
Manila, Philippines
November 25, 2009
ICEET 2009 - International Conference on Environmental Engineering and Technology
Sydney, Australia Johannesburg, South Africa
December 9, 2009
Communication and Environment: Transformation for a Sustainable Tomorrow
Penang, Malaysia
WORLD ENVIRONMENT
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SPECIAL ENERGY Sponsored by:
WORLD ENVIRONMENT
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By Marc William LOWE
FUTURE ENERGY POLICY AS AN OPPORTUNITY FOR ECONOMIC GROWTH Can the Requirement to Further Develop Innovative Technologies in the Field of Renewable Energy Sources lead to an Opportunity for Industrial and Economic Growth? he 2nd World Future Energy Summit, staged in Abu Dhabi between 9-11 January 2009, saw the presence of delegates and visitors from over 80 countries. This in itself is evidence of the importance of the event.
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However, should further proof be required the official statistics speak for themselves; 18,240 visitors – 7,000 more than the previous event, 734 members of the international press, 145,000 unique visitors to the summit’s website and 350 exhibiting companies. Given the level of attention dedicated to the summit it is hardly surprising that some of the world’s biggest brands and companies sponsored the event. At the World Future Energy Summit's closing ceremony, Tony Blair, the former British prime minister, commented that: “this is a remarkable summit, it is now established as the premier future energy summit of the world”. Following the success of the Abu Dhabi Summit the next appointment is in Europe. The first European Future Energy Forum will be held in the Spanish city of Bilbao between 9-11 June 2009. The choice of the Basque capital as a location for the Forum is significant; on the whole Spain is a shining example to the rest of Europe, but the Basque Region in particular has made considerable investments in renewable energy sources as part of its aim to treble its electricity generation. Bilbao is also an excellent stage to examine and discuss the future of energy technologies, the city is a 12
vibrant centre for innovation and technology with a twenty-fold increase in investment in research and development activities over the past two decades. This edition of World Environment Magazine features an article on Spain’s commitment to the development of renewable energy sources. The Spanish Government’s position is an example to other European countries. Massive progress has been made in a number of fields, especially in the harnessing of solar and wind power. The central Government’s stance on investment and development in renewables is reflected in the strategies of many regional governments, the Basque Region being an excellent example. If Spain is to be considered a prime example of support and investment in the development and implementation of innovative green technologies what is the situation in other Europe countries? Although at times difficult to understand the underlying strategy, the United Kingdom is strongly committed to renewables. Despite a number of set-backs, the British Government would like to see the United Kingdom emerge as a global leader in green energy. At the time of writing one project in particular is suffering a number of difficulties; the London Array scheme, situated in the Thames Estuary, may require the support of the European Investment Bank (EIB) if it is ever to become the world’s largest offshore wind farm.
Energy In the Euro-zone the situation is far from serene: a number of countries have suffered set- backs to renewable projects, due to the credit crunch and the consequent reluctance of banks to lend on large projects.
Although it has a strong personal backing from British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, the project is facing severe financial difficulties, due to a number of high-profile companies pulling out and fears over its overall funding. The £3 billion project, which Brown would like to see completed in time for the 2012 Olympics in London, is a crucial part of the United Kingdom’s commitment to fulfilling its ambitious target of generating 35% of electricity from renewable sources by 2020. The London Array project has been in difficulty since Shell withdrew its support on account of concerns about increased costs.
A final decision from the EIB in regards to partially financing the London Array project is expected by this summer. There is no doubt that the current economic crisis is having strong impact on a number of projects, globally there has been a 53% fall in investment in clean energy between the first quarter of 2008 and the same period in 2009. Compounding difficulties in the United Kingdom, the fall in the value of the pound has forced prices of imported equipment up by more than 20%. In the Euro-zone the situation is far from serene: a number of
countries have suffered set- backs to renewable projects, due to the credit crunch and the consequent reluctance of banks to lend on large projects. The European Union is well aware of the necessity to develop and support initiatives aimed at addressing the major energy challenges faced today, in particular climate change, Europe’s increasing dependence on imports, and secure energy sources. The EU is working on an ambitious energy policy that addresses all forms of energy sources and aims to spark industrial development with the consequential creation of new jobs in innovative technologies. Í
The other main backers, the German E.ON and the Danish company Dong Energy, remain committed to the project. In October 2008 Masdar, the renewable energy fund controlled by the Government of Abu Dhabi, announced that it would acquire Shell’s former stake. Although the EIB will not comment on specific project a spokesperson recently confirmed that the bank is “committed to funding offshore wind projects in the UK”. The EIB has already funded a number of renewable energy projects, including a number of solar energy developments in Spain and France.
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WORLD ENVIRONMENT
Analysis
“2009 should be the year we summon the will and wit to conclude a new treaty on climate change, one that should have the United States as a signatory” Tony Blair
energy sources to America's total energy mix, an objective that requires substantial public investment in new technologies. The challenges ahead are worldwide and require ever greater collaboration. World leaders should not lose sight of the urgency of the climate crisis and the necessity to invest more in renewable energy sources because of the global financial crisis.
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Another EU proposal is the creation of a trans-European energy network, an important part of this project is the proposal to link into the network plants that harness renewable sources of energy, for example Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) plants in southern Spain. In the United States of America, President Barak Obama’s administration will have to face a number of challenges; none as daunting or important as energy. It is fair to say that energy plays a part in almost all of the other major challenges facing the current administration; the economy, the environment, foreign policy and foreign conflicts. All of this while
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the United States faces an almost unprecedented energy crisis that is worsening by the day. President Obama’s administration needs to urgently define a strategy that addresses, amongst others, the following issues: the reduction of oil’s contribution to America’s energy supply, a goal in which technological innovations in the field of renewables will play an important part; reducing America’s reliance on coal and consuming it in a climate-friendly manner, something that can only be reached through government support for the development of carbon capture and storage technology; and dramatically increasing the level of renewable
In his address during the closing ceremony of January’s World Future Energy Summit, Tony Blair congratulated Barack Obama on his inauguration as President and called for a greater US role in a new global climate treaty. The former British Prime Minister noted that “2009 should be the year we summon the will and wit to conclude a new treaty on climate change, one that should have the United States as a signatory”, adding that “the decisions of 2009 will determine the world in 2029 or 2049. Let us put economic growth and combating climate change in alliance, not opposition.” The forthcoming European Future Energy Forum in Bilbao represents a platform for dialogue, collaboration, and the development of a framework for greater investment in renewable energy sources. Future energy policy is critical to the environment but is also an opportunity for economic growth.
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WORLD ENVIRONMENT
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By Mark William LOWE
SPAIN: LEADING EUROPE’S GREEN REVOLUTION Making massive progress in the field of renewable energy, Spain’s solar, hydro and wind technologies are harnessing green power and demonstrating just what can be achieved through strong administrative support.
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ollowing the success of the second edition of the World Future Energy Summit, held in Abu Dhabi in January 2009, a special European Future Energy Forum will be held in the northern Spanish city
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of Bilbao in June. The choice of Spain as a location for what represents Europe’s largest ever exchange of knowledge on future energy solutions is far from casual. Indeed, the European Future Energy Forum
Energy THE SPANISH GOVERNMENT’S COMMITMENT TO GREEN TECHNOLOGIES IS NOT ONLY ADDRESSING ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS BUT CREATING JOBS AND BOOSTING LOCAL INDUSTRIES.
aims to gather over 5,000 manufacturers, investors and technology providers from around the world in a nation that is rapidly emerging as a showcase for the potential of renewable energy sources and technologies. A strong commitment to energy diversification and the development of business opportunities on the part of the Spanish Government has led to an astounding level of investment and growth in the renewable energy sector. Industry experts estimate that the value of the wind power market will rise by over 50% in 2009, whilst business linked to solarphotovoltaic and thermo-electric technologies will rise by 125%. The sales of energy derived from these technologies increased by 55% from
2007 to 2008 and the forecast for 2009 is equally impressive. With specific reference to the Basque Region, the implementation of forward-looking energy policies and strong investments over the past 20 years have led to over 33% of the power demand of Basque homes being met through energy derived from renewable and environmentally-friendly sources. Power generation from solar, ocean, hydro, wind, biomass and thermal sources has been coupled to greater energy use efficiency through the application of energy efficient technologies aimed at reducing consumption. Amongst the Basque Region’s stated long-term ambitions is that of tripling overall power generation, as part of this plan to date over 4 billion Euros have been invested in combined-cycle power plants, co-generation and a series of renewable energy sources.
Central government support for renewable energy At national level, Spain is committed to legislative and financial support for both the development and implementation of renewable energy technologies and the lowering of carbon emissions. One excellent example of commitment to the development of alternative energy is the current and promised future support to the growth of Concentrated Solar Power (CSP) technology. Currently CSP energy generation costs are double those of traditional methods.
However, to counteract the high investment and running costs, CSP projects across Spain are being built in the knowledge that the Spanish Government will pay a premium, known as a feed-in tariff, for CSP electricity delivered to the national grid. This form of government incentive, as well as the fast-tracking of approval for the construction of CSP plants, has led to Spanish companies charging ahead with more than 50 CSP projects throughout Spain. Industry and Government experts estimate that by 2015 over 2GW of power will be generated from CSP plants, a figure in excess of current national targets. The companies involved in the development of CSP technology are exporting knowhow and experience to North Africa, particularly in Morocco and Algeria, as well as the United States of America. Such is the interest in CSP technology that the European Commission has identified CSP as part of its future clean energy technology strategy. Indeed, experts from the European Union’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) have argued that CSP could represent an important part of the proposed European Union “Supergrid”; a project that envisages the transporting of electrical power generated in solar plants in southern Europe and northern Africa throughout Europe. The “Supergrid” concept has received political support from the United Kingdom’s Prime Minister, Gordon Brown and the President of France, Nicolas Sarkozy, who has gone as far as to commission a feasibility study.
Greenpeace and WWF enthusiastic According to José Luis García at Greenpeace in Spain, CSP technology is destined to boom in those countries that have the correct atmospheric conditions. Í 17
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Spain
José Luis García Spain could comfortably consider arriving as high as 50%.
Is Spain in the grips of a Green Revolution? All of the signs would certainly seem to point to just that, not least the Spanish Government’s efforts to reduce levels of CO2 emissions.
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Certain areas of Spain, particularly the southern region of Andalucía, have exactly the right environmental conditions that allow the harnessing of the sun’s energy. García is of the opinion that, given the abundance of sunshine hours in the southern regions, Spain is in a position to be a leader in the development and implement of this innovative technology. Greenpeace are not alone in praising the renewable energy situation in Spain - the World Wildlife Fund has commended the country’s efforts to develop renewable energy sources over the past decade. According to Heikki Willstedt of the World Wildlife Fund Spain’s commitment to renewable energies is paying off, recent figures are impressive and Spain is well on the way to reaching the target of producing 30% of annual demand for electricity from
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renewable sources. Some experts believe that the 30% target could even be reached as early as 2010. In February 2009, partially due to heavy rainfall that increased hydroelectric production, renewable energy sources provided 31% of Spain’s total energy supply. Willstedt believes that Spain will be able to cover half of its energy requirements from renewable sources by 2020 if the current enthusiasm, as well as legislative and financial support from the Government, continues. Spain’s clean energy targets are well in line with European Union plans for member countries to source 20% of primary energy from renewables. According to the European Union plan, around 30% of electricity would have to be generated from carbon free sources, this figure may be raised to 40%. However, according to Greenpeace’s
One example of how this is being addressed is the level of investment in the ultramodern high-speed rail network. Industry experts calculate that passengers on the high-speed AVE train connection between Madrid and Barcelona account for one-sixth of the carbon emissions of airplane passengers travelling the same route. Straight tracks and limited stops also mean that the 220mph AVE trains use around 19% less energy than conventional trains. It is estimated that hundreds of thousands of passengers have abandoned air travel for the space and convenience of the new rail system, some estimates put the fall in air passenger numbers over the past year as high as 20%. Given that many Spanish cities are more than 500 km (300 miles) apart, air travel has been the preferred option for many years. Until the beginning of 2008 aircraft carried around 72% of the 5 million long-distance passengers travelling by rail or air. That figure is now down to 60% and some experts believe that within two years the share will be equal. Whatever the precise figures actually are, there is no doubt that Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero’s boast that Spain will soon have Europe’s most extensive highspeed rail network demonstrates not only a commitment to putting infrastructure projects at the heart of an anti-recession surge in public spending, but also demonstrates an important commitment to reducing CO2 emissions and energy consumption.
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GEMASOLAR 171 MILLION EUROS SECURED TO FUND GEMASOLAR The world’s first solar power plant with central tower and salt receiver technology commences construction in Spain. 20
Energy “The construction of Gemasolar represents a gigantic step forwards in Torresol’s technological development and positions us as world leaders in central tower solar thermal projects.“
About Torresol Energy, S.A. Torresol Energy, a company set up in March 2008, with a 60% SENER stockholding and 40% Masdar stockholding (company for the development of renewable energies launched by the investment company belonging to the Abu Dhabi Emirate, MUBADALA Development Company). The new company was set up with the objective to become the world´s leader in the sector and with the aim of promoting the development and exploitation of an average of two large solar thermal energy plants around the world, particularly in the so-called “sunny belt': Southern Europe, Northern Africa, the Middle-East and Southwest USA. According to these forecasts, the production capability will be 320 MW at the end of 2010 and should reach 1,000 MW in 10 years. At the same time, each new Torresol Energy project will introduce and test new technologies with the aim of making Concentration Solar energy an economically competitive option and a real, viable, ecological and sustainable alternative to traditional power sources. www.torresolenergy.com
About Masdar
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orresol Energy, the strategic alliance between Spanish engineering group SENER and Masdar, Abu Dhabi’s multi faceted renewable energy initiative, has announced a 171 million euro financing deal which will allow construction to commence on Gemasolar. Masdar is driven by the Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company (ADFEC), a wholly owned company of the government of Abu Dhabi through the Mubadala Development Company. Gemasolar is the world’s
first utility grade solar power plant with central tower and salt receiver technology and will provide clean and safe energy as well as create more than 1,500 jobs in Spain. The plant is located in Fuentes de Andalucía, in Seville. The funding which has been secured through the open market with Banco Popular, Banesto and the Instituto de Crédito Oficial acting as mandated lead arrangers, highlights the attractive proposition that the strategic alliance offers in this
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The Masdar Initiative is Abu Dhabi’s multi-faceted, multibillion dollar investment in the development and commercialization of innovative technologies in renewable, alternative and sustainable energies as well as sustainable design. Masdar is driven by the Abu Dhabi Future Energy Company (ADFEC), a wholly owned company of the government of Abu Dhabi through the Mubadala Development Company. In January 2008, Abu Dhabi announced it will invest $15 billion in Masdar, the largest single government investment of its kind. For more information about the Masdar Initiative, please visit www.masdaruae.com. 21
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Solar Energy
excited at the prospect that this technology promises to deliver and look forward to building similar but larger capacity towers in Abu Dhabi and elsewhere using this technology.” The EPC contract has been awarded to a consortium, including SENER and AMSA, a ACS Cobra subsidiary.In the consortium, SENER will be in charge of providing the technology, and the detail design and commissioning of the plant, The technology which includes Sensol software and SENER’s world class receiver, which is able to absorp 95% of the radiation from the sun’s spectrum and transmit this energy to the salt compound that circulates within the receiver. The technology provided includes the innovative thermal molten salts storage system, which is capable of reaching temperatures over 500 degrees centigrade.
Í
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challenging financial market. The plant will be operational in 2011 and will produce 17MWe of renewable energy reducing C02 emissions by more than 50,000 tonnes a year.
further proof that the industry will continue to advance. “ The project is the first of its kind in the world due to the application of this technology in a commercial environment.
“The construction of Gemasolar represents a gigantic step forwards in Torresol’s technological development and positions us as world leaders in central tower solar thermal projects”, said Enrique Sendagorta, Torresol Energy’s Chairman.” This strategic alliance brings the best of Abu Dhabi and Spain together to help drive forward the large scale deployment of renewable energy projects. The response of the financial markets is
The project will open the way for a new solar thermal electricity generation technology that is a better alternative to cylindrical – parabolic type commercial solar thermal power plants that are currently being built. “Gemasolar is an important milestone for the CSP industry and its success is likely to revolutionize this industry, “ said Dr. Sultan Al Jaber, Chief Executive Officer at Masdar. “Masdar is very
In terms of performance and operation, the technology inherent within the Gemasolar plant will treble electricity production in the rest of the thermoelectric solar power plants with the same power but under conventional technology basis. This is due to the fact that the majority of thermoelectric plants, that are being developed, do not have a thermal storage system, whilst Gemasolar has high temperature heat storage that extends the normal operating period of these plants. Salts, made up by sodium and potassium nitrates, are kept molten using the solar energy collected from the heliostats, so that they store excess accumulated heat during sunshine hours, which makes it possible to continue to produce electricity even when there is not enough solar radiation. Due to this advanced technology, Gemasolar’s autonomy will be 15 hours without sunlight. Furthermore, the high temperature at which solar energy in captured in the salt receiver allows to have more pressurised and hotter steam, which considerably increases the steam turbine’s performance.
Energy About SENER Ingeniería y Sistemas, S.A. SENER Ingeniería y Sistemas has been present for years in the renewable energy field. It started to work in the solar energy field in the 1980s, designing the first heliostats that are currently working in the Almería Solar Platform (Spanish acronym PSA). At the end of 2001, the company embarked upon the Solar Tres project, an experimental plant with central tower technology with heliostats, and since then it has made considerable progress in solar energy technology. SENER has developed software, with the Sensol computer programme, which allows to size and optimise plants, to components, such as the heliostats, heliostat axis drive mechanisms, tower receivers, storage systems, direct steam generation systems and beam-down or plant control systems, as well as cylindrical-parabolic collectors. In the case of collectors, SENER has patented the SENER trough design, with an appreciably lower steel weight and assembly time than other similar collectors. However, the big technological difference of SENER’s solar thermal plants lies in the innovative molten salts storage system, which doubles the energy exploitation level of a conventional thermosolar power station. SENER’s capacity for anticipation in the Concentrating Solar Power field, as well as its ambitious technological development programme have always been directed at obtaining electricity from solar energy on a large scale, and the company is therefore the leader in cost efficient solar innovations. In this sense,
SENER offers practical solutions that can be seen and tested, being Gemasolar the seventh solar project SENER has developed. At the moment, SENER is taking part in four thermosolar projects under construction for several customers. They are two 50 MW plants with SENERtrough cylindricalparabolic technology, Andasol 1 and Andasol 2, currently being built in the province of Granada near Guadix, in a consortium with ACS-Cobra, and two plants, Extresol 1 and Extresol 2, that are being built in Extremadura. The company is also taking part in other projects, whose construction will be spread over 2008 and 2009, concerning similar plants to those mentioned above located in Andalusia, Extremadura and Castile-la Mancha. SENER is an engineering, consultancy and systems integration company that has become an international benchmark engineering firm in the Aerospace, Civil and Architecture, Energy and Process and Marine Engineering sectors. It has a workforce of more than 2,000 employees and a turnover of over 350 million euros, with offices in Madrid, Barcelona, Bilbao, Valencia, Seville, Algiers, Buenos Aires, Lisbon, Mexico DF, Okayama (Japan), San Francisco and Warsaw. SENER Ingeniería y Sistemas forms part of SENER Grupo de Ingeniería, one of the largest Spanish engineering groups, with more than 4,500 employees and a turnover of over 753 million euros. www.sener.es
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By Christopher BOYES
SAUDI ARABIA: A SOLAR FUTURE With more than twice as many sunshine hours than the European average Saudi Arabia is well on its way of becoming a Solar Power House.
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lthough synonymous with oil production the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has a long history of innovation in the field of solar energy. In 1960, only a few years after the first ever demonstration of the potential of solar power, a small photovoltaic plant was installed in the airport of Medina. Since this first experiment Saudi Arabia has invested significant resources towards the development of solar energy in the Kingdom. Another important milestone was the Saudi Solar Village Project launched in the early nineteen eighties. The project was one of several solar experiments sponsored by the Saudi Arabian National Centre for Science and Technology. The experiment was part of a joint cooperation agreement, signed in 1977, with the United States Department of Energy. Within the framework of the agreement each country provided approximately fifty million dollars towards specific technical projects over a five year period. The Saudi Solar Village Project was one of the most significant results of this important financial and technical research commitment. Costing around twentysix million dollars at the time, the project was the largest within the framework of the agreement. Upon completion the village, and two others nearby, became not only the first the Kingdom, but in the world, to be continuously powered by solar technologies. After more than sixteen months continuous use the Saudi Solar Village Project was declared a success. At the time the project was unique, although far from being the largest photovoltaic power system in the world the Solar Village was the only example of a community deriving its
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primary source of power from the sun. Following the success of the Saudi Solar Village Project plans were made to build and operate a solar energy water desalination plant in the industrial city of Yenbo. Several other projects followed. Collaboration with foreign governments and corporations has meant that know-how and experience gained in Saudi Arabia has been used far afield.
A clear vision for a clean future Over two and a half decades have passed since the launch of the Saudi Solar Village Project and support for solar energy within the Kingdom is stronger than ever. As regards future development of solar projects sights are being set high. The crucial elements towards achieving the ambitious goals are in place; vision and institutional support. Past projects demonstrate that, over the past three decades, institutional support for solar power initiatives has always been high. Indeed government spending and support has been such that the valuable lessons learned in the Kingdom have not only advanced research in the field of solar power in Saudi Arabia itself, but have also proved of particular
Energy
Saudi Arabia could also become one of the world's major solar power sources. Located at the centre of the so-called Sun Belt this huge area boasts the best solar energy resources on Earth.
value to other countries with similar climatic conditions. As regards vision the Kingdom is well placed to take a leadership role at international level. Government, institutions and the private sector all recognise that, while being a major oil producer, Saudi Arabia could also become one of the world's major solar power sources. The Kingdom lies at the centre of the most potentially productive region on the planet for harvesting power from the sun. Saudi Arabia is located at the centre of the so-called Sun Belt, the vast, rainless region that stretches from the western edge of North Africa to the eastern edge of Central Asia. This huge area boasts the best solar energy resources on Earth.
More importantly Saudi Arabia is well placed to supply power to surrounding nations, a fact that has not escaped the attention of several regional and European leaders. It is by now recognised that the Kingdom’s role in the future solar power is one of both technical innovation and the supply of clean, environmentally sound energy.
Global Strategic Studies Institute One of the key-players in developing the Kingdom’s future role in renewable energy is HRH Prince Faisal Bin Turki Al-Faisal. In 2007 Prince Faisal founded Saudi Arabia’s first environmental NGO, the Global Strategic Studies Institute. In its turn the Institute has established a think-tank which will be crucial
to developing the policies and guidelines that will shape the future of renewable energy throughout the Middle East. The GSSI has come out in favour of large projects, in fact one of the Institute’s current activities is the building of the first Saudi Arabian solar farm and factory. The plant will be built on a 5 square mile plot just outside of Riyadh. The scale of the project is impressive; the plant will be around twice the dimensions of the Masdar Environmental City in Abu Dhabi. HRH Prince Faisal Bin Turki AlFaisal is well placed to guide the GSSI, not only does the Prince have an MSc in Environmental Policy Planning and Regulation form the
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London School of Economics, but he has been involved in a number of environmental organisations and initiatives for several years. In addition to his academic qualifications and practical experience Prince Faisal also has a very clear idea and understanding as to Saudi Arabia’s role in the future of renewable energy. The Prince recently summarised his thoughts as follows: “As Saudis, we have to admit to the errors which have been carried out in the past due to the lack of environmental awareness or planning. We must learn from those past mistakes and begin to build a newer, greener kingdom.”
The Solar Powerhouse In line with the desire to respect new models of low carbon growth and sustainable development, Saudi Arabia is investing heavily in the development and implementation of renewable energy sources and technologies. The investments include changes to legislation and attention to the creation of new professional 26
figures. The role of the media is also being examined, Saudi Arabia recognises the need to influence public opinion and behaviour through information and education. All told the potential for the generation of solar power in Saudi Arabia is enormous. The raw resources are not enough in themselves, what is required is a clearly defined longterm strategy. To this end the Global Strategic Studies Institute is working closely with a number of strategic international partners from both the governmental and private sectors. Their experience and expertise in areas such as environmental legislation, sustainable development, assessment methods, and Carbon Credits will assist the Kingdom to become the world’s Solar Powerhouse. However ambitious this goal may seem there are two simple observations that give it credit. The first is that recent studies have proved that the cost of generating power from solar energy in Saudi Arabia is
“As Saudis, we have to admit to the errors which have been carried out in the past due to the lack of environmental awareness or planning. We must learn from those past mistakes and begin to build a newer, greener kingdom.” Prince Faisal Bin Turki Al-Faisal
less than in countries, such as Spain, where the sector is already highly advanced. The second is that reliable forecasts indicate that, within a relatively short period, Saudi Arabia could produce in excess of 1 Gigawatt more than all European solar power combined. With more than twice as many sunshine hours than the European average, clear future vision, investment capability, government sponsorship, and a rapidly developing long-tem strategy, Saudi Arabia is already well on its way to becoming a Solar Powerhouse.
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Saudi Strategic Studies Institute Presents:
SAUDI FUTURE ENERGY COMPANY INC 2009 – PLC 2011 Establishment in july 2009 To be listed in the GCC Market, july 2011
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n ambitious plan and study presented by the Saudi Strategic Studies Institute, to make Saudi Arabia the most important producer of Solar power and Solar photovoltaic energy. The feasibility study, presented by the Saudi Strategic Studies Institute, was based on a long term study and includes detailed explanations, tables, graphs and diagrams.
Available Technologies and Goals There are two major technologies which generate power; Solar power and Solar photovoltaic. There are three different technologies for solar cells and panels (Crystalline-Si, which has proven itself over the last 30 years, and with 95% presence is the most popular technology, Thin-film technology and New Technologies). Different raw materials, sources, and technologies can be used. So far Japan has been the leader in PV technology, but the Saudi Strategic Studies Institute’s goal is to make Saudi Arabia the first producer of solar power and PV energy. To realise this vision, Saudi Solar has taken partners on board, such as Suniva, Conergy, Titan and Inventux. The long-term goal is to export energy outside of Saudi Arabia through grids and to become well known globally for this. Such a project by Saudi Solar will create approximately 200.000 jobs within Saudi Arabia in direct and indirect employment in areas such as Research & Development, Manufacturing, Installation, Maintenance and Monitoring. 28
Why The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia? Sustainable development plays an important role in every society today. Considering renewable energy is a big part of that. Sustainability is not only important to protect the environment today, but also to protect future generations. Therefore global warming and CO2 emissions are major concerns. However, besides the environmental aspect, one day fossils fuel reserves will run out due to the fact that natural resources are limited. Solar energy and Photovoltaic development are important for Saudi Arabia, it shows a commitment to preserving the planet, which therefore puts the country in a positive light, and it will earn the country carbon credits. One might ask why invest a great amount of money in alternative energy if there is still a vast amount of oil within the country, but it is essential to understand that it makes more sense to invest in advance rather than waiting until it is an absolute necessity. Solar energy is renewable, but the traditional energy resources, such as gas or oil will one day be depleted. At the current moment oil prices are increasing. Investing in an environmentally conscious project such as this one will not only protect the environment but it will create approximately 200,000 jobs within Saudi Arabia through Research & Development, Manufacturing, Installation and Operation. In these difficult economic times it is important to create jobs and to think about creating a sustainable future. After the investment has paid off Solar farms and Photovoltaic energy will produce considerable profits, generating solar energy
Energy used for construction, direct supply to homes and power supply to grids. The most commonly used technology for solar energy is Crystalline Si, which has proven itself over the last 30 years and is said to be the best. Covering 95% of the market, it is a well established ecological system, it offers the highest wattage per unit area, the cost per watt can be reduced significantly and it does not have toxic effects of silicon.
The Project This project proposal is based on the production of 600MW of power, however the plan is to bring the total plant capacity online in stages. The first stage is to set up a 60MW plant module that can be added to as and when the power demand requires. Commercially the project will adopt best in class technologies with implementation results in a timeframe that will provide attractive economic returns. Technically we are striving for KWh/y and not MWp, which should be the criteria. The goal is to achieve an increase in plant uptime, due to the nature of the product, with relative maintenance free periods of 20
years plus. Sustainability from an Environmental perspective is the future long-term goal. The Arabian environment is adapt and a reduction in maintenance manpower levels can be achieved. Execution planning and implementation will allow the possibility of reducing time-to-market, adapting to the changing market and technical requirements by allowing a phased development program, will allow new technologies to be adapted. Saudi Arabia is urged to review its 90% subsidies backing for fossil fuel based projects, renewable projects can ease these subsidies, while generating employment and value added products
For a 600 MW project, the subsidy is approx. $4.9B over 25 years. As signatory to Kyoto Protocol, Saudi Arabia can offset credits for GHG using solar projects
A 1MW solar project carbon credit offsets carbon charges for 3MW thermal based projects. Project priorities are to begin work on the 1st large scale Saudi Solar Photovoltaic Project. Obtain Local Buy-in from City governments and to close financing issues. Initiate High-
level Vertical Integration & R&D Strategies. The use of solar power in the world today (0.1%,) hardly makes a dent in the worlds power requirements, therefore before the world is inundated with suppliers of this technology we propose to step into the market now to give Saudi Arabia an advantage in a market place in which there is a lot of room for expansion and development.
Japan, India & Germany A good example of where renewable energy has paid off big time is Japan. They are the world’s leader in Photovoltaic energy. Japan does not only feel committed to being environmentally friendly, but has also saved considerable money over time
Solar energy and Photovoltaic development are important for Saudi Arabia, it shows a commitment to preserving the planet, which therefore puts the country in a positive light, and it will earn the country carbon credits.
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by using renewable energy. Japan as a country is about 70% to 80% forested, mountainous, and unsuitable for agricultural, industrial, or residential use and with a population in excess of 128 million people is one of the most densely populated countries in the world. With the lay of the land as such, Japan relies heavily on fossil fuel imports such as oil and gas to provide power for it’s highly developed industries. This means that consumers pay the highest price for power per kWh in the world. The signing of the Kyoto agreement by Japan meant a commitment was given to the world and it’s people to reduce carbon emissions mainly from industrial pollution, therefore a commitment to finding alternative power supply means was needed. The development of solar/photovoltaic power is the
Partners to the project
means of power generation the Japanese government sort to promote, with Japan now being the market leader in the production and use of Solar/PV cell technology, a position attained by heavy backing from the government in the form of government subsidies of 50% of the cost of installation to homeowners as an incentive. These incentives in 1994, when the cost of the systems was high, led to increased demands for solar cells due to affordability. Thus the cycle of the production trend started. The greater demand led to increased production, which led to lower production costs, which led to lower initial capital costs for the end user. In 2003 the government achieved its goal in bringing down the costs of Solar/PV system installation by 50% based on 1994 prices, meaning the consumer is paying the same price as they did in 1994 allowing the government to plan the complete phasing out of subsidies in 2005. The bonuses that were derived from government investment in Solar/PV systems included the money brought into Japan via exports as the Japanese systems lead the world market. In addition to this employment opportunities were generated by the growing industry. Spin-off industries from these systems popularity have come in the form of the peripheral industries, such as silicon feedstock manufacturing, ingot and wafer production, inverters, and reinforced aluminium frames all adding to the increasing Japanese work force and industrial economy. The Japanese government and industry have a view that the next 25 years will be a critical period for the creation of a full-scale PV market. A cumulative capacity of 83 GW of photovoltaic power production in Japan is seen achievable by 2030, by which time PV could meet 50 % of
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residential power needs, which is the equivalent of about10 % of Japan’s entire electricity supply. The PV price targets to be achieved by means of R&D, large scale deployment and export sales are 23¥/kWh (USD 0.24/kWh) by 2010 and 7¥/kWh (USD 0.07/kWh) by 2030. Thus, the goal of 7¥/kWh by 2030 corresponds to the current industrial rate (about what U.S. electric rates are today). All price goals are defined in terms of 2002 Yen. As PV Systems spread across the world, Japan has deliberately and intelligently placed itself as the global leader to meet future PV demand. The Japanese industry model is outwardly focused towards export markets and the majority of Japanese produced PV product is exported. In particular, there is a focus on key developing Asian markets (e.g., China, Mongolia, Vietnam), as well as European markets (Germany, Spain) and North America (U.S. and Mexico). Japanese industry has now set up overseas manufacturing operations in Europe, U.S., and Mexico, thus gearing itself for the challenges of the future. As the Japanese are planning for the future it is the right time for an industrial power such as Saudi Arabia to take note of future trends. The suitability for solar thermal power plants in Saudi Arabia compared to the rest of the world is excellent due to its location. The vertically integrated system brings the following benefits to the local region:
Technology transfer Manufacturing on site Mega renewable energy power stations
Carbon Credits Research and Development 200,000 new Jobs
Energy
The long-term agenda of this project is not only to protect the environment but also to set up Saudi Arabia as the economic hub for the production of solar and photovoltaic cells.
Through smart sustainable energy development Saudi Arabia will be able to gain benefits and opportunities to secure energy and power, to create jobs and also generate revenue. Depleting natural resources, such as gas and oil, will lead to a loss of revenue, a loss of international jobs, and threaten the future stability of the natural energy resource based economies. The long-term agenda of this project is not only to protect the environment but also to set up Saudi Arabia as the economic hub for the production of solar and photovoltaic cells. This will create revenue for the country through export from manufacturing, jobs and employment, business interaction, and the knock on effect of setting up manufacturing in Saudi Arabia.
The country can use this massive opportunity by investing now and becoming the global leader vying with Japan in this technology market in the production of renewable energy. Future scenario plans include developing new energy markets and setting-up a global grid agenda, through exporting power to North Africa and Southern Europe. This is where the plan for Saudi Arabia differs significantly from that of Japan in that we shall be targeting the provision of power to an international grid spread across Asia, Africa and Europe as opposed to individual residents and exporting the technology. After calculations it shows that in 10 years the initial scenario plan costs would be covered and for the further scenario, cost plans will have been covered and profits will have been generated after only 20 years. The costs of generating energy through the sun will be equal to the costs of generating energy through oil by that time. After looking at research statistics it can be seen that the population of Saudi Arabia will grow steadily in the
coming years, therefore the demand for energy will also increase. That is why 2009 can be seen as the window of opportunity for strategic investment to build a strong foundation for the next generation and further generations to come. The growth potential in this sector is massive. Material shortages are easing, demand has been reduced due to the financial crises, therefore there is a surplus of materials at competitive prices and others, who prior to the crisis were strong financially, will be willing to partner now. For 2010 the forecast is that the inventories will be low, demand will increase, weaker players will be filtered out, the Obama factor will start to matter, and remaining players will grow and prices will increase. Saudi Arabia, like Japan, should be looking to future in terms of power provision, but unlike Japan, Saudi Arabia has a vast quantity of oil reserves from which profits should be used to help diversify an already strong economy and make it a bigger player in the shaping of the world in the sustainable energy market by being at the forefront of development. 31
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ZAYED FUTURE ENERGY PRIZE Inaugural prize awarded to Dipal C. Barua for bringing renewable energy to rural communities. he first annual Zayed Future Energy Prize was awarded on January 19 by His Highness General Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces, to Mr. Dipal Chandra Barua, Founding Managing Director of Grameen Shakti for his visionary efforts to bring renewable energy solutions to the rural population of Bangladesh. The Zayed Future Energy Prize finalist, Dr. Martin Green, was also recognized at the award ceremony for his groundbreaking research in photovoltaic (PV) technology that will result in increased efficiencies, bringing solar energy closer to grid parity. The Prize was launched in January 2008 at the inaugural World Future Energy Summit to honour the legacy of environmental stewardship of the UAE’s late ruler and founding father, His Highness Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan. The award winner, Mr. Barua, and the finalist, Dr. Green will receive US$1.5 million and US$350,000, respectively, to accelerate the development of their innovations. Mr.Barua’s organization, Grameen Shakti (GS), has installed more than 200,000 solar PV systems that currently provide power for more than two million rural people. Under Mr. Barua’s leadership, GS has developed a number of other innovative initiatives, including a biogas technology that converts cow and poultry waste into gas for cooking, lighting and fertilizer. GS has installed more than 6,000 biogas plants and plans to construct 500,000 more by 2012. In addition, GS has trained rural women to be solar technicians hereby enabling green entrepreneurs through a highly successful micro-credit program. “It is a great honour to receive this recognition inspired by the vision of HH the late Sheikh Zayed,” said Mr. Barua. “I consider myself a global Ambassador of the Prize, and would like to carry forward the message of environmental sensitivity that is being championed by the leadership of Abu Dhabi.” “We share this award with the rural people of Bangladesh who have demonstrated incredible ambition and innovation in adopting clean, renewable technologies to solve their daily energy challenges in the rural areas,” added Mr. Barua. The finalist, Dr. Green is a leading researcher in the field of PV. He is currently developing “third-
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About Zayed Future Energy Prize The Zayed Future Energy Prize was created in honor of the legacy of the late Ruler of Abu Dhabi and Founding Father of the United Arab Emirates, HH Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan. The prize aims to inspire the next generation of global energy innovators – creating solutions for the future. The Prize is awarded annually to up to three individuals, companies, organisations and/or NGOs that have made significant contributions in the global response to the future of energy, climate change and sustainable global energy resources.
generation” solar cells that will help decrease costs to less than US$0.50/W, to potentially $0.20/W or better, which will drastically increase the economic viability of this technology. “I firmly believe that many of our future energy needs can be addressed by photovoltaic technology,” said Dr. Green. “I’m proud that as one of the first recipients of this award, PV technology and its importance in the renewable energy mix is also being recognized as a commercially viable solution.” “I am confident that the Prize will help boost our efforts to accelerate the development, and market entry of thirdgeneration PV modules,” he added. “It is quite inspirational to be a part of Zayed Future Energy Prize,” said Nobel Laureate Dr. RK Pachauri, Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and Chairman of the jury for ZFEP. “The technologies and the innovative solutions that we’ve seen through the submission process are a good reminder of the ability of human innovation to solve our global challenges.” “These winners and their innovations embody the very qualities the Zayed Future Energy Prize aims to recognize pioneering, ambitious ideas that provide us with a more sustainable future,” said Dr. Sultan Al Jaber, Director General of the Prize and Chief Executive of Masdar. “This prize encourages us to be bold, to innovate, to strive and to act. A quality that we inherited from our father, the late HH Sheikh Zayed who taught us to make a meaningful and sustainable impact on the world we live in,” added Al Jaber in the ceremony’s opening.
ﻫﻴﺌﺔ اﻟﻤﺪن اﻟﺼﻨﺎﻋﻴﺔ وﻣﻨﺎﻃﻖ اﻟﺘﻘﻨﻴﺔ
Saudi Industrial Property Authority
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ARCHIMEDE SOLAR ENERGY
SOLAR RECEIVER TUBES: THE NEW
FRONTIERS OF MOLTEN SALTS The Company Archimede Solar Energy (ASE), in partnership with Siemens Renewable, is a subsidiary of Angelantoni Group headquartered in Italy, Massa Martana (Perugia).
Environment). In 1932 “Angelantoni Industrie” started its activity in the refrigeration sector, and over the years, became renowned in three main industrial fields one of which is testing.
Archimede produces receiver tubes for thermodynamic solar power plants (CSP) licensed by ENEA (The Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and
Since 1952 under the ACS brand, Angelantoni Industrie has introduced world-wide environmental test chambers for all types of tests on materials, components, and finished
products. ACS brand has now a strong leadership in the aerospace sector, the most challenging environment for simulation. After the first space simulator in 1988, Angelantoni Industrie became one of the three leading international manufacturers, and a supplier for the most important Space Research Centers testing satellites and satellite parts.
ASE’s HEMS08 is the world‘s most advanced solar receiver tube, designed for thermodynamic solar power plants, operating at high temperature with molten salts as Heat Transfer Fluid (HTF). 34
The vacuum experience achieved in space simulation, combined with the coating know how, permitted to Angelantoni Industrie to develop a revolutionary receiver tube, core business of Archimede Solar Energy. Archimede Solar Energy is the world’s sole company using molten salts as heat transfer fluid in its solar receivers for parabolic-trough power plants. Compared to plants using the customary thermo oil the efficiency of solar thermal power plants can be significantly enhanced. Molten salts can also be used as a heat store, with the stored energy being used in solar thermal power plants to also produce electricity at night. Solar thermal power plants work on the same principle as conventional steam power plants – with the difference that the heat for steam generation is not produced by combusting fossil fuels but with the aid of solar energy. To this end parabolic mirrors bundle the incident solar radiation and reflect it onto receiver tubes, through which a heat transfer fluid flows. The salt used exclusively by ASE is heated to temperatures up to 550 degrees Celsius and then flows through a heat exchanger, in which the steam is produced to drive a steam turbine-generator.
In 2008, Archimede Solar Energy furnished HEMS08 receiver tubes for the first Solar power plant in the world using Molten Salts technology ( ENEL - Priolo Gargallo (SR), ITALYIntegrated Solar Combined Cycle Plants (ISCC) ) .
ENEL-Priolo Gargallo 5MWCSP
In 2009 and following the strategic alliance with Siemens which acquired 28% of Archimede Solar Energy. The company invested in:
Buiding the new manufacturing facility The Establishment of a Demo Plant (Operational in October 2009): A complete Stand Alone CSP Demo Plant using molten salts with storage system and turbine. In 2010 the Factory will increase the production of Solar tubes to 50.000 a year. In 2011 the production will be of 100.000 tubes a year.
The receiver tube ASE’s HEMS08 is the world‘s most advanced solar receiver tube, designed for thermodynamic solar power plants, operating at high temperature with molten salts as Heat Transfer Fluid (HTF). ASE produces also Parabolic Trough Receiver Tubes (HEOI09) using ordinary mineral oil. 35
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Thanks to a revolutionary patented coating process (CERMET) the solar receiver tubes have an absorbance equal or higher to 95%, an emissivity lower than 10% at 400°C and 14% at 580°C. Kept in a vacuum, Archimede tubes ensure the maximum sunlight yield and thus they are the most technologically advanced solar receivers available for high temperature range. The surface coating deposited on the tube is constituted of a thin film multilayer structure including an inferior layer of metal, reflecting in the infrared, and a superior layer of antireflective ceramic material. The external glass has an antireflective coating on both surfaces with a solar transmittance higher or equal to 96.5%. The metal bellows adjust the difference in thermal expansion between the hot absorber tube and the cooler external glass envelop during operating conditions. In order to achieve outstanding vacuum tight enclosure, each bellow is welded on one side to the absorber tube and to the glass on the other side by glassto-metal junction. Innovative glass-tometal junctions are made by a special machined and vacuum heat treated stainless steel rings. The internal shields have been dimensioned to optimize the thermal characteristics and reliability of the
Archimede Solar Energy is member of Solare XXI. A consortium commited to design produce and market an innovative parabolic trough solar collector, having unique characteristics in the worldwide scenario.
tube with an irradiated surface/total surface ratio equal to 0.95. In order to ensure the designed vacuum conditions, inside the glass enclosure during the entire working life of the tube, a quantity of getter strip is wrapped around each shield. HEMS08 has an expected lifetime of more than 25 years at working temperature (of up to 550°C) under normal installation, operating and maintenance conditions. Archimede Solar Energy will be present at The European Future Energy Summit, Bilbao: Pavilion 2, D49.
The Angelantoni Industrie Group was established on 1932 and has a workforce of 750 employees at eight manufacturing plants in Italy, France, Germany, India and China. It posts annual revenues totaling EUR130 million revenues. The two traditional core business are biomedical and laboratory equipment, and test equipment for automotive, electronics and aerospace applications. The test equipment includes environmental test chambers, space simulators for satellites, car and car component test benches, and electrodynamic shakers
www.angelantoni.it “By acquiring a stake in Archimede Solar Energy Siemens is underlining its intention to become the leading provider of solutions for solar thermal power plants,“ The Siemens Energy Sector is the world’s leading supplier of a complete spectrum of products, services and solutions for the generation, transmission and distribution of power and for the extraction, conversion and transport of oil and gas. In fiscal 2008 (ended September 30), the Energy Sector had revenues of approximately EUR22.6 billion and received new orders totaling approximately EUR33.4 billion and posted a profit of EUR1.4 billion. On September 30, 2008, the Energy Sector had a work force of approximately 83,500.
www.siemens.com/energy Archimede Solar Energy new manufacturing facility.
Archimede Solar Energy SpA Angelantoni Group Massa Martana (PG), ITALY Loc. Cimacolle, 464 - 06056 tel. + 39.075.89551 fax. + 39.075.8955200
www.archimedesolarenergy.it Your contact person for Solar Receiver Tubes: Paolo Martini Business Development and Sales Director
paolo.martini@angelantoni.it 36
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By Klaus WENZEL, MED-ENEC Team Leader, GTZ International Services
MED-ENEC The Implementation Gap for Energy Efficiency in Buildings. Experiences from the MENA-region
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contributing about a third of all energy-related CO2 emissions. At the same time, this sector has the highest potential for energy savings and the use of renewable energies. What is even more important: buildings also have the highest mitigation potential with no-cost and low-cost measures, e.g. by just improving the building design and applying wellknown technologies such as insulation, solar-waterheaters, efficient lighting, etc. The 2007 IPCC report assessed the conservation potential per sector in different country groups and came to the conclusion that the building sector has the highest saving opportunities as shown in the following figure.
uge technical potentials exist for energy conservation in buildings. But why are these opportunities hardly tapped? This article provides some evidence and conclusions from the perspective of the EU-financed regional MED-ENEC project, which supports energy efficiency in the construction sector of 10 southern and eastern Mediterranean countries.
The Energy Efficiency Gap in Buildings According to several recent studies, the building sector is the biggest single consumer of final energy world wide, using 35-40% of energy resources and
Figure 1 >Economic mitigation potential by sector in 2030, 2007 IPCC Report, Fig. 4.2
World total OCECD EIT Non-OECD/EIT GTCO2EQ/YR
7 6 5 4 3 2
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Buildings
Industry
Agriculture
Forestry
Waste
<100
<50
<20
<100
<50
<20
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Energy
Med-Enec pilot projects in Algeria, Egypt, IsraĂŤI, Morocco and Jordan..
Why is Market Development so Slow for Low-Energy Buildings? If the potential is so high at least on the aggregate level of country groups, why then the wide dissemination of these available and mature technologies in the southern and eastern Mediterranean countries is still lacking? In most of these countries, with some exceptions for urban regions in Israel and Turkey, the energy efficiency (EE) standards of new buildings remain very poor. So what are the constraints for market development? The EU-financed MED-ENEC project supported 10 low-energy buildings in 10 MENA countries, shown in the pictures below, and found some answers to this question.
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Energy Efficiency
..Lebanon, Palestinian territories, Syria, Tunisia and Turkey. Projects funded by the European Union.
Performance Data of the MED-ENEC Pilot Projects
Reasons for the Dissemination Gap
The high technical potential for energy conservation could be fully confirmed with the Pilot Projects (PP). The PP buildings save on an average 57% of primary energy for heating and cooling, compared to a conventional building in the same country. However, the economic performance data seem to be less attractive as shows the following table.
Only the PP in Lebanon (refurbishment) is financially very attractive. Five PP are moderately attractive with a payback of around 10 years and the remaining four PP exceed 17 years. Although the PP have received high visibility and public attention, only few have been able up to now to disseminate the used EE technologies on a larger scale. An analysis of the reasons for the
PP with moderate and bad financial performance indicators shows the major constraints for energy efficiency investments, not only in buildings. 1| Some of the PP promoters want first of all demonstrate high the technical potential for EE, using highly innovative and less cost-efficient technologies, such as solar cooling or photovoltaic devices. In the case of Tunisia and
Figure 2 > Economic performance indicators of MED-ENEC Pilot Projects
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Primary energy savings Incremental costs Pay back period
Energy Israel, this increased considerably the payback time. 2| For some countries, the most important constraint is subsidized energy tariffs. In the case of the PP in Algeria, the 57% reduction of primary energy consumption results in a financial saving only of 70 Euros per year, while the incremental investment is around 4,500 Euros! This is a clear disincentive for EE-investments. 3| In all countries, the PP promoters experienced market failures and high transaction costs. The three most important bottlenecks are: Information
and know-how gaps: potential clients are not aware of the technical and financial potential and suppliers/developers lack know-how for identification, procurement and implementation of appropriate EE-technologies. The corresponding search cost as well as additional monitoring needs on the building site did increase significantly the cost for the PP. Lack of financing for the incre-
mental costs: potential clients often do not have the financial capacity and liquidity to bear the higher upfront cost of EE-investments, even if they are aware of the profitability. Banks are usually not interested in the corresponding relatively small credit amounts and do not take into account the higher available income of the borrowers through energy cost savings.
Diversity of actors and split incentives: the value chain of the construction sector is particularly diversified. Investors, developers, architects, construction companies, subcontractors, banks, owners and inhabitants all have different interests and risk perceptions. The economic benefits of EEimprovements do not always accrue to the investor (landlord-tenant problem).
Conclusions for Energy Policy The MED-ENEC PP experiences suggest a clear need for strong government intervention in order to tackle market failures and high transaction costs for EE.
The reduction of energy subsidies in a socially acceptable way is a necessary but not sufficient measure in this respect. Comprehensive and country specific policy packages are necessary combining “carrots” (smart credit programs, tax holidays, public procurement, etc.) with “sticks” (enforced EE building codes, mandatory standards and quality control, etc.) and with “tambourines” (information and awareness campaigns, education/training, etc.).
MED-ENEC MED-ENEC aims at boosting energy efficiency and the use of renewable energies in buildings in 10 countries south and east of the Mediterranean. MED-ENEC has an integrated project approach, combining activities for the improvement of framework conditions such as laws, standards and incentive programs with demonstration projects, capacity building and the promotion of business cooperation and technology transfer.
For more information: www.med-enec.com
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By Fiorella MINICUCCI
SCOTLAND’S DEVELOPING ENERGY POLICY To emerge as a leader in green energy Scotland’s leaders need to resolve a number of issues before achieving the nation’s ambition
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here is no doubt that Scotland would like to see itself as a leader in Green Energy, an ambition championed by the Scottish Parliament and industry alike. However, there is significant doubt with regard to Scotland actually fulfilling its potential. In the words of Scotland’s Energy Minister, Jim Mather: “We need to face the fact that Scotland's growth record over the last three decades has been mediocre.” The Royal Society of Edinburgh recently estimated that there will be a 50% increase in Scotland’s energy demand by 2050. At the same time it is expected that Scotland will lose around 30% of its electricity generating capacity from large power stations in 10 years and around 70% in 20 years. So with a far from excellent past history in development and an urgent requirement to increase energy production just what can Scotland do to resolve the situation whilst, at the same time, respecting the need, and the will, to promote and develop the renewable energy sector? According to the Scottish Council for Development and Industry as matters currently stand, there will be a growing gap between energy supply and demand in Scotland and the UK in general, and a growing global gap between greenhouse gas emissions and targets for stabilising the climate. Of particular concern is the fact that there has been underinvestment in the energy industry over many decades. This state of affairs will need to be redressed in the next 10-15 years to close these gaps.
Towards a Green Future The Council is concerned that the scale of the challenge is without precedent. The problem is not simply financial, but also one of mindset and skills. These considerations are of particular concern as, according to the Council, Scottish industry risks losing position in the clean energy market that is estimated as being of 42
a $1 trillion vale by 2030. Thus the immediate issues that Scotland needs to address are twofold; resolving the ever increasing demand for energy and encouraging growth in the development of know-how and technologies. To do this a coherent, well-planned and forward-looking national strategy has to be developed and implemented. This strategy is beginning to emerge and although far from complete it has considerable political and industrial backing. Scotland is ideally placed to benefit from technologies developed to harness the power of the wind, tides, rivers, and sea. Many green sectors, for example hydroelectric and wind power, have been heavily invested in over the years, some of these investments, as is the case of many of Scotland’s hydroelectric plants, date back to the early 1930’s. Indeed while the United Kingdom average for electricity generated from renewable sources is around 5% Scotland can boast a figure slightly in excess of 20%. Scotland’s potential for generating power from renewable sources should not be underestimated, the country possesses some of the best natural resources in the world for harnessing energy from the three Ws: waves, water and wind. Amongst the most significant examples of innovation in the harnessing natural power are the Clyde wind farm, the largest approved onshore wind farm in Europe, the recently approved commercial wave farm off the Western isles and the planned marine energy plant situated in the Pentland Firth – an area considered the Saudi Arabia of marine energy.
Nuclear Power? No Thanks Scotland’s Energy Minister considers nuclear power as having proven costly and dangerous, this coupled to Scotland’s vast natural resources, makes the integration of nuclear energy in the country’s energy policy
Energy lower than those of wind power. Scotland has for many years been at the forefront of research into the development of commercial wave power generators, in fact one of the world’s first commercial scale wave power plants has been operating for some time on the Island of Islay.
Priorities for Development
completely unnecessary. It is also difficult to make nuclear power coexist with the ambition of making Scotland the Green Energy Capital of Europe. Rather then consider nuclear power the Minister is currently involved in consultations regarding the proposition to build a series of thermal power stations. Final decisions would appear to remain far off, especially due to the fact that it is not clear how emission reduction targets would be reached and just how Carbon Capture and Storage (CSS) would be implemented. It is Mather’s stated belief that any new power plants will have to reduce their emissions via CCS, the Minister is also of the opinion that CCS offers Scotland opportunities to become a world leader. Mather believes that Scotland possesses the necessary technical expertise in carbon capture, the sponsorship of the power industry, and unrivalled storage capacity in the North Sea to achieve this vision. On an equally ambitious note last December the Scottish government unveiled the £10 million Saltire Prize, one of the most important scientific innovation
THE SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT’S CURRENT GOAL IS TO GENERATE AS MUCH AS 10% OF SCOTLAND’S ELECTRICAL POWER FROM WAVE TURBINES BY 2020.
awards in history. The prize will be awarded to the team that develops a system capable of harnessing a minimum of 100 GW output over a two year period from wave or tidal energy. The prize has attracted over 70 declarations of interest from around the world. The Scottish Government’s current goal is to generate as much as 10% of Scotland’s electrical power from wave turbines by 2020. It is hoped that by establishing a new industry as many as 7,000 jobs could be created. For a long time wave power has been considered the poor relation of the renewable energy sector, this despite that costs are
It is ironic that a nation traditionally at the forefront of inventions and innovation today faces a series of challenges in the development of its energy industry, perhaps the greatest is recruiting and training sufficient skilled people to work in the fields of research and development, design, and manufacturing. According to the Scottish Council for Development and Industry Scotland’s key priorities for developing its renewable energy industry can be defined as: Education/ Training - Increasing participation in science, technology, engineering and maths. Retraining and upskilling the workforce for existing and emerging technologies e.g. the training for plumbers, electricians and building professionals to become installers of micro-renewables. Fresh Talent – Many graduates are now from overseas so the availability of work permits must meet demand. To promote and facilitate the North East and Highlands and Islands as attractive places to live and work in order to encourage and retain high calibre, skilled professionals. Collaboration – Collaboration on skills utilisation and crossover would be beneficial.
In conclusion it can be said that overall Scotland’s Government is aware of the urgency to address lost time in the renewable energy sector and is making progress towards addressing future requirements. Although still in its definition phase the country’s future energy policy is already taking shape and is taking into consideration practically all of the necessary issues and components. 43
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By Steve SAWYER | Secretary General, Global Wind Energy Council
WIND ENERGY AS A KEY CLIMATE SOLUTION
Pictures provided by: Global Wind Energy Council
Climate change is happening, and it is happening fast.
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Energy
”WE HAVE ENTERED THE RENEWABLE ENERGY AGE, AND INVESTORS HAVE FLOCKED TO THE SECTOR.” Steve Sawyer Global Wind Energy Council
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hen climate change first started to worry the scientific community in the 1980s, the idea of a carbon free energy economy was still a technological fantasy – maybe it could be achieved in the far distant future. Back then, fossil fuels seemed plentiful, and they were cheaper than ever. Moreover, most renewable energy technologies were in the early stages of development, they were expensive, and they were inefficient. Back in the 1980s, the dire warnings of scientists largely fell on deaf ears both in the energy business and the political arena. The build-up of CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere was something that could safely be put in the ‘to be worried about in the future’ basket. But much has changed since then; we have learned more about how quickly this ‘future’ is approaching. Climate change is here, it is happening, and much faster than initially thought. Melting polar ice, shrinking glaciers in Greenland, Antarctica and around the globe, rising sea levels, severe weather events, heat waves and droughts are getting ever harder to ignore. The old questions about ways to combat climate change are back on the table, and need to be addressed urgently. The IPCC’s 4th Assessment Report showed that climate change is developing faster than previously thought. It also sent the clear message that if we are to have any chance of avoiding the worst and irreversible damages of climate change, then global greenhouse gas emissions must peak and begin to decline before 2020. In addition, a number of independent studies, such as the report for the British government by former World Bank Chief Economist Sir Nicholas Stern, have highlighted concerns that the economic and social costs associated
with the increasing impacts of climate change far outweight the costs of effective mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions. Not only has our scientific understanding of the threat we face deepened to the point that no serious policymaker can ignore; public awareness has also increased dramatically, with citizens around the world demanding action and demanding change – the recent ‘Earth Hour’ campaign is just one example of this public engagement. Citizens are becoming increasingly aware of the threat of climate change every day, as part and parcel of the whole mix of energy insecurity, the scourge of air pollution in major cities around the world, and the economic disaster of the reliance on imported fossil fuels.
Renewable Energy Technologies are AvailableHere and Now Something else has changed, too. We now have the technology to begin the move to a sustainable energy economy, here and now. In fact, it is already happening; we have entered the renewable energy age, and investors have flocked to the sector. In 2008, total investment in the clean energy sector reached $150 billion, up from just 34 billion in 2004. Particularly in the electric power sector, traditional energy giants such as General Electric, Iberdrola, Siemens, EON, Florida Power and Light, RWE, and even French nuclear utility AREVA are staking more and more of their future on renewable energy. Most of the asset investments are going to wind power. Even the International Energy Agency has begun to pick up on the renewable energy revolution. In its recent publications, the IEA has started to acknowledge that renewable energy will dominate the
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Figure 1 > GLOBAL CUMULATIVE INSTALLED CAPACITY 1996-2008
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power sector in any sustainable energy future. While the IEA’s estimates still err on the conservative side, the starting recognition of the role that renewables can play is finally picking up on the explosive development of so-called ‘new’ renewable energy technologies. Wind energy is the most developed of ‘new’ renewable technologies, and its story is indeed remarkable. Global installed capacity growth has averaged over 28% over the last 10 years, doubling installed capacity globally every 2.5 - 3 years. 2008 was another banner year, with more than 27,000 MW installed globally, bringing the total installed capacity up to over 120,000 MW.
Wind Power: Potent CO2 Saver… and Boosting the Economy Wind power is a key tool in the fight against climate change, with the potential to save billions of tons of CO2. But not only does it provide 46
clean power from an inexhaustible indigenous source, it also boosts economic development by creating jobs, channelling investment into a sustainable energy model and saving billions in foreign imports of fossil fuels.
Wind Energy and the Environment: While the power sector is far from being the only culprit when it comes to climate change, it is the largest single source of emissions, accounting for about 40% of CO2 emissions, and about 25% of overall emissions. The options for making major emissions reductions in the power sector between now and 2020 are basically three: energy efficiency and conservation; fuel switching from coal to gas; and renewable energy, primarily wind power. Modern wind technology has an extremely good energy balance. Wind power does not emit any climate change inducing carbon dioxide
2008 120.798
2007 93.835
2006 74.052
2005 59.091
2004 47.620
2003 39.431
2002 31.100
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0
nor other air pollutants which are polluting the major cities of the world and costing billions in additional health costs and infrastructure damage. The CO2 emissions related to the manufacture, installation and servicing over the average 20 year lifecycle of a wind turbine are “paid back” after the first three to six months of operation, while substantial CO2 savings continue throughout the lifetime of a turbine. Further, in an increasingly carbonconstrained world, wind power is risk-free insurance against the long term downside of carbon intense investments. The Global Wind Energy Council1 has presented a scenario showing that wind power is on track to reducing CO2 emissions by a total of 10 billion tons by 2020, far more than any other power sector technology. It will help revitalise our economies, and create millions of jobs in the process. But this will not happen by itself.
Energy
According to the GWEC scenario, global wind energy capacity would increase from the current 120 GW to over 1,000 GW by 2020, generating 2,600 TWh of electricity annually, which would represent around 12 % of global electricity demand. This would save more than 1.5 billion tons of CO2 per year, adding up to 10 billion tons of CO2 saved by 2020, and make a substantial contribution to global efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Given the crucial timeframe up to 2020 during which global emission must start to decline, the speed of deployment of wind farms is of key importance in combating climate change. Building a conventional power plant can take 10 or 12 years or more, and until it is completed, no power is being generated. Wind power deployment is measured in months, and a half completed wind farm is just a smaller power plant, starting to generate power and income as soon as the first turbines are connected to the grid.
An Investment and Job Dynamo: Wind energy makes sound economic sense. In contrast to new gas, coal or even a nuclear power plants, the price for fuel over the total lifetime of a wind turbine is well known: it is zero. For conventional generation technologies, the volatility of fuel price developments are a significant risk factor, with oil prices recently fluctuating between 50 and 150 USD in the course of just one year. Wind farm owners, however, know how much the electricity they generate is going to cost. No conventional technology (except hydro – the ‘established’ renewable power generating technology) can make that claim. This is of fundamental concern not only to individual utilities and power plant operators, but also to government planners seeking to mitigate their vulnerability to macroeconomic shocks associated with the vagaries of international commodity markets.
WIND ENERGY IS THE MOST DEVELOPED OF ‘NEW’ RENEWABLE TECHNOLOGIES.
In addition, at many sites, wind power is already competitive with new-built conventional technologies, and in some cases much cheaper. Although nothing can compete with existing, embedded conventional generation plant that has already been paid off (and was mostly constructed with significant state subsidies: governments still subsidize conventional technologies at the rate of about 250 billion USD/year), wind power is commercially attractive, especially when taking into account the price of carbon, which is a factor in a growing number of markets. Already in 2008, over €36.5 billion Í 47
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to keep their economies moving ahead in the face of the global flight to the cities.
No More Imported Dirty Fuels at Volatile Prices: Global demand for energy has been increasing at a breathtaking pace, and this is particularly true in China, India and other rapidly developing economies. This sharp increase in world energy demand will require significant investment in new power generating capacity and grid infrastructure, especially in the developing world. Industrialised countries face a different but parallel situation. While demand is increasing, the days of overcapacity in electricity production are coming to an end. Many older power plants will soon reach the end of their working lives. The IEA predicts that by 2030, over 2,000 GW of power generation capacity will need to be built in the OECD countries, including the replacement of retiring plants.
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were invested in wind energy worldwide, and the sector is now employing well over 400,000 ‘green collar’ workers. According to the GWEC scenario, the annual value of global investment in wind energy would reach €149.4 bn by 2020 and account for over 2.2 million jobs. Although these figures may appear large, they should be seen in the context of the total level of investment in the global power industry. During the 1990s, for example, annual investment in the power sector was running at some €158-186 billion each year. Especially at times of economic uncertainty and high unemployment rates, any technology which demands a subs-
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tantial level of both skilled and unskilled labour is of considerable economic importance, and likely to feature strongly in any political decision-making over different energy options. Regional economic development is also a key factor in economic considerations surrounding wind energy. From Schleswig-Holstein in northern Germany, to Andalucía in Spain; from the US Pacific Northwest to west Texas to Pennsylvania; and from Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia in China to Tamil Nadu and Gujarat in India, the wind power industry is revitalising regional economies, providing quality jobs and expanding tax bases in rural regions struggling
Just as energy demand continues to increase, supplies of the main fossil fuels used in power generation, are becoming more expensive and more difficult to extract. One result is that some of the major economies of the world are increasingly relying on imported fuel at unpredictable cost, sometimes from regions of the world where conflict and political instability threaten the security of that supply. In contrast to the uncertainties surrounding supplies of conventional fuels, and volatile prices, wind energy is a massive indigenous power source which is permanently available in virtually every country in the world. There are no fuel costs, no geo-political risk and no supply dependence on imported fuels from politically unstable regions. Every kilowatt/hour generated by wind power has the potential to displace fossil fuel imports, improving
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Wind energy
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both security of supply and the national balance of payments, which is not only an issue for the United States which sends more than half a trillion dollars a year out of the country to pay its oil bill. This is an even larger issue for poor countries in Africa, Asia and South America whose economies have been devastated by recent oil price hikes. Wind power also has the advantage that it can be deployed faster than other energy supply technologies. Even large offshore wind farms, which require a greater level of infrastructure and grid network connection, can be installed from start to finish in less than two years, a crucial asset given the pressing threat of climate change.
The Road to Copenhagen What Matters to the Wind Industry? Even in this time of financial crisis and economic downturn, the climate issue remains high on the agenda. The first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol is coming to an end in 2012. While this agreement is not
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perfect, it is the only international policy tool we have to curb carbon emissions and combat climate change, and coming to an agreement for the period post-2012 is essential. In December 2007, at COP 13 in Bali, the participating countries agreed that the negotiations should be formally launched and successfully concluded by COP 15, to be held in December 2009 in Copenhagen. However, the last 14 months have seen little progress, and there is now pressure to meet the December deadline. Danish authorities expect up to 18,000 people in Copenhagen for two weeks. In addition to the negotiators, this includes Heads of State and Government; Environment, Energy and Finance Ministers; thousands of reporters from outlets around the world and advocates representing business and industry, environmental groups, research NGOs, trade unions and indigenous people’s groups. For the wind sector, the outcome of these negotiations is critical, and the
wind power industry has mounted the Wind Power Works2 campaign during this ‘Year of the Climate’, to highlight the key role of wind power in meeting greenhouse gas emission reduction targets. In particular, three points are of key interest to the wind industry: the rigour of the emissions reduction targets, technology transfer agreements and an expanded carbon market.
Targets: The emission reduction targets for industrialised countries under consideration (minus 25-40% in 2020 compared with 1990 levels) are much greater than those under the Kyoto Protocol’s first commitment period. If targets in this range are agreed and enforced, this will have an immediate impact on the framework conditions of the wind sector. Firstly, the price of carbon will rise substantially and drive energy investment decisions. We are already beginning to see this as a result of the modest targets agreed by the EU, most clearly in the
Energy THE BASIC CONCEPT FOR THE SECTORAL MECHANISM IS QUITE SIMPLE.
GHG emissions in the sector
BAU emissions
Crediting baseline
Credits issued
lesser extent other developing countries, and income from Certified Emission Reductions (CERs) can make a substantial contribution to a project’s profitability. There are more than 25,000 MW of wind power projects currently in the CDM pipeline 3. While this unique mechanism has made a good start, it can and must be expanded and improved, creating the conditions for wind energy and other clean development in a much broader range of developing and emerging economy markets.
Actual emissions
Historical emissions Crediting period
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recent decision by a major German utility to cancel a series of new coal-fired power plants in the wake of the EU’s landmark ‘20/20/20’ decision agreed in December 2008. Under the new emissions trading rules where electricity producers need to buy emission reduction credits at auction to compensate for their emissions, the price risk of new coal-fired generation capacity was deemed too high. We have also seen plans for dozens of new coal-fired power plants cancelled in the US, merely in the anticipation of a price for carbon. With a new climate agreement in place, this trickle should turn into a flood. In reality, reaching an international agreement on substantial targets will be hard. Although negotiators in Bali agreed to negotiate in the 25-40% reduction range, only the EU has to date agreed to a 20% cut by 2020 (to be increased to 30% as part of a new international agreement), and to
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sourcing 20% of its final energy demand from renewable sources by the same date. In the US, President Obama pledged to return the country to 1990 levels by 2020, which would mean an approximately 16% reduction below today’s levels. This may be ambitious given the recent history of the US, but nowhere near enough. Australia has announced very disappointing national targets – 4% below 1990 levels (5% below 2000 levels) by 2020. Japan, Canada and Russia, the other notable players among industrialized countries, have yet to lay their cards on the table.
The Flexible Mechanisms: The Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) has already had a substantial impact on wind energy development in China and India. The CDM also impacts to a
To achieve this, the wind industry is arguing in favour of a Sectoral Crediting Mechanism which would provide a much broader means for industrialising countries to use the carbon markets and private finance to decarbonise their power sectors. For developing countries, preliminary analysis has shown that such a mechanism could leverage hundreds of billions of dollars for clean energy investment in the developing world between now and 2020, and result in emissions reductions of many hundreds of millions of tons.
The Basic Concept for the Sectoral Mechanism is Quite Simple: a) define a voluntary ‘no regrets’ target on the basis of national efforts with some assistance from international funding for the electricity sector in a given industrialising country; the target would be ‘no regrets’ in the sense that there would be no penalty for not reaching the target. b) any reductions below the ‘no regrets’ target would generate tradable credits; c) technology cooperation and other funding could be utilised to create the conditions which would facilitate both domestic and international capital investments in clean energy technologies. Í 51
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“THE FUTURE OF OUR PLANET DEPENDS ON MAKING THE RIGHT CHOICE, AND THE WIND INDUSTRY STANDS READY TO PLAY ITS PART IN A SUSTAINABLE ENERGY FUTURE.” Steve Sawyer Global Wind Energy Council
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Technology transfer: The discussion surrounding technology transfer has been going on in various UN forums for 20 years, but has been largely abstract. Discussion was based on the notion that a) governments owned technology; and b) they would give it away; and c) that there is some theoretical model from which a mechanism could be derived to achieve this. There is some indication that this discussion might now be changing. But there is a fundamental confusion between the relative roles of public and private sector which needs to be overcome before the UN system can come up with anything that will be useful in the real world. The aim must be to reach an agreement that works to support the rapid and widest possible diffusion of existing renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies, as well as adaptation technologies. Some say that reaching robust agreements in all four pillars laid out in the Bali Roadmap (mitigation, adaptation, technology and finance) is too much to achieve in time for Copenhagen.
A lot of work ahead for a new climate deal There is indeed a lot of work ahead in the next six months, but with the 52
right political leadership it can be done. For the first time in a very long time, there is hope that the US, as the new Congress and President Obama turn their attention to domestic greenhouse gas emission reduction legislation, the sine qua non for engagement by the US in the international negotiations. With the US on board, anything is possible.
to the future of the wind energy industry. Policy makers have the choice between the path of sustainability, energy security, clean air and water, which would strengthen our economies and reduce our dangerous dependence on imported fuels, or they can continue our disastrous business as usual.
Whatever the outcome in Copenhagen, we are at a crossroads in relation to our energy future, the design of which will be fundamental
The future of our planet depends on making the right choice, and the wind industry stands ready to play its part in a sustainable energy future.
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Daily traffic collapse in New Delhi, India; the traditional role of the Indian streetscape as the traditional ‘public domain’ has been lost. Reducing car dependency could be achieved through the concept of the ‘City of Short Distances’ and a strong focus on public transport integration.
By Steffen Lehmann, the University of Newcastle (Australia) and UNESCO
The Work of the UNESCO Chair in Sustainable Urban Development for Asia and the Pacific Identifying plausible responses to the rapid urbanization. 54
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living in towns and cities. A forecast of the UN Habitat ecent research has delivered clear evidence that Forum (2008) indicates that over 90 percent of the global warming and urbanization are closely urban growth over the next 15 years will occur interlinked. Rapid urbanization, and its impact on primarily in developing countries. Asia alone will communities and the environment, is now one of the account for more than half of the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s urban most pressing issues of today. The UNESCO Chair in population. In fact, the Asia-Pacific region is the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Sustainable Urban Development for Asia and the Pacific fastest growing region and one of the major sources of Region (including the Middle East Region), established greenhouse gases; it is also likely to in 2008, is a joint initiative of be severely affected by the impact the UN and the University of Cities are the engines of of global warming on regional Newcastle. The mission of this economic growth. economies, environment, society Chair is to conduct pragmatic As architects and urban and the lives of ordinary citizens. and innovative strategic research, designers we are in as well as to offer advice and the business of the future. The task that While the Asia-Pacific region is expecapacity building in order to the people charge us with is to riencing rapid economic growth support sustainable development anticipate, to comprehend and to deal and extensive urbanization, coupled in the Asia-Pacific region. with the challenges with continued population increases, of future cities. And then, the region faces also the challenging The UNESCO has made susto imagine and identify issues of poverty and insufficient tainability a key topic in its a vision for their future. sustainable management of its development oriented activities urbanization processes. Many of the and has launched a new iniSteffen Lehmann current developments negatively tiative - with the University of impact on natural resources and the Newcastle, Australia (NSW) - to environment through poor planning, misinformed address the increasing concern of non-sustainable urban design, air and water pollution and an increase urbanization which currently occurs in the Asia and in waste generation. Pacific region. Cities in the Asia-Pacific region have currently an urbanization rate of 42 percent and growth rate of 2.5 percent p.a., which means that they will have to accommodate an additional 1.7 billion people in the next 40 years. This represents a doubling of the current urban population. Given this situation, it is obvious that environmental urban strategies for the Asia-Pacific region are desperately needed. It is a region of rapid change, cultural alienation and environmental crisis, with a threatening divide between city and countryside. The interdisciplinary research initiatives conducted by the newly established UNESCO Chair in Sustainable Urban Development will lay-out a roadmap for the next ten years to facilitate sustainable growth, strengthen international, high-level research collaborations with other universities and consult city governments in the Asia-Pacific region.
The challenge Increasing urbanization is one of the hallmarks of global change, characterized by gradual and continuous growth of cities to urban mega regions. Lack of affordable housing and scarcity of water and energy are just some of the consequences from the uncontrolled urbanization process, which poses huge challenges ahead, accelerated by climate change. It is projected that in the next 50 years, two-thirds of humanity will be
Towards a new urbanism in the Asia-Pacific region Cities are the engines of economic growth. As architects and urban designers we are in the business of the future. The task that the people charge us with is to anticipate, to comprehend, and to deal with the challenges of future cities and then to imagine and identify a vision for their future. Regarding the AsiaPacific Region this means that there is a need to identify effective strategies and propose practical solutions to support sustainable urban development. Moreover, it is vital to carry out appropriate urban development proposals based on the conditions specific to each area of the region characterized by great diversity in terms of economy, politics, culture, climate, and the natural environment. In this context, the UNESCO Chair will support managing this rapid urbanization and globalization process and enhance collaboration with a broad range of stakeholders. Research results will be disseminated freely, contributing to the transition towards a more sustainablesociety. Cities (both in developed and developing countries in the Asia-Pacific region) can make a real difference in terms of mitigating their global environmental impacts for example through the application of international best practice in urban design and climate-responsive urbanism. In this sense,
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quality urban design should be the first strategy utilized to reduce the need for fossil-fuel energy. It is important to note that many improvements do not require heavy financial investment. In many cases measures that bring global environmental benefits can also bring economic savings to a city or town, creating new jobs and a futureproofed economy. With the end of the fossil energy system, a new relationship between city and countryside is emerging, where the city does not exist or grow on the
expense of its rural hinterland. Compact communities will be stopping urban sprawl, and decentralized energy production will allow reconnecting the energy production with the place of final energy consumption.
sustainable urban development in resonance with the local and regional needs of the Asia-Pacific region and in line with the priorities of UNESCOâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Medium Term Strategy (2008-2013), including a focus on the impact of climate change on migration and urbanization;
The aims of the UNESCO Chair
contributing to capacity building and professional training, and acting as a think tank;
The UNESCO Chair in Sustainable Urban Development for Asia and the Pacific has the mission to operate in the following areas: conducting scientific research in
enhancing international cooperation in higher education and research, attracting post-graduate candidates to conduct research; advising and consulting in the area of sustainable architecture and urban design; strengthening inter-university and
inter-disciplinary cooperation in training, education, publications, conferences, seminars, master classes, and curricula development; exchanging knowledge of inter-
national best practice, establishing knowledge sharing in practical and achievable sustainable urban development for a new urban society;
The various priority research areas of the UNESCO Chair.
disseminating research-based best practice for re-engineering existing cities into sustainable cities, sharing experience and developing an action plan; transferring knowledge to deve-
loping countries, offering UNESCO Scholarships and Visiting Fellowships to graduates of Asia-Pacific universities; inspiring and supporting people to live in a more environmentally friendly way.
Methods to increase energy-efficiency. (UNESCO Chair, 2008) 56
Urban design provides our highest ability to influence sustainable outcomes. The first projects have now started in China (retrofitting existing building stock), India (Green Campus initiative), and Thailand (Hua Hin Development). Other urban developments in Jordan and UAE (zero-emission eco-cities), and in Vietnam (ecotourism and heritage) are about to take shape.
Sustainable Development
Professor Steffen Lehmann (born in Stuttgart, Germany) works as urban designer, architect and University educator/researcher. Email: steffen.lehmann@newcastle.edu.au Publications: Steffen has published over 200 academic papers and 7 books (2008). A full publication list can be found on Steffen’s homepage: www.slab.com.au More information: Further information can be found on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professor_Steffen_Lehmann
> Short Biography Dr. Steffen Lehmann holds the UNESCO Chair in Sustainable Urban Development for Asia and the Pacific, the Professorial Chair of Architectural Design in the School of Architecture and Built Environment at the University of Newcastle (NSW), and is Founding Director of the s_Lab Space Laboratory for Architectural Research and Design (Sydney-Berlin), an international interdisciplinary research cluster: www.slab.com.au. Steffen’s expertise is in sustainable cities, ‘Green Urbanism’, and energy-efficient buildings. Since 1990, he has presented his work at more than 200 conferences in 12 countries. He has researched, built and taught on informal urban design, urban renewal and energy-efficient cities since the early 1990s. He is the editor of the US based Journal of Green Building (2006 – to date) and an advisor to government, city councils and industry in Europe, Asia and Australia. Steffen holds three post-graduate degrees; after graduating in Germany and from the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London (1989), he worked one year with James Stirling in London, and 3 years with Arata Isozaki in Tokyo. Before being appointed to a Professorial Chair in December 2002 in Australia, he ran his own ideas-driven practice in Berlin,
for more than 10 years, where he designed numerous award-winning and energy-efficient buildings. He completed his doctoral research on ‘Modernism and Regionalism’ at the TU-Berlin. Steffen has a particular interest in sustainable strategies for urban regeneration of the post-industrial city. During the 1990s, he was instrumental in the urban redevelopment of Berlin’s city centre and has built small and large-scale buildings in Berlin’s Potsdamer Platz, Hackescher Markt and Pariser Platz (for instance, the French Embassy in partnership with Christian de Portzamparc). In recognition of the international significance of his work, he has been invited as Visiting Professor to lead design studios at leading universities in six countries. He has been a leader in large research projects and is frequently appointed as jury member of design competitions. In 2008, he received a Vice-Chancellor’s Award for Teaching Excellence, the highest award possible for teaching. The prestigious UNESCO Chair in Sustainable Urban Development for Asia and the Pacific is the first UNESCO Chair in the area of Sustainability which was established in the Asia-Pacific region, with the aim to consult governments on sustainable urbanization models to harmonize extreme conditions of rapid urban growth. 57
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CLIMATE-INDUCED CONFLICT RISKS OVER SHARED WATER RESOURCES IN AFRICA By Prof. Dr. Samir Anwar Al-GAMAL
Ecosystems in Africa are currently under threat from a variety of impacts and climate change is likely to be an additional stress.
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he study was designed to inform policymakers and stakeholders about the implications of climate change and the scarcity of water due to climatic and non-climatic factors. This scarcity in shared water
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resources could leads to a dispute over its distribution and use. Consequently, the study is specifically aimed at shedding light of negotiation as a mitigation tool for conflict resolution in water-stressed areas.
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Both historic and scientific data showing the frequent occurrences of a water dispute among African countries are used. Conflict resolution technique to disputing parties is proposed. The results of the analysis suggest that threats to water security are already the primary cause of some of the most intractable conflict in Africa. Salinization of coastal aquifers due to heavy withdrawals of fresh water, pollution of rivers, lakes, and reduction in hydropower
energy as direct conse-quences to climatic changes as well as other abuses of water resources, could lead to extremely serious disputes. The study has also shown that even though technical solutions are now available for solving most of the existing problems related to water resources and other environ-mental issues, the social and political mechanisms for realistically implementing these solutions within the sustainable development paradigm are still unknown. Furthermore, Conflict over the utilization of water resources within a sustainable development paradigm is specially pronounced in the context of transboundary river basin as well as transboundary aquifers that cross international boundaries. Negotiation on water in areas of conflict could be used as a valuable tool to help negotiate policies, treaties and laws that promote sustainable development throughout the basin, and especially with respect to the equitable utilization of water from both quality and quantity viewpoints.
Benue , 4 for Senegal , 6 for Volta and 4 for Comoe. Transboundary increasingly disputed as a result of increased freshwater demand and decreased availability (due to worsening climate conditions)
Clearly, there is inherent conflict between the forces of development, which would prefer continued economic growth, and the group concerned with protecting our natural environment. If disputes arising are not solved using creative negotiations and consensus building, many controversies could eventually lead to warfare.
Observational records and climate projections provide abundant evidence that freshwater resources all over the world and in Africa in particular are vulnerable and have the potential to be strongly impacted by climate change, with wide-ranging consequences for human societies and ecosystems.In global-scale assessments, basins are defined as being water stressed if they have either a per capita water availability below 1,000 m3 per year (based on long-term average runoff) or a ratio of withdrawals to longterm average annual runoff above 0.4. A water volume of 1,000 m3 per capita per year is typically more than it is required for domestic, industrial and agricultural water uses. Such water-stressed basins are located in northern Africa.
Climate change and freshwater demands in Africa Water access and water resource management are highly variable across the continent. In order to shed light on water resources in Africa on â&#x20AC;&#x153;vise-a vise â&#x20AC;&#x153; basis, it should be noted that out of the 261 transboundary river basins in the world that represent surface water resources, 61 are recognized in Africa which cover 62% of Africaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s surface area. In West Africa 25 transboundary rivers basins are shared among 17 African countries of which 11 for Niger-
The 17 countries in West Africa that share 25 transboundary rivers have notably high water interdependency. Eastern and southern African countries are also characterised by water stress brought about by climate variability and wider governance issues. Significant progress has, however, been recorded in some parts of Africa to improve this situation, with urban populations in the southern African region achieving improved water access over recent years. As far as the shared groundwater resources are concerned, 38 Transboundary aquifers are recognized in Africa (UNESCO) within the scope of the present paper case examples from West Africa will only be notably considered.
In water-stressed areas, people and ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to decreasing and more
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variable precipitation due to climate change. As a direct consequence Habitats and ecosystems in Africa are currently under threat from a variety of impacts and climate change is likely to be an additional stress. Higher temperatures and increased variability of precipitation would, in general, lead to increased irrigation water demand, even if the total precipitation during the growing season remains the same. The impact of climate change on optimal growing periods, and on yield-maximising irrigation water use, has been modelled assuming no
change in either irrigated area and/or climate variability.
Difficulties , constrains and limitations related to climatic changes in Africa Low adaptive capacity of African countries, as well as consecutive dry years with widespread disruptions are reducing the ability of the society to cope with droughts by providing less recovery and preparation time between events. Furthermore, Future rainfall patterns are not clear cut but it is likely that over the next 50 years there will be a
decrease in rainfall of 10 to 25 per cent over northern parts of Africa in the months of June, July and August and a 10 to 60 per cent decline in March, April and May. In contrast, western Africa may see an increase in rainfall of 10 to 35 per cent in the December, January and February period which is normally a dry time with an increase also during September, October and November of between seven and 28 per cent. Another difficulty arises from the low distribution density of weather stations which is one per 26,000
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threats to water security are already the primary cause of some of the most intractable conflict in Africa. Salinization of coastal aquifers due to heavy withdrawals of fresh water, pollution of rivers, lakes, and reduction in hydropower energy as direct consequences to climatic changes as well as other abuses of water resources, could lead to extremely serious disputes.
square kmâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;eight times lower than the World Meteorological Organisationâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s minimum recommended level. In addition to the lack of good monitoring of the El Nino Southern Oscillation as it relates to Africa; the onset of the Sahel precipitation and the interaction of Saharan dust with climate.
Case Studies on African water conflicts 1. Cameron versus Nigeria on the Lake Chad Problem definition The flooded area of Chad Lake has
declined drastically as a direct consequence to climatic change from 37,000 Km2 in 1963 to 25,000 in 1973 and then to 2000 Km2 at present. So the total area of the lake was splitted; with only southern part now as perennial Surface water body. Accordingly fishermen from Nigeria shore had to follow the receding lake. A situation which has ended by settling in the Cameroon territory. Eventually, the government of f Nigeria followed its citizens: administration, school, heath facilities, police, military i.e. border dispute Cameroon-Nigeria
(Transboundary Freshwater Dispute Database, 2000).
2-Senegal versus
Mauritania
Problem definition The Senegal River has its main source in the Fouta-Djalon Mountains in Guinea and provides water to the semiarid parts of Mali, Senegal and Mauritania. The basin has a total area of ~483,000 km2 and the river course is 1,800 km long. Mauritania has the largest area of the basin with 50%, followed by Mali with 35%, Senegal with 8%, and Guinea with 7%. Eight severe drought events have occurred during the period from 1970 to 1980. The whole area has suffered from chronic rainfall deficits particularly from 1986 to 1988 where in September 1988, the traditional transboundary land use practices constitute a dispute and it was the beginning of real crisis and the consequent loss of lives in both countries. Eventually 75,000 Senegalese & 150,000 Mauritanians 61
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F. 1 Water level in Akosombo Lake (Niasse,2007)
In water-stressed areas, people and ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to decreasing and more variable precipitation due to climate change.
F. 2 Annual discharge of Niger River at Niamey
repatriated. In June 2000 new tension under the same reasons has occurred (Transboundary Freshwater Dispute Database, 2000)
3- Ghana. Versus Burkina Faso (1998) Problem definition White Volta & Black Volta contribute to 56% of inflows into Akosombo Reservoir of Akosombo & Kpong Dams which produce more than 90% of Ghanaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s electricity. Consequently any decline in rainfall will be expressed directly on the decline in water level in Akosombo Reservoir. This situation will be impacted directly on energy production in Ghana, provided that total storage capacity of all Burkina Faso reservoir is about 1.49 billions m3 which constitutes less than 5% of the Volume of the Akosombo Reservoir (Fig.1). So Burkina Faso can not be blamed for any decline in the reservoir producing hydroelectricity for Ghana ( Niasse) . 62
4-Niger versus Nigeria on
the Niger River Basin Problem definition
The Niger River basin, located in western Africa, covers 7.5% of the continent and spreads over ten countries (Fig.2). The area of the Niger River basin in Guinea is only 4% of the total area of the basin, but the sources of the Niger River are located in this country. The quantity of water entering Mali from Guinea (40 km3/yr) is greater than the quantity of water entering Nigeria from Niger (36 km3/yr), about 1800 hen further downstream (IUCN-IWMIRamsar-WRI). This is due among other reasons to the enormous reduction in runoff in the inner delta in Mali through seepage and evaporation combined with almost no runoff from the whole of the left bank in Mali and Niger. According to Nigerian point of view more than 10% of increased withdrawal compared to current situation is considered not accep-
table. Eventually, risks of water conflict could be due to blaming upstream countries for what would be due to climatic change.
5-Eastern Africa (IGAD REGION) Problem definition More than 70% of the population of Eastern Africa is rural and practices subsistence agriculture. Rapid population growth and increasing demand for food, combined with the high variability in rainfall and frequent droughts, are putting growing pressure on natural resources. Analyses of current economic and environmental trends reveal increasing competition over access and use of freshwater resources, at the same time that population growth, industrialisation and climate change are adding stress to these resources. There is also competition for ac-cess to water resources between countries, some of which depend on fresh water not only for domestic, agricultural
Global Warning and industrial consump-tion but also for hydropower generation. Freshwater availability and access are thus priority issues for the entire region. The major river basins in Eastern Africa that are internationally shared include: Rufiji, Juba, Victoria/Upper Nile, Turkana and Shaballe. Eastern Africa has experienced at least one major drought each decade over the past 30 years. There were serious droughts in 1973/74, 1984/85, 1987, 1992/94, and in 1999/2000. There is evidence of increasing climatic instability in the region in terms of increasing frequency and intensity of drought. Eastern Africa is fairly well endowed with fresh water, with a total average renewable amount of 187 km3/yr. Uganda has the largest share of this, with 39 km3/yr (1,791 m3/capita/yr) while Eritrea has the smallest, with 2.8 km3/yr (data on per capita resources are not available; UNDP et al, 2000).
References: Ashton, P. J. 2002. Avoiding Conflicts over Africa’s Water Resources, Ambio, Vol. 31, No. 3, 236-242.
Ashton, P. J. and Ramasar, V. 2002. Water and HIV/AIDS: Some strategic considerations in Southern Africa.In: (Turton, A. R. & Henwood, R. eds.) Hydropolitics in the Developing World: A Southern African. Döll, P. (2002) Impact of climate change and variability on irrigation requirements: a global perspective. Climatic Change ,54(3), 269–293.
Döll, P. & Hauschild, M. (2002) Model-based regional assessment of water use: an example for Northeastern Brazil.Water Int. 27(3), 310–320.
Gibb, A. and Partners 1987. Etude de la gestion des ouvrages communs
de l’OMVS. Rapports phase 1, Volume1B, Optimisation de la crue artificielle. Electricité de France Euroconsult.
FAOSTAT 2000: AQUASTAT Database: FAO, Rome. IUCN, IWMI, Ramsar and WRI, 2003. Water Resources eAtlas: Watersheds of the World_CD.World Resource Institute. Le Barbe, L. T., and Tapsoba D. ,(2002), Rainfall variability in West Africa during the years 1950-90. Journal of Climate vol. 15 pp.187-202.
Nachtnebel,H.P.(1990):Comparison of Hydropower utilization and
environmental impacts along the Danube downstream of Vienna.ingenieurs et architectes Suisse,No,18,412-415.
Niasse, M.,(2007), Climate-Induced Conflict Risks over Shared Waters in West Africa, The Third International Conference on Climate and Water 3-6 September 2007, Helsinki, Finland Perspective Pretoria: African Water Issues Research Unit (AWIRU), 217-235. UNDP, UNEP, World Bank and WRI 2000. World Resources 2000-2001: People and Ecosystems: The Fraying Web of Life. World Resources Institute, Washington D.C. Ramsar sites: List of Wetlands of International Importance, http://www.ramsar.org/ Transboundary Freshwater Dispute Database, 2000: Facing the Fact; Assessing the Vulnerability of Africa’s Water Resources to Environmental Change ,UNESCO/UNEP Publications. UNESCO, WWAP.2006.The 2nd United Nations World Water Development Report: 'Water, a shared responsibility' Vlachos,E.(1996):Hydro diplomacy and dispute resolution in private water resources conflicts. In; Tran boundary water resources Eds: Nato Asi Series 2, Vol.7,Springer Verlag, Berlin, Deutschland. WHO/UNICEF 2000. Global Water Supply and Sanitation Assessment 2000 Report. World Heath Organisation, Geneva. 63
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Subsequently we assume a hypothetical case study derived from a real world problem (Nachtnebel) by modifying a purely Austrian conflict about hydropower utilization into an international dispute. This case study is a good and typical example for the upper section of the Danube. However its replication to cases in Africa could be of paramount nature It is assumed that:
Conflict resolution techniques Theoritically, collaboration for addressing a wide range of environmental disputes involves three phases:
Problem definition or problem architecture. Direction setting (predominantly negotiations over substantive problems). Implementation (systematic management of inter-organiza-tional relations and monitoring of agreements). Some countries adopted environmental standards from the EU while others modified their existing guidelines for assessment and impact studies.
The country act rationally; There is complete information about the system
There exist an agreed set of alternatives; There is full communication among the partners involved; The countries may have different objectives and criteria; They have different preferences; The projectâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s impacts are different in each country
Conclusions and recommendations Case examples from Africa show that risks of water conflicts are real. Lessons learned from the foregoing
water-conflicts have shown that, though high water interdependency can be opportunities for promoting international cooperation, they can also be causes for aggravated conflict risks, especially where the following factors are combined in a lumped parameters approach
1 2
Decreased water demand to respond to growing development needs.
3 4
Large water infra-structure projects planned in isolation by individual riparian countries.
Decreased water availability as a direct consequence to climatic change and climatic variability.
Weak coordination that result in conflict prevention accompanied by the absence of resolution mechanisms. Eventually, it is recommended to recognize the impact of climate on water resources on ad.hoc basis in order to reduce risks of climateinducing water conflict.
A brief autobiographical note about the main author
Prof.Dr./Samir Anwar Al-Gamal Professor of Environmental Hydrology Advisor in water resources Sahara and Sahel Observatory (OSS),Tunisia Boulevard du Leader Yasser Arafat, PB-31,Tunis-1080 E-mail address :samir.algamal@yahoo.com Cell phone:(00216)21708526 / Fax ( 00216)71.206.636
Prof.Samir Al-Gamal is a university professor in Environmental Hydrology. He has been seconded to the International Organization known as Sahara and Sahel Observatory (OSS) as an advisor in water resources since August 2006.Before joining OSS he was the chairman of Siting and Environment Dept. in Egyptian Atomic Energy Authority and Professor of Fluid Mechanics and Isotope Hydrology in MUST University and visiting professor. to Stockholm University Department of Physical Geography. He has published more than 40 different articles in recognized journals such Journal of Acta Mineralogica (Belgium), Journal of Theoretical Climatology (Sweden), Journal of Hydrology(Netherland),Journal of Environmental Hydrology(USA), Turkish Journal of Environmental Engineering (Turkey) and Journal of Nuclear Sciences (Egypt) most of which center most widely around the use of Isotope Hydrology Techniques in assessing water resources. 64
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AFRICA: PROTECTING WATERSHEDS SAVES BILLIONS Healthy river systems are essential to maintain the livelihoods of local communities. The objectives of sustainable development can only be achieved if nature continues to provide freshwater that everyone needs,” David Sheppard
P
rotecting watersheds provides many of the world’s megacities with freshwater – and saves billions of dollars. This is the result of a new compilation of case studies by IUCN, published ahead of the World Water Forum.
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“Many of the world’s big cities have understood that protecting their catchment areas makes economic sense. Rather than chopping down the forests or draining their marshlands, they are keeping them healthy and saving billions of dollars by not having to
Water About IUCN IUCN, the International Union for Conservation of Nature, helps the world find pragmatic solutions to our most pressing environment and development challenges by supporting scientific research; managing field projects all over the world; and bringing governments, NGOs, the UN, international conventions and companies together to develop policy, laws and best practice. The world's oldest and largest global environmetal network, IUCN is a democratic membership union with more than 1,000 government and NGO member organizations, and almost 11,000 volunteer scientists and experts in some 160 countries. IUCN's work is supported by over 1,000 professional staff in 60 offices and hundreds of partners in public, NGO and private sectors around the world. IUCN's headquarters are located in Gland, near Geneva, in Switzerland.
pay for costly infrastructure to store water, clean it or bring it from elsewhere,” says Mark Smith (Head of IUCN’s Water Programme). The Indonesian capital Jakarta gets its freshwater for free from some 60 rivers originating in the nearby Gunung Gede Pangrango National Park. The water is worth an estimated US$1.5 billion. The Venezuelan capital Caracas relies on the rivers from Guatopo and Macarao National Parks for its freshwater provision. Today, those rivers continue to supply a constant flow of freshwater to the city’s 5 million inhabitants, consuming some 17 thousand litres of water per second. Protecting freshwater sources also benefits nature. In and around South Africa’s Kruger National Park, better river management has helped improve water provision for
some local rural communities – whilst at the same time preventing loss of aquatic life in the park. “Kruger’s main five rivers have suffered from pollution and unsustainable water use upstream which led to some of them drying up completely. After implementing a large river-related programme with the agriculture, forestry and mining industries, we have seen an improvement in flows. Previously disappeared species have recolonised, and fewer unnatural fish kills have occurred,” says Harry Biggs, (Programme Integrator at South African National Parks and leader of IUCN’s World Commission on Protected Areas Freshwater Task Force). During drier times, expensive arrangements like water transfers
and trucking of water had to be made to meet basic needs of some rural communities living along rivers near the park, when they could no longer, as in the past, access water from rivers. For some of these communities, cleaner and more water is now available. The study by the IUCN Species Programme, in collaboration with the South African Institute for Aquatic Biodiversity and the South African National Biodiversity Institute, shows that seven percent of species are known to be regionally threatened or extinct. But this figure will skyrocket unless freshwater species conservation is considered in development planning. These species provide food for local people and some of them, such as the mollucs, help purify the drinking water. The study shows that while 77 percent Í 67
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SOUTHERN AFRICA’S FRESHWATER SPECIES IN FIRING LINE Many freshwater fish, crabs, dragonflies, molluscs and aquatic plants are at risk of extinction in Southern Africa if its rivers and lakes are not protected from developers.
Zambezi meets the Kwando and Chobe rivers above Victoria Falls, the Komati and Crocodile river tributaries of the Incomati system in Mpumalanga, South Africa, and the Mbuluzi river basin, also in Mpumalanga, South Africa, and in Swaziland. Many of southern Africa’s coastal drainages have sites which contain species that only occur in that area, including the Kunene and Kwanza rivers on the west coast of Angola, and the Rovuma and Pungwe and Buzi systems on the east coast of Mozambique.
Í
of species are not threatened with extinction, there is not enough information for the remaining 16 percent to determine their threat status. “Here at the World Water Forum the trend is to think about water supply in terms of irrigation, hydropower and drinking water,” says William Darwall (Manager of IUCN’s Freshwater Biodiversity Unit). "People tend to forget about the species that live in the water but we can no longer afford to do this. We want developers to use the information on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species to work out how they can minimize the impact on freshwater species when they develop water resources.” The results from the assessment of 1,279 freshwater species in Southern
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Africa show that the more developed a country is, the more species are threatened with extinction. Of the 94 species threatened in southern Africa, 78 of these are found in South Africa, the most developed country in the region. “We are in a unique position in Africa to avoid an extinction disaster,” says Julia Marton-Lefèvre (IUCN Director General). “Most developers have not taken freshwater species into consideration because they simply don’t have the information they need. We hope this study will change that and show that Africa’s water resources can be developed without causing thousands of extinctions.”
According to Marc Smith: “To really save these species we must protect the rivers and lakes by looking at river basins as a whole, we can’t just look at the parts that interest us economically or as natural areas. For our plans to work, we must manage them together, using all the tools we have to meet the needs of people and nature for water.” The results of this report will be combined with similar studies currently being conducted in the rest of Africa. Case studies will be used to develop a series of Good Practice Guidelines to help developers and governments take freshwater species into consideration when planning water projects in Africa.
For additional information: David Sheppard : Head of IUCN’s
Three hotspots of species diversity have been highlighted in the report, including the area where the upper
Programme on Managing Ecosystems for Human Well-Being | East and Southern Africa
www.iucn.org
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By Alya KEBIRI
EGYPT Water pricing; a viable solution for Egyptâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s water crisis?
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the responsibility of managing water: in order for water to be managed effectively its economic value must be treated as mutually exclusive with its non-economic human value.
It is now a widely accepted view that water is an economic good and, therefore, must have a value assigned to it; while that might sound like a platitude it was not a stated view until 1992, when it was articulated in the fourth principle of the "Dublin Statement" at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), in Rio de Janeiro.But the Dublin Statement tempered this principle with a caveat about
Like all goods, therefore, water must have an economic price assigned to it but that price must also reflect its human value. Water pricing, the topic of this article, is the policy of assigning value to water in order to manage its demand and, by extension, its supply. This article aims at analyzing how the policy of water pricing can be effectively implemented as a solution for Egypt. Focus will be on the economic benefits of water pricing, and recent water pricing policies in Egypt and the obstacles it faces; it then presents an analysis of the Algerian experience in implementing water pricing and gleans the lessons learned for Egypt.
he challenges policymakers face in managing the supply and demand of water in a developing country, where water is scarce, are enormous. There are not only massive human and health costs to pay for in the mismanagement of water, but the implementation of any successful management program requires public consensus and acceptance of the inherent social and economic rights people have to water.
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Water several elements, such as flat tariffs, block tariffs, subsidies, and volumetric pricing through metering. In their article -"Water is an economic good: How to use prices to promote equity, efficiency, and sustainability"- Rogers et al rightly argue that tariffs and prices rarely reflect the true "full-cost" of water, which they are in favor of implementing as a policy. "Full-cost" pricing includes three important concepts of water economic: cost, value, and price. Cost includes operating and management costs, capital costs, and other economic costs. Value is the benefit of the good to users, both in direct and indirect values. Price is the amount that the political and social systems assign to water to ensure equity and efficiency. Full-cost water pricing is the sum of these three concepts. These policies are discussed in further detail in the context of Egypt's recent water pricing program and the case study on Algeria which is discussed below.
Economic Effects of Pricing Policy There are three well known economic effects of pricing policy. The first is that it reduces demand for water - when users have to pay for their consumption, they do not consume more than they need to. This initiates behavioral change that encourages conservation and changes consumption habits. The second effect, a direct result of a reduction in demand, is that it increases the supply of water - users have an economic incentive to reduce water use and water loss. The third effect is an efficient, market-driven reallocation of water across sectors household, agricultural, and industrial; the reallocation occurs as a result of higher prices which make waste expensive and encourage more responsible distribution, thereby removing from the system any inefficiencies. The total cost of water, for consumers or industry, is usually comprised of
Although many people at the 1992 UNCED seemed to agree that water should be treated like an economic good, it was unclear what the implications were, and as a result the Dublin statement came with a number of disclaimers, among them that water is also a "social" good and should be kept available to the poor. What this ultimately meant was that water should be supplied to the poor through government subsidies, and sold to urban households and industry at economic value, which may exceed production costs, for demand management purposes; the revenue funds the subsidies However, while subsidies have long been used in development to promote growth, there is growing recognition among water policy scholars that subsidies and crosssubsidies (when revenues from profitable enterprises the poor) are not the best means to achieve
economic or social goals. This is especially true when these support measures are used to prop-up ailing industries that invariably contribute to significant environmental damage. General reduction in water prices shields all consumers from important economic and environmental signals. The question of what price to assign to users is particularly relevant to developing countries like Egypt, where many households, removed from centralized water distribution, are not accustomed to paying for water and could not afford sudden price hikes. These communities are also the most vulnerable to water shortages, due to droughts or sanitation.
Egypt's History with Water Pricing Egypt's history with water pricing is an illustrative example of what happens when prices are assigned to water based solely on its economic cost, without also taking into account its domestic or local human cost. The Egyptian government is in the process of liberalizing its water sector through a recent privatization program that removes government control - and operational and bureaucratic inefficiencies. In May 2004, President Mubarak announced the privatization of all the water management and purification services in each governorate. As a result, drinking water management authorities of each governorate are now part of one big enterprise centralized in Cairo: a Holding Company for water and purification. The Holding Company is a public property with a private sector mandate: they are subject to the laws of private sector companies, do not receive any government subsidies, and must efficiently deliver their product, water, to a wide customer base. The Holding also has to cover a deficit estimated Ă? 71
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to financing such an overhaul. In response to the intensity of the protests, the increase in prices was partially adjourned. In fact, the modalities of payment have been changed and lower prices were set for people living in poor areas. The government justified this increase in prices by its willingness to open the market to privatize this sector. The public justification was, unfortunately, less apparent in the short term, as people who could once afford water all of a sudden could not.
There are many different ways to promote equity, efficiency and sustainability in the water sector and water pricing is probably the simplest conceptually, but maybe the most difficult to implement politically.
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However, it is obvious that the Holding's status remains unclear in part because of the important role the government still plays in decision making. Furthermore, the companies affiliated to the Holding Company have not changed much from their previous incarnations. Also, it is surprising to see how these decrees have managed to increase the centralization of the power by concentrating it in Cairo. Indeed, before the decentralization policy, the different governorates had their own management authorities that made them partially autonomous.
at L.E. 14 billions. Its water management mission is to purify, desalinize, transport and distribute drinking water, and to collect, treat and safely get rid of sewage. According to the first decree declared by President Mubarak in May 2004, the Holding's capital will be determined by the sum of capitals from each of the companies formerly operating independently and now operating as one. Moreover, the General Assembly and the Board of Directors will be formed according to the private sector's rules but will have to include a representative from the Ministry of Finance. In parallel, a Regulatory Agency for Water and Waste and a Customer Protection Agency has been created in order to evaluate and determine water pricing. The agency's budget will be determined by the government.
meter. According to experts and economists, this price remains too low to cover costs, maintain the integrity and quality of water infrastructure, and invest in upgrades. Still, a lot of Egyptians are opposed to the increase in water prices. In November 2004, prices were increased from 12 to 23 piasters per cubic meter; the increase saw a strong reaction from the public including riots and people not paying their bills. Once the bills started arriving, the angry reactions intensified.... In Matariya, more than 500 people demonstrated in front of the district headquarters, refusing to pay their bills. One family was shocked at the LE100 they were being asked to cough up....In Al-Wayli and Al-Zawya Al-Hamra, angry residents chased bill collectors down the streets.
There are many different ways to promote equity, efficiency and sustainability in the water sector and water pricing is probably the simplest conceptually, but maybe the most difficult to implement politically. There are two main politicaleconomic questions governments must face when adopting water pricing policies: how to implement new prices and how high to raise them. The political risks of water policy rise in direct proportion to the level of government involvement required, which is almost universally very high.
Yet, just like a private company, the Holding's aim is to create profits. The cost of production of water is around 60-65 piasters per cubic meter. Water is currently sold at less than 23 piasters per cubic
Most Egyptians have not taken a principled stance against water pricing; they simply do not have the means to get by with it as a policy. While the advantages to Egypt are great, the lower classes rightly object
Governments cannot introduce water pricing too quickly. It is important that the water pricing program transfers the responsibility of managing the utility over to users incrementally or gradually,
Water thereby giving them a stake in the investment of the operation.
Algeria's Experience Algeria's experience managing their water supply in the 1970s represents a good case study and cautionary tale in implementing ambitious water schemes requiring high levels of involvement from the government and the abrupt removal of subsidies. Algeria's experience shows that neither policy works well on their own, but when coupled together they fare even worse. In the 1970s, the government of Algeria founded the National Water Distribution Company (NWDC) and gave it the responsibility of distributing the country's water. The decision to consolidate this responsibility in one company was designed to remove many of the enterprises that were controlling the water supply, from government agencies, local utilities, and private sector companies. Since many of those companies were not financially sound or did not have the knowledge to operate a water infrastructure, the NWDC was founded to replace them all. The company was expected to operate without state subsidies and recover their costs from water users.
The company operated for 13 years but did not ultimately succeed for several reasons. The first problem was that the full-cost prices remained too low for the NWDC to have any meaningful financial autonomy. As a result, localities could successfully undermine and challenge the NWDC since they were the ones who had traditionally managed the water supply anyway. As a result, responsibilities were divided into two: the localities would distribute the water and the NWDC would handle the supply. Algeria did not design and implement a more nuanced and effective water pricing policy until the early 1980s. Until then, not only did water prices not reflect the full-cost of water, they did not distinguish between the cost of production and the cost of distribution; that lack of accounting made cost recovery nearly impos-sible. The Algerian government applied the lessons of their past in the form of their 1985 Water Code, which distinguished between four types of users (domestic, industry, services, tourism) and sub-categorized domestic users into four separate tariff blocks based on consumption. While these are positive steps and relatively impressive policy achieve-
ments, Algeria still faces obstacles unique to their land. Operating costs, for example, are very high since Algeria is largely dependent on surface water supply which requires high investments in infrastructure such as dams, transportation facilities, and treatment plants. The major challenge is that tariffs have not, and could not, rise as fast as operating costs. Users simply could not pay. In the 1990s, as Algeria began liberalizing its economy, the government began implementing more progressive reforms to its water pricing policies, including allowing more private sector and NGO participation, drawing finer distinction in the application of its tariffs (for example, implementing them by region based on where operating costs are more expensive), and, in 1995, reinstating the NWDC to manage Algeria's subsidy program. The experiences of Algeria teach other developing countries several lessons: to be bold yet pragmatic in reforming stagnant water pricing policies; to account for, if not implement "full-cost" water pricing; and to remain flexible, politically and economically - the Algerians, after all, did not begin to see real reform in their water economy until the rest Ă?
The water management mission is to purify, desalinize, transport and distribute drinking water, and to collect, treat and safely get rid of sewage.
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The water management mission is to purify, desalinize, transport and distribute drinking water, and to collect, treat and safely get rid of sewage.
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of their economy moved forward in tandem. For emerging markets, where certain sectors lag behind others, that lesson is especially relevant.
Implementation of Water Pricing One of the most salient points that consistently emerged in the research is that for water pricing to be effective its implementation must be localized; there are few universal rules that dictate how much the utility should charge or to what degree subsidies should be applied. As mentioned previously, the Egyptian water Holding is currently unable to cover its expenses due to low prices on drinking water. This is the case in many developing countries where the community relies on the municipal budget to bear the deficit of the utility. This results on one hand, in diminishing strategic financial resources (environment, health, education, for instance) needed for developmental purposes; or on the other hand results in the progressive degradation of the water system and services over time. Some argue that public subsidies raise the cost of the service in the long term by 74
increasing users' long term reliance on the service's low cost; when subsidies aren't targeted they provide no incentives, only "free rides." A sound tariff system in one that delivers services while improving the service's quality, and makes efficient use of scare resources. In many poor communities the best way to do this is by showing users the cost of water and the price they pay by not conserving it. Also, the workshop revealed that misguided subsidies benefit the rich more than the poor - the exact opposite of its intentions. Tariffs are needed to promote water conservation but they also exist to promote conservation and increase the poor's supply to water. Subsidies cannot succeed in an economic or political vacuum. The role water plays in society is such that removing or limiting people's access to it, even minutely, can severely alter even the most stable civic balances; in developing countries such as Egypt and Algeria, where the balance is even more delicate, people see water as a humanitarian right and will not take gently any threats to
its removal. One source of the problem is that opinion in those governments is often crystallized in a vacuum, with scant attention seeming to be paid to how inextricable the problem is - subsidies are necessary, but can also be an unnecessary crutch; people must pay for water, yet no government has the legal or moral authority to deny it to its citizens; people must reduce their demand for water, but are not incentivized to do so unless they are forced to pay for excessive use. Though as a policy tool water pricing has several goals, -to manage water demand, conserve supply, recover operating costs- those goals reflect a singleness of purpose: to get the greatest possible value from the economic good. That is, however, an incomplete definition when the good is a vital human need such as water, and one whose supply cannot be left to market forces alone. The goal of pricing policy is to find a balance in which the true cost of water economic, social, and humanitarianis reflected in its price and the resource is then put to its most valuable use.
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By Christopher BOYES
WASTE NOT, WANT NOT Simply burning waste in an incinerator is far from desirable, unless the process involves generating or extracting energy.
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he modern consumer lifestyle enjoyed in the majority of developed nations is the cause of a huge worldwide waste problem. The consumption habits of the developed nations have led to the exhaustion of landfill capacities in a number of countries and the consequential exporting of refuse to less developed nations. The result of this is often a devastating impact on the environment, delicate ecosystems, and local cultures. In India the amount of waste generated per capita is estimated to increase at a rate of up to 1,5% annually, according to this forecast it can be estimated that within the next forty years the country will generate over 260 million tons of refuse per year.
from desirable, unless the process involves generating or extracting energy.
Recycling, volume reduction and waste-to-energy Recycling can take many forms, one of the most interesting is a process known as Mechanical Biological Treatment (MBT). In the United Kingdom, where it is estimated that twice as much waste is sent to landfills than in Germany which has a bigger population, the waste management company Shanks uses MBT technology developed in Italy. The process involves using bugs which are present in waste to absorb moisture; the end result is that the original weight of the treated waste is reduced by almost a quarter. What remains then has the metals extracted from it followed by elements such as glass, ceramics and stone, all of which can be recycled.
If this waste is not dealt with in a systematic fashion then in excess of 1400sq. km of terrain will be required for landfills. Dealing with internal waste will be a massive challenge in itself therefore The consumption habits local authorities cannot afford to add to of the developed nations the problem by allowing other nations to send their waste for disposal in India. have led to the exhaustion Solutions need to be found rapidly to the problem of ever increasing volumes of waste, the challenge is not localised to the more developed nations but is a global issue. Incorrectly managed landfills may be considered a local problem, however, the burning of refuse and the poisoning of groundwater create problems that are of international relevance. The dependence on landfills can be addressed in a number of ways, including burning waste and recycling. Simply burning waste in an incinerator is far 76
of landfill capacities
In one specific case, a contract awarded to Shanks for the handling of 500,000 tons of waste produced in east London every year, the objective was to reduce the amount sent to landfills from 97% to 30%. Similar results are critical to achieving the targets set by the British Government for the amount of household waste local authorities can send to landfills. Limits have been set whereby local councils have to reduce the amount of biodegradable waste dumped in the ground to 75% of the 1995 total by 2010, then down to 50% by 2013, and to 35% by 2020. Far more than in the United States of America waste-to-energy technologies
Waste Management have been implemented in Europe and Asia. Considerable investments have been made in technologies capable of reducing waste volume in an environmentally-friendly manner that generates energy and reduces greenhouse gas emissions.
Physico-chemical conversion involves a series of processes aimed at improving the properties of solid waste. The combustible elements of the waste are converted into highenergy fuel pellets.
Landfill gas Several European countries have adopted waste-to-energy as the preferred method of waste disposal, indeed legislation has been introduced by the European Union aimed at limiting the amount of biodegradable waste that can be sent to landfills.
Where landfill sites are still the preferred option there are a number of ways in which alternative energy companies are transforming waste into energy. The potential for further development is of interest to a number of investors.
to fossil fuels such as coal. Waste Management calculates that the collection and use of landfill gas provides the equivalent of 470 megawatts of energy, enough to satisfy the power requirements of over 400,000 homes, and offsets the requirement for over 2 million tons of coal per year. As such landfill gas is considered a natural resource that provides clean energy and is a vital part of the United States’ attempt to develop sources of environmentally sustainable alternative energy.
According to figures released by the Confederation of European Wasteto-Energy Plants (CEWEP) over 50 million tons of waste are treated in European waste-to-energy plants each year. The technologies used are capable of generating energy that is sufficient to supply the electricity requirements of over 25 million people.
Waste-to-energy technologies at a glance Although there are a number of technologies available for the process of transforming organic waste into energy there are three main paths that can be followed; thermochemical, biochemical and physicochemical. Thermochemical conversion is the process of reducing waste volume and neutralizing the harmful elements within it. Heat recovered from the combustion process can be used to power turbines for electricity generation or provide heating. Biochemical conversion is preferred for wastes that contain a high percentage of biodegradable matter. Organic waste is broken down via anaerobic digestion and composted in controlled, oxygen-free conditions resulting in the production of biogas used in the production of electricity and heat.
The World is facing a huge waste problem which has a devastating impact on the environment.
One example of harnessing the energy potential of landfill sites is the American company Waste Management’s operations. The company runs nearly 300 sites and handles the disposal of millions of tons of waste per year. The sites provide a vast supply of a natural, renewable energy source; methane. This product, commonly known as landfill gas, is created through the decomposition of waste in landfills and can be collected and used to fuel turbine driven electricity generators. Albeit the product of an undesirable landfill the gas is a reliable and economic form of energy that is an environmentally sound alternative
An excellent example of harnessing the potential of waste is the decision by IT giant Dell to use green power supplied by Waste Management. Around 40% of the power required by Dell’s global headquarters comes from a nearby landfill gas-to-energy plant, in order to respect the commitment to becoming carbon neutral Dell buys corporate headquarters’ remaining power requirements from local wind farms. The next step is for the more developed nations to export wasteto-energy technology to developing countries rather than simply sending their waste. 77
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The Eco-conscious packaging unveals out of the box installations and recycled art objects.
PROMOTING THE ECO-PRINT ATTITUDE! Beirut based Print Expert and Paris based Packaging Expert meet in the Design Pack Museum in Paris, to discuss the Eco-Pack Attitude. 78
Waste Management
“Stella” Collar ni beer bottle tongues
Water Bottle Lamp Recycled Cola Bags
“Capsules”, hand-made soft drink can tongue bag.
The Design Pack Museum, Paris, France.
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he Design Pack Museum was founded by Fabrice Peltier, Managing Director of P’References (a design packaging studio in Paris), in September 2008. Its opening Exhibition focused on international Water packaging. The second show focused on the historical and modern relationship between Art and packaging. The third, currently showing, is focused on Eco-Packaging, and showcases a variety of recycled packages and art objects imported from different parts of the world (Europe, Latin America, Africa, Asia, to name a few). Every object displayed at The Design Pack is recycled. What used to be a beer can is now a bracelet or a penholder, what used to be a bottle is now a coat holder, and what used to be a cigarette is now a beautiful necklace.
The Design Pack Museum received a newly released book in its store and private collection. Published by Rotovision, this publication is entitled “Print and Production Finishes for Sustainable Design” and portrays a selection of innovative and eco-friendly print works by world leaders in the field, and works as a platform and source of inspiration to graphic designrs, printers, packaging designers and a wide audience of people interested in adopting eco-friendly directions to promote their products, services and companies. On page 94-95, features the work of Award-winning eco-friendly printer, Raidy Printing Group, with whom the pages of W.E. magazine are meticulously designed and printed. MarieJoe J. Raidy, Graphic Print Expert for
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“Ecodesign, chemins vertueux”, by Fabrice Peltier, a book published with the current exhibition on the Eco-Pack Attitude.
“Print and Production Finishes for Sustainable Design”, an indispensable ideas sourcebook and practical guide to what has become an important consideration for many designers: sustainability. Printing innovations and specialized printing techniques using environmentally friendly ingredients are included.
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Raidy Printing Group and print production professor for Saint Joseph University, adopts the Eco-Print Attitude. In her office, you first notice that what used to be a car is now a candy case and pen holder and what used to be a water bottle is now a coat rack. In April 2009, she meets with Mr. Peltier, to
discuss the Eco-Print Attitude. “There are numeral ways to be ecofriendly, from the moment we awake to every decision we make. Many consumers are under the impression that the only way to be eco-friendly is to use recycled paper, when there are many more ways to that.”
Raidy highlights some of the many ways to adopt the eco-print attitude, from the layout size used, to the paper ordered, to the inks chosen, to the print techniques adopted. On Monday April 20, 2009, Fabrice Peltier gives a lecture on the ecopack attitude. From books to magazines and catalogues, adults and even children today are more informed, more aware and more concerned with the world environment. Statistics made in Europe show that in 2003, less than 15% of the population was ecoconscious. In 2005, numbers increased to 19%. In 2006, they almost doubled with 32% of eco-active consumers concerned with their current health and the future generations (from bio products, to eco-friendly packaging). Statistics made in France in 2006 showed that each citizen throws about 86 kgs of packaging waste yearly, which equates to 235 gs daily (or 4 to 6 packages). However small, this waste takes up volume space (35% of the waste volume, and 25% of the actual weight of waste). Today, more than 55% of this waste is recycled in Europe. With enough indivisual effort and marketing strategies, these numbers can increase worldwide to ideally reach the zero waste target. Help the world spread the message. Reuse, Reduce, Recycle! Preserve, Optimize your waste, Sort your Trash, Avoid using plastic bags. Make sure your purchases go around recyclable products. Adopt the Eco-Print Attitude today, for a better tomorrow.
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By Mai SAMAHA
THE GREENHOUSE If you think guerilla gastronomy is a load of old rubbish – then wait‘til you see what’s been dumped in Melbourne’s Federation Square.
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he Greenhouse by Joost is an Australian first in sustainable design and innovation. Built entirely from recycled and recyclable materials this pop-up event venue is completely self sustained and is made entirely from detritus. 'The Greenhouse' came as an artistic and intrinsic response to waste in the events industry, challenging the current vernacular on minimizing our impact on the planet, whilst dishing up degustation fare (in part dug from the garden of its own roof-top space) and operating as a unique gallery, café and bar. The imperative of this ‘waste of space project’ is to show how simply trash turns into treasure with minimal cost to the pocket and at no cost to the planet setting example to a city on how simple and straightforward sustainability
The Greenhouse' came as an artistic and intrinsic response to waste in the events industry ... and operating as a unique gallery, café and bar.
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practice can be if each individual gives a thought to the life-cycle of the things they consume. Born into a dynasty of Dutch flower growers, Joost is a discipline-crossing creative who constantly draws on his ‘horti-culture’ to make artful commentary on the world’s wasteful way. Joost was pushed by event entrepreneur, Corina Baldwin of ‘bigger than ten bears’, his co-collaborator on some of Melbourne’s most memorable events, to take up the opportunity of a three month tenure at Federation Square to dial up the ‘waste’ principles on which his own home is built in one of Melbourne’s prominent public spaces. Extrapolating the experiment of his own home, an extraordinary pot-plant veiled structure made from
Waste Management straw bales and furnished entirely and exclusively with the discard from and with other’s waste, Joost decided to take the opportunity to project its possibilities into a more commercial structure in a dense city environment. Conceiving a building made from straw bales - one of the world’s biggest and most problematic waste products set into a 100% recyclable steel framework (uncoiled and cut on site), he envisaged a ‘Greenhouse’ that whilst serving as a platform for Spring to Summer exhibition that would serve to instruct a city on how simple and straightforward sustainability practice can be if each individual gives a thought to the life - cycle of the things they consume. And so it began, The Greenhouse was literally dumped and built within 14 days in one of Melbourne's most prestigious cultural locations', Federation Square. As the structure had not been built before, the best one could describe and illustrate the project is by illustrating the materials, methods and contributors to the project – the recycling guy, the compost man, the builders, the raw ingredients, the food, straw bails, steel, the furniture, the fittings… Hundreds of hay-bales were set into a steel-structure rollformed on site, one truck delivering a machine capable of making all parts as opposed to the eight trucks required to move the factory made equivalents. Enlisting the material donation and promise of voluntary labour from all manner of like-minded industry and individuals, Joost took his Waste of a Space idea – with its floors of deconstructed
shipping crates, feature wall of wild strawberries planted in old plastic palettes, tables fabricated from redundant fire hydrants, beverages served in re-cycled glassware (jam-jars), chairs of re-structured street signs and shadecloths woven from tiles discarded by the Melbourne Cricket Club and ‘de-registered’ shopping trolleys – to officials at Melbourne City Council and expected the bureaucracy to baulk at the precedent. Now the Question was “Who’s going to rubber-stamp a roof-top garden in Fed Square complete with compositing vats, a burgeoning vegetable patch, rows of bay trees in recycled CHEP bins and buzzing-alive bee-hives?” But the director of design and urban environment at the City of Melbourne, Professor Rob Adams instantly saw in The Greenhouse a small salve to the heat island effect and an accessible, artful opportunity to make the public think about how technology, processes and materials are impacting on the planet and how they might make a difference. So the red-tape was cut through and planning went underway for its imminent launch. The Greenhouse by Joost will instantly deconstruct leaving not a single trace of waste. Plans are afoot in the very near future to take The Greenhouse to Milan for the Trienalle.
www.greenhousebyjoost.com
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Forests cover 12% of the planet and nearly all are inhabited. Many of the peoples who live in and have customary rights to their forests have developed ways of life and traditional knowledge that are attuned to their forest environments. Yet forest policies commonly treat forests as empty lands controlled by the State and available for 'development' - colonisation, logging, plantations, dams, mines, oil wells, gas pipelines and agribusiness. These encroachments often force forest peoples out of their forest homes. Some conservation schemes to establish wilderness reserves also deny forestdwellers' rights. Cut off from their ancestral territories, forest peoples face poverty, the erosion of their customary institutions, loss of identity and cultural collapse.
CONSERVATION AND INDIGENOUS PEOPLES â&#x20AC;&#x153;If I do not go into the forest, I do not eatâ&#x20AC;?, An old Baka from a village lying between two national parks. 84
Biodiversity
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orest Peoples Programme (FPP) advocates an alternative vision of how forests should be managed and controlled, based on respect for the rights of the peoples who know them best. We work with forest peoples in South America, Central Africa, and South and South East Asia to help these communities secure their rights, build up their own organisations and negotiate with governments and companies as to how economic development and conservation is best achieved on their lands.
Assessing the Progress since Durban: As far as indigenous peoples are concerned the conservation movement’s ‘New Paradigm’ declared in Durban in 2003 exists more on paper than in practice. Isolated examples suggest that delivery of this new paradigm is possible, but lack of legal reforms, limited knowledge of conservationists and lack of priority in practical implementation on the ground mean that really very little has changed. Protected Areas are still being run in top down ways that exclude indigenous peoples and deny their rights. Since 2003 a trend by conservation organisations to adopt policies on indigenous peoples and to develop programmes that target their needs shows that the conservation community is aware of the need to respect indigenous peoples’ rights. However implementation lags far behind. Work to address the rights of indigenous peoples is not central to any organisation interviewed. The necessity of national legal and policy reforms to accommodate indigenous peoples’ rights in protected areas was highlighted in the Durban Accord. The review found little evidence that conservation organisations are attempting this. At the national level reforms are blocked by officials’ vested interests, prejudicial attitudes towards indigenous
peoples and conservative thinking. Despite conservation organisations accepting the need to respect the right to Free, Prior and Informed Consent in their operations, few resources have been invested to put this principle into effect. Two years’ away from Durban’s 2010 target for the establishment of mechanisms for the restitution of indigenous peoples’ lands taken for protected areas without their consent, there is no indication of conservation organisations taking up the challenge. There also appears to be little progress at national level.
Key facts The 1990s heralded a call for radical change in the nature of conservation provision, particularly in Africa, and sought to go beyond the colonial and neo-colonial construct of ‘Fortress Conservation’ and develop a new conservation paradigm. At the IUCN ‘World Parks Congress’ in Durban in 2003 the 3000 participants – including scientists, politicians, industry leaders, non-governmental organisations and indigenous peoples – issued the Durban Accord and Action Plan, new commitments and policy guidance for protected areas worldwide based on respect for rights and full and effective participation of indigenous peoples and local communities. In 2004 decisions at the 7th Congress of Parties (COP7) to the Convention on Biological Diversity called for similar changes in conservation approaches, in particular the inclusion of Indigenous and Mobile Peoples in decision-making and management of Protected Areas. With the ‘New Paradigm’ Conservationists committed themselves to respect the rights of indigenous peoples. No new parks should be established without consent, forced resettlement should be strictly eliminated, lands taken without consent should be returned to their traditional owners and
indigenous peoples should be effectively involved in the management of protected areas and should share in the benefits.
Implementation of the 2003 Durban Action Plan and CBD Programme of Work on Protected Areas Policies and Guidelines: following the Durban Accord several agencies have modified their policies and programmes towards indigenous peoples.
The World Bank adopted a revised safeguard policy on indigenous peoples in 2005; this was criticised by indigenous peoples for its unclear protections of indigenous peoples’ land rights and because it did not explicitly uphold their right to ‘free, prior and informed consent’. The World Bank now plans to review.
The IUCN has issued renewed guidance aimed at promoting comanaged and indigenous and community conserved areas, also guidance about sacred sites. However the IUCN international and regional offices have not undertaken the implementation review as agreed in Durban and efforts to provide guidance for the reform of national laws and policies have been patchy at best.
Conservation International and the WWF have adopted revised policies and set up small programmes to relate to indigenous peoples and can point to important examples where they have helped them secure land rights and a place in protected area management plans. They have yet to mainstream this approach into their work and push for legal reforms and land restitution.
The Nature Conservancy has not adopted a policy on indigenous peoples and the degree to which its field programme has begun working with indigenous peoples to promote conservation through
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In Uganda ‘conservation’ is missing its main best chance to be effective. Mainstream conservation still marginalises and ignores indigenous peoples, continuing to impose an old model of ‘fortress conservation’ that marginalises the Batwa in protected area management. This despite growing evidence showing that respect for the rights of indigenous peoples
Key facts The Batwa, previously forest-
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securing rights varies greatly. In Asia and Africa this is not evident; in South America TNC has initiated an active programme with indigenous peoples to secure conservation values in protected areas.
The Wildlife Conservation Society has not adopted a policy on indigenous peoples to guide its field programmes. While promoting conventional protected areas, particularly in Latin America, WCS has started to works with indigenous peoples to involve them in protected area management and seeks to build partnerships, especially in Bolivia.
ACTIONS AT THE NATIONAL LEVEL:
UGANDA A Review of South West Uganda ‘Conservation’ is missing its main best chance to be effective. Mainstream 86
conservation still marginalises and ignores indigenous peoples, continuing to impose an old model of ‘fortress conservation’ that marginalises the Batwa in protected area management. This despite growing evidence showing that respect for the rights of indigenous peoples is effective in securing both livelihoods and conservation. While certain frameworks exist and there is a growth in recognition of community rights, genuine participation remains illusory. The Batwa continue to suffer multiple layers of marginalisation in protected area management. Having been arbitrarily evicted they now get the least attention from the Government as it tries to make protected area management more socially responsible. Despite Durban’s rallying call in 2003 for a new ‘conservation paradigm’ protected area managers still see indigenous peoples as external to conservation. As a result the translation of the Durban Action Plan into action on the ground is not satisfactory.
dwelling hunter-gatherers, are widely regarded as the first inhabitants of South West Uganda; approximately 6,700 Batwa now live within Uganda, half in the South West. In Bwindi, Mgahinga and Echuya forests the Batwa lived in coexistence with the environment and in full reliance on the forest for their physical, economic, spiritual and social sustenance. In 1964 Forest and Game Acts made it illegal to reside, hunt and farm inside parks. In 1991 the establishment of Bwindi and Mgahinga forests as national parks resulted in the eviction and exclusion of the Batwa from their homeland; 17 years later the Batwa remain marginalised from management of the parks and from any deriving benefit and rights to access and use the resources. The majority of Ugandan Batwa suffer severe isolation, discrimination and socio-economic exclusion. Their customary rights have not been recognised in Uganda and they have received little or no compensation for their losses. Almost half remain landless (squatting on others’ lands and working for non-Batwa masters in bonded labour agreements) and almost all live in absolute poverty. They have poorer levels of health care, education and employment than their ethnic neighbours.
Biodiversity Implementation of the 2003 Durban Action Plan and CBD Programme of Work on Protected Areas
of dependency and lack security of land tenure. The resettlement scheme has now stopped.
Social Benefits: Despite a firm policy commitment to the needs of the Batwa and an increase in funding from national parks to local communities in the last few years, funding is still not reaching the Batwa. No money has been put towards land purchases since 2003, despite extreme landlessness.
Tran boundary Protected Areas: The Batwa from Rwanda, Uganda and the DRC are soon to send a letter to Ministers demanding to know why they were not asked for their free, prior and informed consent for a new initiative to create a single biosphere reserve out of national parks in the three countries.
Customary Use: Forest uses considered critical by the Batwa – including wild honey collection, hunting of small animals, worshipping of ancestors – have not been addressed by a programme meant to enable access to forest resources by local communities. Such forest uses are therefore illegal.
Some Recommendations for Change Stakeholders at both
Participation in Management: The review found no evidence of a national-level review of protected area management since 2003; Bwindi and Mgahinga national parks continue to be managed with a topdown approach by the Uganda Wildlife Authority without meaningful participation of the Batwa. Removal of Barriers to Participation: Government officials often cite low education and literacy levels as a barrier to Batwa participation; however there is no targeted government programmes to address these barriers. Capacity Building: There is a gap between policy and practice of the IUCN. The Durban Action Plan calls for the IUCN to help disseminate guidance but the IUCN country office does not have a budget for this; consequently guidelines have not been disseminated to protected area managers since 2003. Resettlement of Indigenous People: The 55% of Batwa who have received land have been given it by NGOs and religious groups; title has yet to be transferred to the Batwa. They therefore remain in a position
the national and international level should continue to educate relevant government agencies on legal and human rights obligations as they relate to indigenous land and natural resource rights. The Government should amend national policy to acknowledge the internationally recognised definition of indigenous peoples. This must then lead on to the Batwa being specifically acknowledged as the indigenous peoples of the south-west of Uganda. The Government should urgently implement a long-term programme, developed in consultation with the Batwa, to increase Batwa capacity to participate in decision-making bodies and processes, including: adult literacy programmes and information on protected area management in appropriate languages and formats. The IUCN secretariat should launch a specific programme of work to sensitise its members and their staff to the background and context of the Durban Action Plan. It should not be left to individual members to interpret the agreements as they wish.
CAMEROON Little progress has been made in Came-roon to secure forest
communities’ rights. With a few notable exceptions, conservation organisations, donors and the Government have done almost nothing to implement their interna-tional commitments to protect indigenous peoples’ rights in their conservation projects. Most of the new international standards to which they have signed up remain unknown at the local level. In addition to being impeded by a persistent lack of information and support, government officials at the local level are also constrained by outdated laws which contradict the Government’s international commitments. There is a tendency by Government, conservation agencies and donors to organise workshops and conferences without any follow-up. Initiatives that conservation organisations claim target communities are having little real impact. Most remain unknown to communities, the main beneficiaries. There are some positive examples of progress since 2003, but almost all have been delivered by civil society organisations working with selected conservation NGOs rather than by the Government.
Implementation of the 2003 Durban Action Plan and CBD Programme of Work on Protected Areas Participation in Management: The centralised nature of Government management of natural resources has not changed since 2003. Indigenous peoples are little involved in the management of national parks, logging concessions or safari areas. Traditional Knowledge: The creation of protected areas has done nothing to protect the rights of indigenous people to their traditional knowledge. Under law entry to protected areas is forbidden to all and this has taken precedence over measures to protect customary use of biological resources. Indigenous peoples are prevented from carrying out traditional activities, representing a Í 87
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serious threat to the survival of their way of life. Access and Benefit Sharing: The Government has done very little to share the benefits of protected areas with communities. Forest authorities recognise that benefit sharing still needs to be addressed. The Baka are increasingly informed about these issues and have recently questioned WWF Yokadouma about the benefits arising from the ‘Jengi Project’, the target of substantial funding. Tran frontier Protected Areas: The Sangha Trinational protected area was formally established at Durban, grouping protected areas in Cameroon, CAR and Republic of Congo. Considerable financial support has been raised. All will go to conservation, with indigenous peoples excluded entirely. Decisions about how to reach communities to help is left up to conservation agencies without significant community input. Lack of dissemination of information: Civil servants are unaware of the Durban Accord, as are local and indigenous peoples. There is the need for rapid diffusion of lessons and guidelines deriving from science, traditional knowledge and field practice.
Key Players Conservation organisations: Relationships between most conservation organisations and indigenous peoples have not changed much since 2003. Most conservation organisations, despite the language of the Durban Accord, focus on the preservation of wildlife. A ferocious attack against poaching since 2003 has had a serious impact on local people. Baka and Bagyeli indigenous peoples regularly hide or avoid cars belonging to conservation organisations when they arrive in their communities, fearing government eco-guards are coming to search or arrest them. On the ground the IUCN has not helped to bridge the gap between communities and conservation. Funders: The United Nations 88
Development Fund, World Bank and Global Environment Facility have financed the fight against loss of biodiversity, climate change and water degradation. However funding for social issues has not been forthcoming. Conservation organisations in Cameroon focus on wildlife, not indigenous peoples.
What can be achieved? A participatory project, supported by Forest Peoples Programme, is working in collaboration with WWF to help indigenous Baka defend their rights and document their ancestral lands, and participate directly in forest planning. As a result conservation efforts will also be supported. The maps FPP and WWF are supporting communities to create will form the basis of negotiations with Government authorities that manage the national parks and will identify the traditional cultural practices compatible with conservation. Ultimately the customary rights of Baka in and around Boumba Bek and Nki national parks will be protected in written management plans approved by the Government.
Key Recommendations Conservation organisations should focus on applying the guidelines – agreed at the international level – on the ground. Conservation organisations should open substantive dialogues with communities. Indigenous peoples need to understand what conservationists are trying to achieve and why. It is vital that trust is established. Local government agencies need to ensure that they are informed about international standards, as should the local staff of conservation projects. The IUCN must support this. Without this flow of information the standards simply cannot be applied. The test of success will be represented by progress on the ground, not by the number of papers produced. The Conservation movement must move beyond just talking.
MALAYSIA Reviewing and Promoting Progress: Sabah, Malaysia Many conflicts arise from protected areas in Malaysia, often due to the lack of legal recognition of indigenous peoples’ traditional land and way of life. In Sarawak and Sabah customary rights to land and customary law are partly recognised by state law, introduced by the British during colonial times. However these are not properly implemented and are sometimes ignored by government agencies. In Peninsular Malaysia the indigenous peoples, now a small minority, have few rights to their land under statutory law. In Sabah the gazettement of national parks extinguishes the rights of communities living within their boundaries. This happens often, demonstrating the fragility of local community rights. Ambiguous legal status of customary rights exacerbates conflict between Park authorities and communities. In practice indigenous peoples continue to use and occupy their customary areas throughout Malaysia, even within parks. In Sabah the administration has introduced measures to accommodate local people, such as the requirement of ‘Occupation Permits’, recruitment of local people as ‘Honorary Park Rangers’ and the establishment of Community Use Zones. Although not amounting to proper recognition of indigenous rights, these are positive steps. In Sabah (but excluding protected areas) customary systems of land use and conservation have been partially recognised. In particular the Tagal system of controlling community fisheries has been officially acknowledged in law. Indigenous peoples have also been involved in the drafting of laws recognising indigenous peoples’
Biodiversity continue to live in many of the parks in Malaysia. In Sabah the Crocker Range National Park has been home for generations of indigenous communities, in particular the Kadazandusuns and the Muruts. In Sabah Forest Reserves are classed in seven categories, most under the jurisdiction of Sabah Forestry Department. A forest reserve is gazetted under the provisions of the Forest Enactment of 1968, which requires notices to be posted to forest communities to allow for objections. The test of success will be represented by progress on the ground, not by the number of papers produced. The Conservation movement must move beyond just talking.
Many conflicts arise from protected areas in Malaysia, due to the lack of legal recognition of indigenous peoples’ way of life. rights to their traditional knowledge and to benefits from its use.
Key facts Malaysia was formed in 1963 through a federation of former British colonies and includes the East Malaysian States of Sabah and Sarawak on the Northern coast of Borneo. The forest cover in Malaysia is estimated to be 59.5% of the total land area of which 44% is managed by the Forestry Department; protected areas amount to 16.3% of land area. The total population of Malaysia is 28.6million people; 12% are considered indigenous. Sabah has a vast indigenous diversity with at least 39 different indigenous groups who speak more than 50 languages. They comprise 60% of Sabah’s population. Most indigenous peoples in Malaysia live in rural areas and are typically subsistence farmers. Many also rely on plants in the forest for their food, medicine, fuel and building materials. Hunting and fishing are important for livelihoods. Some indigenous communities
Implementation of the 2003 Durban Action Plan and CBD Programme of Work on Protected Areas Customary Use: The Parks of Sabah are totally closed. Communities living in and around them have no access or user rights to the resources, impacting on daily lives and livelihoods. Crocker Range Park is the largest in Sabah and has 17 communities living in its vicinity. This causes conflict with Park authorities. Free, Prior and Informed Consent: Sabah law requires local inhabitants to be properly informed and consulted about plans for establishment of new forest reserves, in line with the ‘Free, Prior and Informed Consent’ of the Durban Action Plan. Many elders however told the review that they were unaware of any notice given, and so lost the rights to their land. Resettlement of Indigenous People: If authorities in forest reserves view local people as encroachers they have the right to evict the community. The establishment of parks results in enforcement of the Park Enactment, which do not allow settlements. Most parks choose to allow communities to stay but no laws have been made to secure the future of the communities. Participation in Management:
Crocker Range Management Plan consultation was 60 days. The plan was in English and it was necessary for a local community based organisation to visit the villages to gather feedback. At end of the process the communities’ recommendations were not taken into account.
Positive Developments Customary Use: A project in Crocker Range Park, Sabah, is piloting Community Use Zones. The aim is for communities to regain their user and access rights, whilst at the same time being responsible for the management of the area. This could be a win-win situation: communities get user and access rights and authorities have more human resources to care for the park. Traditional Knowledge: The indigenous resource management practice of Tagal has been recognised in law and promoted by the Sabah Fisheries Department. An example of community participation in the sustainable utilization and management of resources, fish can only be harvested when the community decides. Significant growth in fish stocks has resulted. Such inclusion of indigenous knowledge in conservation is a turning point in Sabah. However it is not yet used in protected area management.
Key Recommendations Renewed dialogue is needed between indigenous peoples and protected areas to study and explore options for implementing the Durban Accord. Training needs to be given to local authorities on the obligations of State parties under the CBD. Conservation NGOs need to promote their own policies on indigenous peoples, the Durban Accord and the CBD decisions relevant to indigenous peoples in their field programmes.
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By Simba RUSSEAU
IBSAR SUSTAINING EDUCATION through TREE POWER
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rab countries are facing extreme challenges regarding the conservation of natural resources and protection of the environment. The region is characterized by a wide diversity, not just in ethnic, social, cultural, and economic terms, but also in terms of rich fertile land and biodiversity. According to a 284-page report by the Arab Forum for Environment and Development titled, “Arab Environment: Future Challenges,” Arab countries’ policies and decision makers are ignoring environmental issues and the importance of sustainable education and nature conservation. The
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report emphasized the importance of sustainable education as a means of promoting biodiversity and linking the individual back to their land. In an effort to fill the gap, the American University of Beirut’s Nature Conservation Center for Sustainable Futures (IBSAR) has created the Power of Planting Initiative aimed at promoting tree planting by involving rural communities and propagating tree species native to Lebanon. IBSAR was founded as an interfaculty center in 2002 by AUB academics to promote the conservation and
Biodiversity “People here don’t have the money or government funding to reform the lands; otherwise you would see more trees or gardens” Hakkam Hassan, Mayor of Kwashra.
sustainable utilization of biodiversity in Arid and Mediterranean regions, by providing an open academic platform for innovative research and development. “Protecting biodiversity and natural resources begins by helping people become more aware of the importance of their environment, their connection to it and essential role in
conserving its biological diversity,” explains IBSAR outreach project manager, Arbi Sarkissian. An essential component to IBSAR’s Power of Planting Initiative is the ‘Seeds of Hope, Trees for Tomorrow’ campaign, which is intended to complement existing reforestation programs in Lebanon through community-based tree planting initiatives that focus on
preserving native species of Lebanese trees and shrubs in open spaces and public areas within towns and villages. The campaign will ensure biodiversity conservation and decentralization of reforestation efforts in Lebanon thus improving the communities’ immediate neighborhood environment and ensuring the diversity and sustainability of Lebanese flora and landscapes. Reforestation efforts by nongovernmental organizations mainly focus on large nature reserves that rarely involve community stakeholders directly. IBSAR is interested in projects designed to utilize practical areas for growth like parks, private yards, and other community green areas. This approach places the responsibility in the hands of the local villages so that they can create selfsustainable communities.
“Educating the community on the essentials of developing a relationship with the environment will not only raise awareness of Lebanon’s diverse trees but also stimulate communities to become guardians of biodiversity in their villages and region,” adds Sarkissian.
Self-sustainable communities One of IBSAR’s main objectives is to exchange experience and knowledge with the local community of the importance of maintaining nature’s cycles. According to IBSAR using Í 91
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native trees in reforestation projects enhances the forests’ survival rate because trees and animals depend on one another for their survival, which is referred to as species interdependence. Partnering with local municipalities is another key component of the Power of Planting Initiative in that it engages local communities as active partners in biodiversity conservation. Deputy Mayor Pierre Khoury from the village of Kwashra in Northern Lebanon expressed the importance of continuing tree-planting events like this.
“Tcharafna ESFD and IBSAR!” says Mr. Khoury.
“It’s important that we preserve our heritage and our connection to the land.” “People here don’t have the money or 92
government funding to reform the lands; otherwise you would see more trees or gardens,” says Hakkam Hassan, Mayor of Kwashra.
“It was only in the last fives years that we have been able to plant olive trees again.” Teaming up with organizations like the Center for Civic Engagement and Community Service (CCECS) and the Economic Social Fund for Development (EFSD) provides the much-needed financial support for IBSAR to continue these kinds of interactive community naturebased projects. An absence of these kinds of sustainable education activities will eventually create a society of uninterested people with little respect or special attention towards their environment. “Today we have a project in collaboration with AUB’s
“It’s important that we preserve our heritage and our connection to the land.” Pierre Khoury, Deputy Mayor of kwashara
IBSAR planting 1,300 trees and we also organized an entire day of bio activities with the kids where they were able to learn about biodiversity,” says Zeina Zouain, Community Development officer with the Economic Social Fund for Development (EFSD). “Unfortunately, the local media fails to understand the importance of reporting issues related to the environment,” she adds.
Biodiversity
POWER OF PLANTING Community participation is essential for biodiversity conservation according to IBSAR’s vision, because without local participation, reforestation initiatives will not be as successful and enduring.
be planted in order to reach their goal of planting 50,000 native trees in around 100 villages in Lebanon by 2010 and hopes to achieve its future goal of up to 1 million trees by 2020.
Dedication is apparent for the various IBSAR volunteers who sacrifice early hours of their weekends to donate much needed labour to aid in preserving Lebanon’s nature and environment by planting trees.
In the future, IBSAR plans to use native trees as seed stock for developing micro-nurseries, which would allow villagers to produce trees for reforesting the lands affected by continuous forest fires as well as using trees to monitor climate change in the region.
“I volunteered last month with CCECS and wanted to get involved with the same type of community service so I volunteered with IBSAR today because I wanted to have fun and do something for the local community,” says Loulwa Kalash, a 20 year old Political Science and Management student at the American University of Beirut.
For further information: www.ibsar.org
“I came here because I don’t think that the environment is getting enough attention in Lebanon and it should because this is our country and this is where we live,” says Hala Karaki, a 19 year-old Electrical Engineering student at the American University of Beirut. “Actually there is a whole section that we are learning about in my studies about renewable energies and I am strongly considering taking my profession in this direction because eventually I want my work to do something useful for the environment.” “There are buildings sprouting up everywhere in Lebanon and I wanted to do something for my country to counter this and planting trees is one way,” says Nassib El Khoury, a 21 year old Business and Human Rights student at the American University of Beirut. “Today we planted almost 700 trees. Our goal is to plant 50,000 trees in as many municipalities as possible by the end of 2010, which is less than two years,” says Sarkissian. “As you may know the trees that we are planting are native Lebanese trees and there are 30 different species and woody shrubs that are relatively unknown that you would not see in the wild. That’s why we’re cultivating them at our Agricultural Research and Education Center (AREC) in the Beqqa where we have a farm and then we will distribute them to municipalities for planting.” IBSAR has planted a total of 9,306 trees from 18 species of native Lebanese trees and shrubby perennials in 34 municipalities. They still require another 40,000 trees to
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By Elsa J. Sattout | APJM member
JABAL MOUSSA A Surprisingly rich mosaic of biological, cultural & historical diversity . “Extinction does not simply mean the loss of one volume from the library of nature. It means the loss of loose-leaf book whose individual pages, was the species to survive, and would remain available in perpetuity for selective transfer & improvement of other species” Prof. Eisner, T.[ Cornell University]
J
abal Moussa "JM", a typical Mediterranean mountainous landscape, lying on the foothills and high peaks of the Mount Lebanon Chain is located at the heart of Eastern shores of the CircumMediterranean Basin.
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The Basin is considered a reservoir of plant diversity and has been shown to contain hot spots that are recognized in some countries as relics. Located at the heart of one of the 34 recognized world ‘hotspots’ for conservation priority, Lebanon harbors 2600 plant
Biodiversity species with a high percentage of endemic plant species (12%) among which 221 are broad endemics and 90 are narrow endemics.
A UNESCO Biosphere Reserve In February 2009, the Association for the Protection of Jabal Moussa Association celebrated the declaration of JM a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. JM, imprinted by biological footprints, cultural history and social mingles, extends on 1250 ha and over altitudes ranging from 500 to 1500 meter. It is home to more than 20 tree species and 250plant species. The area gathers Mediterranean, Montane and SupraMediterranean vegetation communities. The mountainous area, dominating two rivers [Nahr Eh Dahab and Nahr Ibrahim], reflects a typical Mediterranean landscape sheltering
mosaics of plant communities. These communities represent a nature refuge harboring mixed and/ or pure patches of Hop horn beam, alder and Storax populations and Turkey oak and kermes oak and Calabrian pine tree species. The hop horn beam and the alder are spontaneous, endemic and occupy limited surface areas in Lebanon. The past civilizations and new societies have imprinted the villages with historical records showing anthropogenic activities and a long history of human interaction with forest in this part of the Mediterranean region. Historical records integrate ancient wells, carved rocks, mosaics, ruins of Roman thermes, abandoned terraces, old charcoal production sites, old mulberry trees from the last century when sericulture was at its peak, old wine presses and
old Lebanese houses that are made from arcades and stones. The residents of villages depend heavily on agriculture [mainly olive groves, grape and apple orchards, cereals and vegetables], charcoal production and pastoral farming and/or pastoral transhumance as a source of income. Recognizing the environmental degradation threatening JM area, the Association for the Protection of JM, was founded in May 2007. This Lebanese Non-Governmental organization was established to protect the mountain and its surroundings from quarrying, over grazing, hunting and illegal woodcutting practices. At present, the association is investing much effort to protect the site while providing an environment-friendly alternative for nature lovers/city dwellers at the heart of Mount Lebanon chain to enjoy the beauty of natural, cultural and historical prints inherited from old civilizations.
Richness of Biodiversity JM mountainous landscape embraces high biodiversity richness. The diversity indices varied from 25 to 65 plant species per 400 m2 which in comparison with other biodiversity-rich areas is amongst the highest. This is also applicable for the richness in mammal's species. The region is shelter to 11 endemic plant species among which 4 are specific to Lebanon and 7 are
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The past civilizations and new societies have imprinted the villages with historical records showing anthropogenic activities and a long history of human interaction with forest in this part of the Mediterranean region. 95
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endemic to Lebanon, Syria and Turkey. Nine observed species figure on the list of species to be protected. Few of the plants are categorized as peculiar to the Mediterranean region. The richness in bulbous species, among which many are of broad and narrow endemism, pinpoints the importance of conserving the area and considers it as a refuge for species listed nationally and internationally of great importance. The Mountain is a land mark for 13 species of mammals including wolves, hyenas, foxes, jackals, stone martin, weasels, wild cats, badgers, hedgehogs, hyrax, wild boars, porcupine, squirrels and small mammals such as rodents and bats [Expert Mounir Abi-said]. It has been found a bottleneck site where at least 20,000 storks or raptors or cranes regularly pass during spring or autumn migration. A Rocha – a Non-Governmental Organization specialized in birdsreported a total of 13,000 and 27,000 to 41,000 soaring birds were observed at JM during spring and autumn respectively. Several species that are known for their scarcity on migration through Lebanon have been noted from Jabal Moussa, including Bonelli’s Warbler, Wood Warbler and Garden Warbler. The organization stated that bird species observed at JM are considered biome restricted species that are only found in a certain type of habitat in a particular geographical area.
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FACTS JM area is categorized in need of national conservation efforts by the Lebanese Council for Development and Reconstruction incorporated, in collaboration with the Directorate General of Urban Planning, the Ministries of Environment and of Agriculture {SDATL, 2005}. The association has succeeded in September 2008 to get a Ministerial decision on the declaration of the area as a Protected Forest. The required documents for its declaration as Natural site have been submitted to the Ministry of Environment. In February 2009, the UNESCO's MAB programme declaration of JM as a Biosphere Reserve recognizes international acclaim for the area's wild and unspoiled habitats, its renowned Adonis Valley with its ancient agricultural terraces and trails, and the strong support expressed among the local communities for the nomination. In March 2009, JM was declared by BirdLife International as Important Bird Areas.
'For as long as Man continues to be the ruthless destroyer of lower living beings, he will never know health or peace. For as long as men massacre animals, they will kill each other. Indeed, he who sows the seeds of murder and pain cannot reap joy and love.' Pythagoras. Since its foundation, APJM has been seeking all the support needed to seed conservation and sustainable management efforts while involving local and national stakeholders in the implementation of its mission and vision. In that light, a new internationally funded project will be launched in May 2009. The project aims at promoting the conservation of biological, cultural, historical and social heritage found in JM Biosphere Reserve and to leverage the social and economic aspects of local communities. The implementation aspect will focus on the establishment of the basic infrastructure for eco-tourism and recreational activities and the promotion of the rural development initiatives.
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By Cathy CHAMI TYAN
SHARK European and Australian Proposals to Weaken Indian Ocean Shark Finning Ban Defeated .
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roposals from the European Community (EC) and Australia that threatened to create new loopholes in the Indian Ocean ban on shark finning â&#x20AC;&#x201C; the wasteful practice of slicing off a sharkâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s fins and discarding the body at sea - were defeated at the annual meeting of the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC), which took place at the beginning of April 2009. The outcome resulted in a statement from Australia in favour of prohibiting shark fin removal at sea altogether, as recommended by conservationists and scientists.
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The EU had proposed two new options to replace the existing method for enforcing the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) finning ban with untested methods which involved placing severed shark fins in plastic bags or numbering and separately storing bodies and fins. Australia proposed a similar option for storing fins attached to shark bodies, but not necessarily in plastic.
"We are pleased by the defeat of the dangerous EC proposals that threatened enforcement of the Indian Ocean shark finning
Biodiversity Most sharks are highly vulnerable to overfishing because they grow slowly, mature late and produce few young. These limitations, along with high fishing pressure and lax fishing limits, have led to the decline of most European shark populations. One-third of EU species are now classified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as Threatened with extinction. Some local populations have already been wiped out.
ban and promoted increased use of plastic bags at sea; however the Shark Alliance remains concerned that the IOTC did not adopt its scientific committee advice to require that sharks be landed with their fins naturally attached, which is by far the best method for preventing finning and collecting shark fisheries data," said Sonja Fordham, Shark Alliance Policy Director.
"We encourage the European Commission to collaborate with its conservation community and not only its fishing industry when developing and negotiating international shark fishing proposals," Fordham continued. Shark Alliance representatives brought to the meeting a letter signed by 70 conservation, scientific,
fishing & diving organisations from around the world opposing both proposals because of concerns about enforcement and risks that plastics pose to wildlife. The 70 groups which include the Pew Environment Group, Greenpeace, Ocean Conservancy, and Shark Trust, amongst many others, called on the IOTC to instead simply ban the removal of shark fins at sea. During the IOTC meeting, the EC and Australian proposals were merged and the reference to plastic removed, but loopholes that could allow unpunished finning remained. Opposition to changing the finning banâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ratio from Japan and Korea resulted in the defeat of the joint proposal. Australia reacted by expressing a general view that landing sharks with their fins naturally attached was the best option for dealing with the associated scientific and enforcement issues. Like most international fisheries bodies, the IOTC enforces its finning ban by limiting the weight of shark fins on vessels to 5% of the weight of the shark bodies on board, in an effort to ensure amounts are proportional. The EC proposal on finning rules for IOTC was a complete departure from the European Commissionâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s brand new European Community Shark Action Plan, which was released in February 2009. Joe Borg, European Commissioner for Fisheries and Ă? 99
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FAST FACTS
The current members of the IOTC are Australia, Belize, China, Comoros, Eritrea, European Community, France, Guinea, India, Indonesia, Islamic Republic of Iran, Japan, z Malaysia, Mauritius, Sultanate of Oman, Pakistan, Philippines, Seychelles, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Tanzania, Thailand, United Kingdom and Vanuatu. Senegal, South Africa and Uruguay are cooperating, noncontracting Parties.
Nearly 500 fishing vessels from EU countries, primarily Spain, are registered to fish in the IOTC area and are responsible for 16% of the Indian Ocean shark catches reported by IOTC Parties and cooperating countries. The IOTC Scientific Committee warns that catch records are likely to underrepresent shark catches. Australia is the only Party to submit complete shark catch data to IOTC.
“To secure a better future for sharks, the EC should cooperate with its conservation community and Australia to advance proposals for prohibiting the removal of shark fins at sea in all oceans,” Sandrine Polti, Fisheries Policy Advisor for the Shark Alliance.
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Maritime Affairs, announced the intention to “introduce stronger control
measures to ensure the strict terms of the finning ban are properly respected” and to work with “international partners to persuade them to take an equally strong line on finning wherever it may occur.” “The European Commission claims that the most important goal of its proposal to overhaul the Indian Ocean finning ban was to address the need for scientific data on shark catches, but IOTC scientists have clearly stated that the best means for collecting this information and for enforcing the finning ban is to have sharks landed with their fins naturally attached,” added 100
Sandrine Polti, Fisheries Policy Advisor for the Shark Alliance. The EU Plan includes a commitment to strengthen the EU finning ban by reducing the fin to carcass ratio, currently the highest (and therefore most lenient) in the world. The EC proposal for IOTC, however, aimed to abolish the ratio system, in line with industry wishes, in favour of new methods that are likely even more difficult to enforce. The EU is obligated to apply measures adopted at IOTC back home in EU waters, as well in the Indian Ocean where hundreds of EU vessels fish.
The EC delegation to the IOTC meeting was dominated by Spanish and French commercial fishing interests (11 out of 19 members). Conservation group representatives were not invited on the EC delegation or to delegation meetings where amendments to the shark finning proposals were discussed. The IOTC Scientific Committee has reported that blue, oceanic whitetip, scalloped hammerhead silky, and shortfin mako sharks are targeted in the Indian Ocean and vulnerable to overfishing. The IOTC currently has no system for placing observers on fishing vessels to monitor catches and compliance with fishing rules. Spain ranks 5th in the world for shark catches. France ranks 12th, Japan 8th and Indonesia 1st. EU limits on shark fishing are either nonexistent or too lenient to allow populations to recover. The disparity between high value shark fins and lower value meat too often leads to “finning” – slicing off a shark’s fins and discarding the body at sea. The EU ban on finning is among the weakest in the world. Its loopholes allow for this wasteful practice to continue unpunished and set a poor example for other regions.
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By Gabriella PORILLI
“SAVE YOUR LOGO” A Revolutionary Fundraising Approach for Biodiversity Conservation.
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he World is facing an extinction crisis. Biodiversity loss is increasing at an unprecedented rate, threatening the very basis of sustainable development. According to the IUCN Red List, at least 1 in 8 birds, 1 in 4 mammals and 1 in 3 amphibians are listed as threatened. It has been estimated that 15 to 37% of all species are committed to extinction by 2050 unless widespread and effective conservation actions are undertaken soon and maintained. There is some good news, however. Species can recover with concerted conservation efforts. One of the key factors constraining effective efforts to conserve biodiversity is funding availability. Although considerable efforts are expended worldwide on species conservation, many of those efforts are targeted on just a few charismatic species and rely on public funds and public donations for funding support.
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Many companies, entities and organizations are using symbols of biodiversity as logos or for their communication needs. Often, they are using the image of animal or plant species that are threatened or who may be one day. The idea is to involve them in the preservation of species that have contributed to their success.
An Innovative Project for the Global Biodiversity The Save You Logo Fund will provide the private sector, and other donors, with a mechanism to contribute to, and support, efficient and coordinated conservation action. Many companies and organizations are already using animals in their logos and marketing strategies. These animals are a signature part of these companies’ logos or brands, be it the crocodile for Lacoste and hundreds more. According to the IUCN “Red List” of threatened
Biodiversity It has been estimated that 15 to 37% of all species are committed to extinction by 2050 unless widespread and effective conservation actions are undertaken soon and maintained.
THE 3 STAGES OF “SAVE YOUR LOGO” 1 | FINANCING OF CONCRETE ACTIONS OF CONSERVATION
species, many of these species are either threatened or endangered and will need serious and comprehensive conservation actions to survive. To date much conservation funding has come from governments, private individuals and NGOs. The SYL campaign provides an exciting opportunity to engage the private sector, encouraging companies to support their species brands and other threatened species. Invite all interested companies to join this effort to save globally threatened species.
Discussions are being held with numerous other big companies on all continents with species logos. The cost of effective implementation of species conservation action plans varies widely, anything between $2-5 million USD per species. Therefore each of the participating companies is expected to contribute at least 1.5 million Euros over 3 years.
There has already been considerable interest in this new initiative.
For further information: www.saveyourlogo.org
All interested companies are invited to join this effort to save globally threatened species.
The financial contributions from the private sector will be invested into the Save Your Logo fund to complement the initial funding. Private sector contributions will be targeted both to logo signature animals and to support much-needed conservation for some of the less charismatic and often “forgotten” threatened species – the “logo orphans” on IUCN’s Red List. This new public-private partnership will bring new partners from the private sector into the conservation community to provide new financing and complement existing conservation efforts. A strong media and outreach campaign will bring up-to-date information on species status to the general public. 2 | PROJECT AND GLOBAL MULTI MEDIA PLATFORM
A strong media and outreach campaign will bring up-to-date information on species status to the general public. Given the universal nature of this project, the Internet will be an important vehicle for communication to engage the global community. Information about projects will be posted www.saveyourlogo.org. In a fully interconnected world where transparency is the norm, our goal is to create a global community gathered around a common interest: The preservation of the world heritage. To achieve this, we will create an new and strong interactive platform. 3 | AN INTERACTIVE EDUCATIVE PHASE:
Our mission is to engage a high level of interactivity between all the stakeholders, through comprehensive and quality content, which will create strong and dedicated communities around the various projects. 103
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By Jonathan F. P. ROSE
LEARNING TO THINK ECOLOGICALLY “We can’t pursue slash-and-burn environmental exploitation without eventually slashing and burning the economy and our own well being.”
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instein famously said we can’t solve a problem with the same mindset that created it. To transform the current grim outlook on climate change and biodiversity loss, we need to transform the way we think. The good news is that we are already on the brink of a major shift in our thinking. The current economic crisis is helping drive us to it. The environmental and social impacts of the crisis are complex and painful, but among other things it reduced oil demand and prices, and increased energy savings and
Photo: Mike Hales
The Garrison Institute, an NGO which has programs in "transformational ecology," is housed in a former monastery on New York's Hudson River.
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investment. It revealed how the American subprime crisis was based on bad land and resource use, destroying farmland for suburban sprawl housing that wasn’t even needed, just driven by environmentally oblivious speculation. The bursting of the oil and housing bubbles point up an underlying truth about the run up to the downturn: our economic system virtually ignores environment as an “externality,” and this ultimately destabilizes the system. In the US it has resulted in bigger home sizes, more debt and waste and fewer resources for health care or education. It is clearer than ever that all
Eco-Living has given us neither longer life nor greater happiness. This underscores how we can’t pursue slash-and-burn environmental exploitation without eventually slashing and burning the economy and our own well being. We are now forced to view the perennial pursuit of economic growth in a new way, weighing the dream of eternal expansion against the nightmare of catastrophic environmental losses. These are the basic parameters of the current debate over how to implement a carbon regime without hurting economic recovery. We can and must do both. In the US, a recent study by Yale University and George Mason University showed that the economy is still the overweening concern among Americans, and climate change ranks only 10th out of 11 top issues. Yet American opinion about global warming is evolving. Even in the economic meltdown, over 90 percent of Americans said that the U.S. should act to reduce global
“To transform the current grim outlook on climate change and biodiversity loss, we need to transform the way we think” Jonathan F. P. Rose
warming. Meanwhile, climate legislation is percolating in the US Congress, although the debate promises to be contentious. But capand-trade or carbon pricing are currently designed as reallocation systems, a kind of patch on the current system of economic incentives and behavior. The larger opportunity now is to tie calls for coordinated economic regulation to calls for a whole systems approach that stops treating the environment as an externality, and starts factoring environmental impacts directly into pricing and economic policy. Our goal should be not just to smooth out this rough patch in the economic cycle, but to make the whole economy sustainable. To do
Photos: Garrisson Institute
A transformational ecology retreat for climate leaders at the Garrison Institute
that, we need a revolution in the way we think about the economy and the environment. Just as the Newtonian physics we are most familiar with fairly describes the motion of a single object in an isolated gravitational field, but ignores the larger system of fields, the Adam Smith view of markets most of us have internalized is good at predicting transactions between buyer and seller, but utterly fails to understand the larger effects of those transactions. Einstein described the larger system of physical fields a whole century ago; now we need a new kind of relativity theory, a whole systems view of economics. Fortunately, such a holistic view is emerging. It’s coming from cutting edge technology and fields like industrial ecology, behavioral economics and neuroeconomism, which are hinting at an evolution in consciousness that is already underway. For example, psychologist Daniel Goleman’s new book Ecological Intelligence: How Knowing the Hidden Impact of What we Buy Can Change Everything deals with how we are beginning to consider the larger environmental impact – not only carbon footprint and but the entire life-cycle assessment (LCA) – of the economic choices we make. Technologies like GoodGuide. com or new iPhone barcode-reading applications will help change our thinking by allowing consumers to instantly view the whole life-cycle environmental impact of a product before they buy it. That’s one factor among others that will tend to expand our now very narrow awareness of the true environmental
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social regulation, stewardship and religious ethics in many cultures, from Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness or southern Africa’s Ubuntu. Ideas about how we assign value or what the right relationship is in a transaction vary from place to place and are profoundly influenced by culture.
Photo: Tom DiMauro
In Ghana, most people can sing you the song of their genealogy for dozens of generations. When two people meet they may spend all day telling their stories.
Gandhi's grandson and biographer Rajmohan Gandhi at the Garrison Institute's 2008 forum on satyagraha and climate change.
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impacts of our decisions. "We can know the causes of what we're doing, and we can know the impact of what we're doing," Goleman told TIME Magazine recently. "It's going to have a radical impact on the way we do business." The emerging field of neuroeconomics draws on brain research, economics and psychology to understand how we make economic decisions in the biological substrate of the brain. The related field of behavioral economics uses experiments to generate formal models that predict how people will decide. These fields illuminate our blind spots, and support the development of economic models that acknowledge the influence of emotional factors on decisionmaking behavior. They account for how our neurologically programmed competitive, fear-based behaviors encourage economic systems that disregard environmental “externalities,” mask our interdependence with one another and the natural world, degrade the environment and threaten the climate, even though the pattern is
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ultimately irrational. Our shortsighted wiring can cut two ways. It is clannish, making us powerfully resent what we perceive to be “freeloaders” or outliers who consume the community’s resources without a legitimate claim on them, hence the fury over AIG bonuses and Wall Street “outliers” from the Main Street core community. But the flip side of this fury is feeling comfortable and happy about collaborating with people inside one’s community. Today, social networking sites and other technologies are fast expanding our interactions with community, and making our sense of belonging evolves into global scale. Given our wiring, this should help us toward a stronger sense of satisfying global cooperation. Neuro and behavioral economics research suggest new ways to construct more holistic worldviews and systems that can take externalities into better account and transform negative impacts of human activity. But in truth, such worldviews have long existed and are the foundation of successful
This grounds them as part of a holistic network, expresses their understanding of their interdependence. It can’t help but inform their ideas about economic exchange. American culture on the other hand evolved an idea of rugged individualism, which has helped make our economics blinkered and fractious. But that’s not the way human brains are wired. Neuro-economics research may help us step outside cultural determination and provide a scientific framework for understanding how the global economy can evolve a holistic, interdependent, systems view in the face of global environmental threats. The current crisis may offer us practical opportunities to reorganize in ways that are better for the earth and more consonant with our true natures.
The Garrison Institute, is a New York-based NGO working to induce the shifts in perspective and shifts toward holistic systems thinking that can help enable that reorganization. It is planning a program for climate change movement leaders on neuro-economics exploring how we evolved neurologically, how our make-up is culturally programmed, and how our seemingly automatic behaviors that accelerate and react to climate change can be
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Jonathan F. P. Rose
is co-founder of the Garrison Institute, with his wife, Diana Rose. Jonathan F.P. Rose’s business, not-for-profit and public policy work focuses on integrating transportation, housing, environmental and open space policies to create healthy equitable metropolitan regions. In 1989, Mr. Rose founded Jonathan Rose Companies LLC, a multi-disciplinary real estate development, planning, consulting and investment firm, as a leading green urban solutions provider. The company’s mission is to repair the fabric of communities. The firm draws on its human capital, financial depth and real estate expertise to create highly integrated solutions to real estate challenges. For more information on the Institute and its Transformational Ecology programs, write to: transformationalecology@garrisoninstitute.org www.garrisoninstitute.org.
reprogrammed through contemplative and intentional practices. Just as learning networks and new management approaches are transforming business models, reprogramming our framework for economic decisions could transform economic models and give us new forms of local economic development, financing, food systems, and other alternatives to the unsustainable aspects of the current global system. The program is part of the Institute’s Initiative on Transformational Ecology, seeking to reframe and solve ecological problems through a more holistic understanding of the world as an interconnected web of life, looking beyond technocratic approaches to an integrative one that appeals to shared values, shifts worldviews and changes behavior in ways that resonate throughout the culture. It takes a whole-systems approach to problem-solving, and combining the insights of ecology, neuroscience, cognitive science, organizational development, systems thinking and contemplative traditions. A decade ago brain researchers
discovered the phenomenon of “neuroplasticity,” whereby the brain changes physiologically in contemplative practice as little as eight weeks of meditation can stimulate new dendritic growth in the brain, at any time of life. This doesn’t just stimulate new thinking; it literally changes minds, actually building new structures and capacities in the brain. Research shows that even in crises and other adverse situations, from captivity to conflict zones, contemplative practitioners respond to the world around them with decreasing negativity, anxiety or aggression and increasing compassion, creativity and altruism. The power of this inner experience can inspire and has inspired social transformation, breaking through old obstacles to achieve systemic change. Gandhi tapped it with his satyagraha movement and transformed India. Imagine what impact a new Gandhi or Martin Luther King might have on climate change today. Last year the Garrison Institute did just that, gathering climate change and Gandhian movement leaders from
around the world to envision ways that Gandhian ideas and tactics, and the larger lineage of nonviolent thought, could transform the climate movement. Now imagine what impact a large number of ordinary people can have on the global environment and economy as our thinking and our brains themselves literally evolve. Armed with new technology and much more information about the impacts of our choices, finally undeceived about the shortcomings of the existing system and the centrality of the environment to economics, able to perceive the larger systems within which we make decisions and to experience our sense community and interdependence on global scale, capable of great mental resilience, creativity, adaptation and growth, ordinary people embracing new modes of thought hold the key to solving our environmental and economic problems. Luckily, unlike approaches to change that rely exclusively on markets, money, energy, technology or hard power, new thinking is an unlimited and infinitely renewable resource. 107
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By Lara FAHS
THE GREEN PARTY OF LEBANON A PIONEER in Lebanon and the Arab world
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fter decades of u n co n sc i o u s n ess, neglect and voluntary degradation, environment in Lebanon finally has a strong voice to defend it and speak on its behalf: the Green Party of Lebanon.
The Party’s mission and role
The Green Party of Lebanon strives to preserve the environment for the sake of the health of future generations and to stop environmental degradation and repairing what can be repairable. The Party works towards prioritizing environmental issues and participates in raising environmental awareness of Lebanese citizens. The Party will also focus on putting out a global environmental strategy for Lebanon The idea first emerged in 2004 but it was until June and on integrating sustainable developmental in 2008 that key persons coming from different environmental policies. At the policy level, the Green backgrounds decided to work hand in hand with well Party of Lebanon will keep a watchful eye over the established environmental experts to found the Party. ministry of environment to support it and at the same time hold it accountaA unique political party with ble and will do the same an environmental aim in the with other ministries working Arab world and more speon environmental issues. The cifically a first in Lebanon, it Party will promote environdefines itself as an envimental issues so that environmental,developmental, ronmental concerns become secular, democ-ratic and an integral part of political modern party en-deavoring programs of other parties. The for Lebanon to remain an Party will work to energize the inherited national treasure, role of environmental NGOs and protected by a modern secular civil associations in order to state that adopts sustainable improve their performance. The development in all of its Party will also work on reviving economic and social policies. the local environmental press The Party’s motto is that “Earth and on developing a close has no Sect” and that all collaboration with the United Lebanese of all ages are resNations and other International ponsible for preserving their programs in order to accompany inherited legacy. global environmental progress. Mr. Philippe Skaff, president of the Party. 108
Eco-Living These objectives have been set based on the Party’s 10 principles: One: The Oneness of Man and Nature The Green Party of Lebanon believes that man and nature are inextricably linked and share a common future on this planet. The Party supports human modernity on condition that it leverages the exploitation of limited natural resources and does not upset the balance of natural systems whereas future generations will enjoy a healthy environment and a proud inherited legacy.
Two: Sustainable Development Sustainable development is the improvement of the quality of human life through the rational and insightful exploitation of environmental resources. The Party believes that real development and modernization reside in people’s conscience and in the availability of a wide variety of choices that do not exclusively result from technological and economic progress. The resources available on this planet are limited hence, boundless economic consumption damages life on earth; to this end the use of resources should be leveraged and the reliance on alternative energy increased.
Three: Respect for Diversity and Difference The Party believes in the richness of diversity and the right to be different. The Party respects political, cultural, religious, ethnic and gender diversity and endeavors to improve interaction and dialogue. The Party also endeavors to understand the peculiarities of diversity and difference.
Four: Equal Rights and Duties for Men and Women The Party believes in the central role of women in politics and public policy and encourages women to prove themselves and their abilities in politics by joining the Party to straddle its causes and assume the highest responsibilities.
Five: Democracy, Freedoms and Human Rights The Party believes in a democratic system that fosters human rights and guarantees personal and public freedoms. The Party endeavors to render the people as the source of all powers by providing ample opportunities of empowerment. The Party seeks a modern electoral law with proportional representation that promotes the principles of fairness and equality between citizens and allows youth and women the opportunity to take part in the core of political life in Lebanon.
Six: Modern State and Citizenship The Party endeavors to found the pillars of a modern state in Lebanon by extracting sectarianism from political texts and from people’s minds and by adopting secularism and the respect for religious beliefs while promoting citizenship. The Party believes in a state with integrity free of corruption and bribery and in the capacity of Lebanese society to advance a system based on accountability, monitoring and transparency.
Seven: Sound Administrative Decentralization The Party believes in a modern and sound administrative decentralization system where people at the local level are able to make decisions on issues affecting their daily lives and in a way that they can utilize natural resources responsibly and rationally while appreciating the value and scarcity of these resources and protecting the cultural legacy.
Eight: A Free and Orderly Economic System The Party believes in a free economic system where the modernization of society, promoting individual entrepreneurship and a defined role of the state are its main objectives. The Party recognizes the importance of thoughtful economic planning to promote new, income generating productions in rural areas; protecting manual labor; preventing monopoly; and a taxation policy that protects low-income citizens. The Party endeavors to leverage public spending; the biggest waste and the largest debt are environmental.
Nine: Nonviolence The Party believes in life and world peace; in a land free of weapons of mass destruction; and in limiting ownership and abuse of arms. The Party apposes all forms of violence, terrorism and wars; and all forms of intimidation and domination wherever they came from and irrespective against whom they are practiced.
Ten: Openness and International Cooperation The Party sees Lebanon’s relationship with its Arab neighbors as voluntary, open to modern trends and based on good neighborliness. Lebanon is a vital nation in the international system especially in the Mediterranean basin, abiding by international conventions and the respect of sovereignty and independence of each country. The Party believes in positive nonalignment and rejects political axes. The Party supports all countries that respect human rights and the principles of environmental protection and respect Lebanon’s freedom and independence. Í 109
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Signing the environmental pact in this picture, Sheikh Sami Gemayel with Mr. Philippe Skaff and Mrs. Nada Zaarour.
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Despite the deeply rooted sectarian mentality in the Lebanese political system and the current tense and critical political juncture, more than 500 members to date have joined the Party. Members come from all Lebanese regions, residents and expatriates, representing various movements, affiliations and denominations sharing the Party’s principles and ideals as their common ground. This proves that an environmental conscience started to emerge in Lebanon not only thanks to the images and messages spread by international and local media but also due to the fact that Lebanon, once a natural haven, needs unfortunately to take some immediate measures to tackle this fierce and soon to be irreversible environmental degradation.
The Green Party of Lebanon’s Environmental Pact: laws and measures to stop the environmental bleeding Based on this critical situation, the Green Party of Lebanon declares the “environmental State of emergency” and launches its Environmental Pact that includes a twenty-point program, notably draft laws to establish a “Green Brigade”, which is an environmental security body that falls under the authority of the Lebanese Armed Forces and is 110
composed of security forces assigned by the different ministries in charge of environmental issues; an environmental attorney general office; as well as the adoption of a national reforestation plan. The themes that the Environmental Pact addresses include legal means to protect the environment; the ministry of Environment; the Directorate of Urban Planning; national forest; biodiversity; rural development, administrative decentralization, as well as suggestions regarding water, energy and waste management. The Environmental Pact has adopted a large number of studies as well as technical and legal proposals, such as: the right for NGOs to sue for environmental violations, affiliate the municipalities with the ministry of Environment, adopt the national master plan for managing the Lebanese territories, free the public maritime and non-maritime properties from all kind of occupations, increase green spaces up to 20% of Lebanon’s total area. The Green Party of Lebanon also called for increasing the budget of the ministry of Environment, as well as obtaining a permanent commitment from future governments to designate a minister of Environment with a background in environmental activism and expertise. The
Environmental Pact also included practical measures to ration energy consumption and improve waste management. The Green Party of Lebanon has started to contact other political parties and leaders to present the Pact to them for signature and to collaborate together to implement it. Recently, a delegation from the Party met officially with Prime Minister Fouad Sniora who showed a lot of interest in the Party’s goals and fight. The Prime Minister, who personally also declared until this moment, the Kataeb Party represented by Sheikh Sami Gemayel signed the Pact on March 21st 2009 during a joint press conference with the Green Party of Lebanon represented by its president Mr. Philippe Skaff and its Vice-president, Mrs. Nada Zaarour. The heads of the parliamentary Environment and Health committees, MPs Akram Chehayeb and Atef Majdalani also signed the Environmental Pact. The Green Party of Lebanon might not be able to solve all the issues at hand because of all the obstacles that are standing in its way. However, many tend to see the Party as a national necessity by playing a vital role in transforming the mentality of the Lebanese and by putting forward environmental issues on the political and socio-economic national agenda.
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ECO-INNOVATION The key to Europe’s future competitiveness ¯ Eco-innovation is any innovation (new technology, product,process or service) that can contribute to environmental protection or a more efficient use of resources. ¯ Environmental technologies are a central element of the European Union’s approach to major environmental challenges such as climate change, natural resource scarcity and dwindling biodiversity. ¯ Viable technological solutions are already available to remedy many of the environmental challenges we face, but their commercial take-up can be hampered by numerous obstacles. ¯ If environmental technologies are to be adopted widely, economic and regulatory barriers must be removed and research,investments and awareness must be promoted. ¯ Opportunities for environmental technologies are greater in the European single market than in smaller national markets. ¯ Research is crucial to realizing the full potential of the fast-growing eco-industries sector and to triggering a wave of innovation and job creation. 112
Eco-Living New challenges call for new solutions The world is facing serious environmental problems such as climate change, the depletion of natural resources, air pollution and biodiversity loss. All of these issues have potentially disastrous implications for life on earth. Novel solutions and more environmentallyfriendly technology must be developed if such problems are to be avoided or minimized. Europe needs to do more with less. Maximizing efficiency at all stages of production is crucial. Eco-innovation is the innovation process to develop and bring to the markets new environmental technologies, products and services that reduce the overall impact on the environment. Business and innovation can together create sustainable solutions that make better use of precious resources and reduce the negative side-effects of our economy on the environment. Environmental techno-logies can help reduce energy and resource consumption and produce less waste and fewer greenhouse gas emissions. For example, emissions avoided as a result of energy saved during production or by driving more environmentally- friendly cars, contribute to fighting climate change.
Boosting competitiveness and environmental protection A clean and healthy environment is essential for maintaining prosperity and a high quality of life in Europe. But the strength and competitiveness of the economy is also essential if this quality of life is to be maintained. Developing and promoting new solutions is fundamental to triggering the potential for economic benefits through cost savings, innovation and international trade. Eco-technologies can unlock potential markets, foster innovation, increase European competitiveness
and create new high-skilled jobs. The European Union recently launched the Lead Market Initiative and identified several market sectors which are future high-growth areas in Europe. Most of the sectors identified as lead markets, such as sustainable construction, recycling, bio-based products and renewable energy, are prime markets for eco-innovation.
A growing business sector It is not just the environment which stands to gain from eco-innovation. The world market for environmental products and services is growing every year. Europe is in a strong position to lead the way in using the power of innovation to meet today’s environmental challenges and also has a great opportunity to step up its investment in this relatively new sector. In recent years, the ecoindustries have emerged as an important segment of the European economy. This sector has an estimated turnover of around €227 billion, corresponding to 2.2% of EU GDP – greater than the European aerospace or pharmaceutical industries – and employs 3.4 million people directly. The market for environmental technologies grows as their potential continues to improve. Certain sectors are expanding at a remarkable rate in Europe and around the globe – over 20% annually for some renewable energy sources such as wind power. Europe has roughly one third of the world market of ecotechnologies, which is projected to double from its current level to €1000 billion by 2020.
Obstacles to getting from research to market While Europe has a reputation for being a leader in new technology development, it isn’t always easy getting a product or service from the research stage to the market. There are many barriers to the development and wider use of environmental technologies. Í
WHAT ARE ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGIES?
Environmental technologies are technologies that are less environmentally harmful than the alternatives. They include technologies and processes to manage pollution, products which are less resource-intensive, and services and processes that manage resources more efficiently. Environmental technologies can be found in nearly all economic sectors, including pollution control, water and waste management, and energy generation. These technologies also produce fewer emissions, generate less waste, have a limited impact on health and biodiversity and generally help reduce costs and improve competitiveness.
WHAT IS ECO-INNOVATION? Eco-innovation refers to all forms of innovation – technological and non-technological, new products and services and new business practices – that create business opportunities and benefit the environment by preventing or reducing their impact, or by optimising the use of resources (including energy use). Eco-innovation is closely related to the development and use of environmental technologies and also to the concepts of ecoefficiency and eco-industries. The common aim is to contribute to more sustainable production and consumption patterns. Practical examples of eco-innovation include processes to recover valuable substances from waste water, more efficient food packaging, the production of construction materials from recycled waste, eco-products and new management methods. For examples visit the ETAP website (see back page) and the EU’s European Business Awards for the Environment website at: http://ec.europa.eu/ environment/awards/index_en.htm. 113
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The market for environmental technologies grows as their potential continues to improve. Certain sectors are expanding at a remarkable rate in Europe and around the globe.
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THE EU ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGIES ACTION PLAN (ETAP) The European Commission set up the Environmental Technologies Action Plan in 2004 to speed up the removal of financial, economic and institutional barriers to the development of environmentally friendly technologies and to increase market take-up. The plan includes nine priority measures in three broad areas: getting from research to market; improving market conditions; and acting globally. The measures are undertaken by the European Commission, national and regional authorities, industries and research organizations. EU countries have developed and are implementing
national roadmaps for environmental technologies under the plan. Current key priorities are mobilizing finance and other actions to promote market opportunities for businesses involved in environmental technologies This includes establishing credible verification of environmental performance to boost confidence in eco-technologies. Tools will be also developed to monitor, benchmark and boost the uptake of ecoinnovation. For example, a networked observatory on eco-innovation will provide relevant statistics and analysis on emerging trends and global business opportunities.
THE SUSTAINABLE CONSUMPTION AND PRODUCTION AND SUSTAINABLE INDUSTRIAL POLICY ACTION PLAN The European Commission launched an Action Plan on Sustainable Consumption and Production and on Sustainable Industrial Policy in July 2008. It aims to improve the overall environmental performance of products throughout their life-cycle, promoting and stimulating demand for better products and production technologies, and helping consumers to make better choices. 114
Encouraging market take-up The challenge is to improve the overall environmental performance of products throughout their lifecycle, to boost the demand for better products and production technologies and to help consumers make informed choices. Sustainable consumption and production maximises the potential for businesses to transform environmental challenges into economic opportunities and provides a better deal for consumers. To encourage greater take-up of environmentally-friendly technologies the European Union is using tools such as green public procurement(the process by which public authorities seek to reduce the environmental impact of good and services they buy), eco-labelling, financial incentives, voluntary agreements, industry standards and market mechanisms like tradable permits. Eco-labels, for example, enable consumers to easily identify and select environmentally friendly goods and services, while environmental technology verification, which provides reliable information on the environmental performance, will help producers to convince markets of the merit of new technology. The EU has also designed specific financial measures to share the risks of investing in eco-innovation. The rules on state aid for environmental protection have been adapted to allow more effective support for innovative technologies. Evidence shows that well designed environmental
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legislation in areas such as waste electronics, eco-design, soil remediation and industrial pollution control acts as a driver for innovation. Results from companies that comply with such legislation show that their overall costs have decreased significantly.
Working together EU Member States have an important role to play in supporting and promoting new technologies. The majority of them have established national roadmaps to implement the Environmental Technologies Action Plan (see box), highlighting national programmes that support innovation and environmental technologies. The European Union is also working with other countries and regions to promote sustainable development on a global scale. It is especially important for developing countries, where addressing the detrimental environmental impact of production activities and lessening the impact of a growing population on scarce
resources is becoming increasingly urgent. In international discussions, the European Commission actively advocates the reduction or removal of trade tariffs on environmental products, technologies and services.
Changing the way we consume and produce There are many areas where technology is helping us to solve the major environmental challenges facing us. But technology alone is not the answer. Big changes are needed to the way we consume and produce goods and services. The market price of many conventional products and services often does not reflect their true costs. The manufacture of products often involves emissions but these are not included in the price. The healthcare costs arising from illnesses relating to correspondingly higher pollution levels are similarly not included. European consumers and producers need to play their part in a low carbon, highly energyefficient economy in order to protect and preserve the planet.
To encourage investment in environmental processes and technologies, the EU has developed a range of instruments that focus on environmental innovation and entrepreneurship. Under the EU’s new Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP), a total of €430 million is available for the promotion of ecoinnovation through different forms of assistance, like risk capital financing or networking activities. €195 million has been earmarked to support first application and market replication projects on eco-innovation, reaching out to the business sector. For more information, visit: http://ec.europa.eu/ecoinnovation/
Under CIP Intelligent Energy Europe Programme €730 million is available to foster energy efficiency and renewable energies. The programme aims to improve market conditions for untapped opportunities to save energy and encourage the use of renewable energy sources. For more information, visit: http://ec.europa.eu/ intelligentenergy/
There are also financing opportunities for environmental services and technologies under the EU’s funding programme LIFE+. It will co-finance projects that contribute to the development and demonstration of innovative policy approaches,technologies, methods and instruments, mainly targeted at the public sector. For more information, visit: <None> http://ec.europa.eu/environment/ life/ funding/lifeplus.htm
Information provided by the European Union Commission For Further information European Commission ETAP website:http://ec.europa.eu/environment/etap/index_en.htm European Commission Sustainable Consumption and Production and Sustainable Industrial Policies Action Plan http://ec.europa.eu/environment/eussd/escp_en.htm http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/environment/sip_new_pages/sip_a1_en.htm European Commission Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme webpage http://ec.europa.eu/cip/index_en.htm Executive Agency for Competitiveness and Innovation webpage :http://ec.europa.eu/eaci/ LIFE+- Financial Instrument for Environment : http://ec.europa.eu/environment/life/funding/lifeplus.htm Seventh Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development : http://ec.europa.eu/research/fp7/ 115
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SEAWATER+CO2= ACID OCEAN & NO MORE FISH "Ocean acidification is the flipside of global warming. Whatever you put into the air winds up in the ocean. It affects everything about how we live." Elizabeth KOLBERT, The New Yorker magazine
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ome of the excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is dissolving into seawater. It's changing the pH, making seawater more acidic; some say "corrosive." This water actually dissolves the shells of certain shellfish and coral reefs. The effects are working their way up the food chain. A Sea Change is a new documentary about ocean acidification directed by Barbara Ettinger and produced by Sven Huseby of Niijii Films. Chock full of scientific information, the film is also a beautiful pane to the ocean world and an intimate study of a family. The USA premiere was on March 14, 2009, at the DC Environmental Film Festival, Baird Auditorium, National Museum of Natural History.â&#x20AC;&#x2122; The premiere at the DC
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Environmental Film Festival was full to overflowing. Attendance broke all records in the history of the Baird Auditorium, and the 17 years of the festival. 565 seats filled, another 40 people standing and 150 who couldn't get a seat; among which NBC4 Anchor Wendy Rieger's. The Director Barbara Ettinger and co-producer/protagonist Sven Huseby were received with a standing ovation following the screening. And two-thirds of the audience stayed for the Questions & Answers , moderated by Brad Warren, Sustainable Fisheries Partnership. The panel included special guests Dr. Richard Spinrad, Assistant Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Eco-Living 2009 screening events, public and private: > MARCH Alaska Marine Conservation Council hosts a series of sneak previews in coastal Alaska, linking marine conservation, climate change, and sustainable fisheries. Explorers Club NY Open House-screening the film's opening at the invitation of the Maine Environmental Research Institute (MERI), to kick off their panel on the ocean Ocean Crisis Day, Sacramento, CA-NRDC California screening an excerpt of the film for state officials.
> APRIL Alaska Conservation Foundation NRDC New York Earth Day Eve at National Constitution Hall in Philadelphia Earth Day screenings the NY Yacht Club (members only), and Stony Brook University for Earth stock European Geosciences Union
Conference in Vienna, Austria-screening an excerpt in a lunchtime session, with Q&A including ocean acidification expert Dr. Jelle Bijima following. International Symposium in Marine Sciences, in Vigo, Spain. West Coast premiere of A Sea Change at the San Francisco International Film Festival, three screenings; April 25, April 27, and April 30. (For details please visit the festival website, beginning March 31.)
> JUNE World Ocean Day, celebrated Saturday, June 6, will have its series of screenings of A Sea Change around the world. Screenings already confirmed in the USA and Spain. Other possibilities include venues in Canada, Israel, France, Iceland, and Australia.. > JULY The Leadership Forum at Silver Bay (for conference participants)
"A Sea Change," which was co-produced by Huseby and directed by Barbara Ettinger, looks terrific, with lots of breathtaking footage of the natural world, from the tiniest pteropod (the fluttery, plank tonic sea snail that is most threatened by acidification) to the most majestic Norwegian scenery. And, at a time when plenty of documentaries want to be the "Inconvenient Truth" of fill-in-the-issue, "A Sea Change" brings a genuinely important subject to the fore with a welcome lack of jargon and preaching." Ann Hornaday The Washington Post
regarding the threat of ocean acidification, touching people's hearts, actually screening during COP-15, or all of the above.â&#x20AC;? The producers are inviting any interested person by either setting up a series of screenings which might kick off on World Ocean Day; or by helping them to strategize about setting up the syndicated panel that will be visualizing for World Ocean Day. The other possibility offered by the producers is to use a 20-minute excerpt of A Sea Change to complement discussion of climate or ocean issues among policy makers.
Administration (NOAA), Dr. Richard Feely of NOAA and the University of Washington, and David Rockefeller, Jr., Co-Founder of Sailors for the Sea. While in DC, Barbara and Sven met with Rep. Norman Dicks a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee. They also met with Erik Solheim, the Norwegian Minister of the Envi-ronment and International Deve-lopment. Television segments on NBC, ABC, Link TV, and NRK, national Norwegian TV covered the event.
What else is in the works The team is especially interested in events leading up to COP-15 right now; Which begins at the end of November 2009, and is the international follow-up to Kyoto. â&#x20AC;&#x153;WE HAVE BIG DREAMS! and, we want A Sea Change to make a difference in Copenhagen. Whether by informing Americans so that we become more active participants in the discussion, raising awareness among the international community
The film producers would like as well the film A Sea Change to screen on university campuses across the US and the world to support raising awareness about COP-15. Many NGOs are already leveraging the film to support their missions. Like Seafood Choice Alliance, People for Puget Sound, Montezuma Climate Action Network, and more in the works.
For further information: www.aseachange.com 117
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By Alya KEBIRI
SIWA ADRÈRE AMELLAL ECOLODGE "At night it is so quiet that you begin to hear the stars.” Benedict Allen, “Desert Retreats”, Harper’s Abroad, June 2002
The ecolodge has been built with great socio-cultural and environmental sensitivity. It is an all-natural Casbah styled lodge that blends perfectly with the rugged stone cliffs at its back. 118
Eco-Tourism Spanish resort? Is there anything at all that could be called ecotourism? The first principle as noted by The International Ecotourism Society (TIES) is to minimize impact which implies running your business on a smaller scale. But that is not the only reason why the bigger resorts fall short when it comes to provide a less eco-hostile tourist experience. Five other principles are listed by TIES and which have been more or less adopted:
Siwa was renowned in ancient times as one of the world's most important oracle centers. Alexander the Great braved the dangers of the Sahara and traveled to Siwa on horseback seeking inspiration before heading off to conquer the world.
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ravelling and tourism is the third biggest industry worldwide and has been growing at a fast rate. The WTO forecasts 1.6 billion international tourist trips for 2020, 400 million of which being long distance trips between continents. We all know it by now: travelling is bad for the environment. Eco-friendly travelling does not exist, only less eco-hostile. So, if travelling is bad for the environment, then what is ecotourism? And why is it considered “ecotourism” when 15 people visit a northern Thai village that never heard about recycling, and not when 500 people sort their waste in a
Build environmental and cultural
tee, holds over 14 meetings a year that include top environmentalists, cabinet ministers, scientists, and ecotourism professionals. They do important work, including protecting natural areas and cracking down on illegal hunting. The passage of a law in 1983 has also led to the declaration of 27 Protected Areas in Egypt (seen in the map above) that represent most of the habitats and ecosystems in Egypt. But the Committee isn’t willing to stop there, they want to increase the number of Protectorates to 40 by the year 2017.
awareness and respect.
Provide positive experiences for
Egypt's Western Desert
both visitors and hosts. Provide direct financial benefits for conservation. Provide financial benefits and empowerment for local people. Raise sensitivity to host countries' political, environmental, and social climate.
One destination where a successful ecotourism spot has developed is Egypt's Western Desert. Located about 70km east of the Libyan border, lies the fertile depression of Siwa, one of the largest oasis in Egypt. Siwa is inhabited by a community that recently emerged from centuries of isolation. The Siwan people have their own culture and customs and, beside Arabic, they speak own Berber (Amazigh) language. Women still wear traditional costumes and silver jewellery and Siwa remains one of the best places to buy traditional local handicrafts.
This is about respecting the limitations of a location and its ability to withstand visitors. Ecotourism must not create friction between different locations within an area. Sometimes the analysis and debriefing after a trip is as important as the initial planning, occasionally you might have to re-evaluate whether or not your trip was ecological. Maybe local guides and partners no longer respect your wish to have a miniscule footprint on your surroundings. Many trips labelled as ecotourism to subSaharan Africa during the late 80’s have left substantial scars in the form of damaged biodiversity and erosion.
Egypt’s Ecotourism Committee In contrast to ecotourism in other countries in the Middle East, such as Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Iran, there is an extremely active Ecotourism Committee in the Egyptian Tourism Federation, which makes ecotourism in Egypt especially diverse, authentic, and unique. Since 1997 Egypt’s Ecotourism Commit-
The projects in place aim at promoting Siwa’s environment and its cultural and artistic heritage by working closely with both investors and tourists, cooperating with the local authorities and the private sector to promote ecotourism, training the local guides and fostering the creation of an ecotourism association, enhancing natural and cultural resources and advocating for sustainable development as a mean to increase the income of the local people. The Siwa Sustainable Development Initiative, for instance, is a private sector led initiative, underwritten by private investment rather than the traditional development framework. It demonstrates that a socially 119
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Adrére Amellal the 11th century style ecolodge in Egypt untouched western desert
responsible and environmentally sound business approach can be financially rewarding. The initiative is an integrated development plan that addresses economic, cultural, and environmental challenges. It has revived traditional Siwan architectural styles as well as traditional embroidery skills, both of which were becoming extinct, and created awareness among the local community and the authorities of economic value of preserving the Siwan cultural heritage, thereby ensuring sustainability of the approach.
desert, an all-natural Casbah styled lodge that blends perfectly with the rugged stone cliffs at its back. The man behind this “peace of heaven” is Cairo’s businessman, Mounir Neamatalla, seeking to turn Siwa into Egypt's premier eco-tourism destination. The Ecolodge offers travelers a return-to-nature experience in a unique ecological and cultural setting. With the help of the old generation of builders, the Ecolodge has revived centuries-old building that were being replaced by modern and inappropriate technologies.
the Adrère Amellal ecolodge
Derelict Siwan houses were restored and extended, using kershef - a mixture of rock salt and mud - to build the walls, a method that keeps indoor temperatures moderate and
The centerpiece of the initiative is the Adrère Amellal ecolodge: an 11th century style mud-brick palace, in Egypt's untouched western 120
ensures that the structures blend with the environment. The entire lodge is free of electricity and telephones, in keeping with the lifestyle of the oasis. Natural breezes produced by strategically placed doors and windows eliminate the need for air conditioning, while oil lamps and candles are used for lighting and braziers for heating. Adrère Amellal- which means "White Mountain" - nestles in a remote oasis fed by some 230 natural freshwater springs, where the locals have lived their culture for more than 10,000 years and where electricity and TV were unknown until the late 1990s. Overlooking ancient olive and palm groves, Siwa's largest salt lake, and the dunes of the Great Sand Sea
Eco-Tourism
Adrère Amellal is truly in harmony with its environment. The simple furniture draws exclusively on natural materials, traditional design, and local skills. A team of trained Siwan staff offers quality hospitality services and the ecolodge, which is a product of the ancient wisdom and creativity of Siwan master builders and craftsmen whose trades were becoming extinct, has led to a revival of traditional building techniques in the oasis.
with its ancient olive and palm grove, slow bubbling Roman springs and the great Sahara stretching out into the distance. Who knew life in a mud hut could be this good? Siwa was renowned in ancient times as one of the world's most important oracle centers. Even Alexander the Great braved the dangers of the Sahara and traveled to Siwa on horseback seeking inspiration before heading off to conquer the world - no doubt you'll be inspired as well.
Within a few days, you'll find yourself shedding your crazily restrictive clothes in favour of the looseflowing djellaba, just as you lose touch with the trivial annoyances of everyday life in exchange for the slow and steady rhythm of the lodge
Mr. Neamatalla's company; Environmental Quality International (EQI), also runs the Shali Lodge, located on the other side of Lake Siwa. Under the ecotourism component, EQI introduced the concept of restoration and commercial utilization of
Siwan master builders and craftsmen whose trades were becoming extinct, has led to a revival of traditional building techniques in the oasis.
dilapidated and abandoned properties surrounding the historic fortress of Shali, near the center of the town. As a result, the heritage hotel, called Albabenshal was created. A total of 11 rooms are now operating in this once abandoned area, serving as a demonstration of the economic and environmental soundness of the approach. 121
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By Tala AL-KHATIB
LEBANON: QOLEILEH MARINE HIMA Visitors will be filled with a sense of awe as the sun creeps into the deep blue sea.
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ne trip thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s well worth doing is a one hour thirty minutes ride from Beirut towards the south of Lebanon, a whirlwind journey that whisks into a very different world, Qoleileh village that will never be forgotten for the way it extends charm and magic to the world-weary. Qoleileh is a coastal village located in the southern
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corner of Tyre Caza, surrounded by Ras El-Ein from the North, Henneyeh from the South, Zibqeen from the East and the Mediterranean Sea from the West. It is inhabited by 6,000 people, mostly farmers and fishermen, with whom connection provides an insight into the areaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s history, archeology and rich cultural heritage, and how they are related to the local
Eco-Tourism geography and climate. It supports an ecosystem of high value, particularly protected within the wet part of the village, Qoleileh Marine Hima, which lies at the heart of the southern Lebanese coast.
What is a Hima? Many of you must be asking “what is a Hima”? A Hima is a traditional system of natural resource tenure that has been practiced for more than 1500 years in the Arabian Peninsula. The Arabic word “Hima” literally means “a protected area” that is employed for the public good. While the concept is simple, the idea is not new; it tends to get well known for securing sustainable use of natural resources by and for the people. In other words, it is community-based conservation area
that considers interaction between nature conservation and human well-being.
“Why Qoleileh?” It is probably the question arising now. Shedding the light back on Qoleileh Marine Hima, it was declared by the municipal council, and established by the Society for the protection of Nature in Lebanon (SPNL), in January 2007. It is characterized by a sandy beach with few rocky areas, extending to around 4 km along the coastline at a width of 100m, and is unique in that it promotes Qoleileh’s natural and cultural heritage in a truly dramatic setting that is dominated by natural scenery that possesses exceptional coastal landscapes.
The drama of this landscape is evident at the moment of arrival. Sweeping in towards the coastline, visitors are welcomed by the waves that lash gently from the endless body of water against the golden sand. Moving further into the Hima, visitors will come across a small house coupled with a huge watching tower, surrounded by areas densely cloaked with bands of citrus trees and banana plantations, many of which are festooned with green patterns clinging to the land and melting into the panoramic sea vista. Visitors can’t but notice that the Hima is also a rich haven for a large variety of shore birds, sea mammals and turtles, multi-colored fish,
Qoleileh is characterized by a sandy beach with few rocky areas, extending to around 4 km along the coastline at a width of 100m
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Tyreâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s historical marks could be seen, arranged in a decorative pattern presenting a remarkably smooth center face to the Hima.
pebbles and sand altogether. This provides a setting of enchanting beauty for wildlife treasure, and a source of income for local fishermen, who have taken the Hima as their home for thousands of years, and are always spotted making their way into the water to collect fish either for consumption by their families or for sale in the local market of Tyre, displaying a hardy character that they are able to cope with the difficult fishing conditions. Gazing from the shoreline for about a few kilometers, a peppering of Tyreâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s historical marks could be seen, arranged in a decorative pattern presenting a remarkably smooth
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center face to the Hima. These were what the Roman left when they had once pre-occupied this area. Climbing up the tower, eyes open onto a viewing platform from where one could look out towards the village hills and across the rugged picturesque blend of the sea plain supinely mingling with the green mangrove and stretching away into the hazy distance, the scene which is the most attractive feature of the Hima that could be seen from the tower.
Protecting the Marine Environment As far as can be ascertained, this
marine Hima is successful in protecting the marine environment, which has been spared the ravages of fishing by dynamite and poison, and has been marked with suitable diving spots. Turning off the marine Hima into the village, visitors will arrive at the shrine of Prophet Umran, father of Virgin Mary, a known destination for tourism, in addition to other unexplored Romanian ruins. They will also be welcomed by the hospitality of the courteous villagers, who have always held liberality and good will within their hearts. Apart, there is so much to see and
Eco-Tourism
do in Qoleileh to experience the delights on offer. The marine Hima has exciting potential nature tours such as swimming, bird watching, camping and other nature-based pursuits for the adventurous, who will get the chance to explore the clarity of the historic connection between the village and the sea. Visitors get to congregate by the Hima to enjoy nature with the locals and awaken their awareness to the area’s rich cultural heritage, which is very heartening indeed. Visitors even get to try locally made food treasures, whose exquisite quality is a testament to the
skills of the local women of Qoleileh village. Visitors will also be filled with a sense of awe as the sun creeps into the deep blue sea, when the sight and sound of the sea make a fascinating evening stroll. Heading back to Beirut and referring to the very well-known motto “please take only pictures and leave only footprints”, one can not but think about the motto once more. Having certainly taken lots of pictures, one fully intends to return very soon to leave still more footprints in those yet to be further explored areas of this wonderful Marine Hima, where humans can make no exception to the rules of nature.
«Perhaps, it is in Qoleileh Marine Hima that I have learned to appreciate the beauty and diversity of the sea and its maritime resources, and to make a long story short, that is why it comes that I am pleased to be its Site Manager for three years now. Yet, several parties have been instrumental in allowing Qoleileh Marine Hima to come to life. Accordingly, and on behalf of SPNL, I would like to express our gratitude to all those who gave us the possibility to materialize this project. I want to thank BirdLife International, Care International, Euronatur, Jensen Foundation, The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), The World Conservation Union (IUCN), and The World Wildlife Fund (WWF), all of whom have contributed significantly in developing this Hima. Qoleileh’s municipality and its local community are as well to be thanked for their facilitation of all the activities under the project of the Hima. Additionally, I would like to thank World Environment TV Magazine for giving those who haven’t heard of Qoleileh Marine Hima the chance of visiting it in words and pictures. » Tala Al-Khatib
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By Piercarlo CRACHI
FUTURE INAUGURATION OF
LYBIA’S NEW MUSEUM An Unforgettable Voyage into Ancient and Modern times. A journey into Libya’s Environment.
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n September, 1st 2009 and on the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of the Libyan revolution; the “Museum of Libya” will be inaugurated. This museum will be a reflection of
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Libya's new modern and open image. Allocated in the actual People’s Palace, the museum was built buy the Italians between 1924 and 1939. The project was originally designed, in a neo-mauresc style by the Milanese
Eco-Tourism
Engineer Saul Meraviglia Mantegazza but was then executed in a more classical Arabic architecture. All the characteristics of this architecture are present: domes, wooden decorations, arcades, loggias, a big central court with its fountain covered by polychrome glass, and a large surrounding garden.
An Interactive Approach: The concept of the museum is rather a new modern interactive approach than a traditional way of conceiving a museum. Based on the “Edutainment” concept (education and entertainment); this new technology uses many different tools to guide the visitor
in an unforgettable journey in modern and ancient times. The Museum offers a wide panoramic view of Libya’s diverse environmental aspects creating a path which involves the five senses of the human being: A 360 degrees experience, inside the travel of knowledge. To enrich the traditional visual experiences; and while the sight remains the more used sense with modern and antique sculptures, paints and texts explaining the masterpieces exhibited; the five senses “sight, touch, hearing, taste and smell” are solicited in many different ways during the visit to the museum.
New technologies are used to reproduce the environment virtually giving a tridimensional vision and certain sense of reality to the visitor.
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Thematic Areas: The museum is divided in six thematic areas presenting a wide vision of what was Libya’s history and what is Libya nowadays. A beautiful country characterized by its rich heritage and traditions. The areas divided according to themes are split among different rooms and floors. The archeological rooms on the ground floor are dedicated to prehistoric sites such as L'Akakus as well as to the most important Archaeological Roman sites of Sabbratha, Leptis Magna and Cirene. Inside these rooms are exposed rare and of incredible beauty archaeological master pieces representing essentially that historical period giving the visitor a logical sequence of historical events. The visitor finds himself physically
crossing a wall made of words and ideograms that take the viewer back to the past and into the present throughout the Libyan culture, traditions and environment. Rooms dedicated to the desert, to traditions, arts and antiques, modern Arab architecture, technological innovations, the revolution of 1969, the Green Book, music, leisure, modern art pieces expressing the desert, the sea and the capital are all located on the first floor. The big central court has been conceived in a way which makes it possible to organize shows and exhibits. At the center of this court hangs a big cube made of mirrors. On each facade are projected black and white and colored pictures with a high iconological meaning. Different movies and virtual reproductions linked to each area’s
The museum is divided in six thematic areas presenting a wide vision of what was Libya’s history and what is Libya nowadays.
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theme are projected in all rooms. Through the tridimensional hologram projection representing the fog screen with mist water, or the Helios display (gas and helios), the visitor is able to see, feel, and touch (touch screen); the fog, the mist and the gas. The hearing is solicited with the use of “ringing bells” located inside each room. The viewer attracted by the sound hears the comments by standing under each bell, becoming during this moment the only person to enjoy the interactive moment. All These technologies are used to reproduce the environment virtually giving a tridimensional vision and certain sense of reality to the visitor. These truly interactive tools make it possible to the visitor to reconstruct virtual environments such as archaeological sites.
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An Unforgettable Experience: But above all the most unforgettable experience will remain the smell of the Libyan nature which is speed up through a nebula of aromas and typical essences from specific geographic areas. Throughout this journey; not only, one can smell the green tea or the odor of the sea, but
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one can also smell the spices used in the typical Libyan cuisine. The smell of; a large variety of citrus fruits, the majestic cedar trees, the magnificent palm trees, the date fruits, and the aroma of the jasmine flower are all an invitation to discover more about the wide, yet still unknown Libyan biodiversity.
Technical information: Project and direction of works: Studio Crachi- Roma
General Contractor:
Aldebaj â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Tripoli â&#x20AC;&#x201C; Libyan
Ordered by:
The Libyan Government
Execution:
Soc. Delma- Gruppo Maltauro, Italy- Lybia