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Biogas projects await nod to go with a bang
KATHMANDU, AUG 09 -
Nepal exerts little strain on the environment, but it is immune to the problems caused by global climate change. Nepal’s low carbon economy coupled with its focus on other alternatives is beginning to be rewarded under the carbon trading scheme.
Two additional biogas projects that are regarded as Clean Development Mechanisms (CDM) will be operational in the next six months.
CDM, a provision of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, is a cooperative mechanism under the Kyoto Protocol that allows rich countries to offset some of their greenhouse gas emissions by investing in clean energy projects in developing countries.
According to Saroj Rai, Executive Director of Biogas Support Programme (BSP) Nepal, the implementing body for CDM in Nepal, two projects namely Project Activity III and Project Activity IV have already been validated by the UN body after an elaborate and stringent scrutiny and are ready to be registered in less than six months.
He said both the projects — each consisting of 20,000 plants — are in the final stage of registration and will start providing payment in a couple of years after getting Certified Emissions Reductions (CERs) from the CDM Executive Board.
Under the BSP, which is also the first CDM project in Nepal, two biogas projects, Project Activity I and Project Activity II with a total of 19,396 plants were registered with the UN authority in 2005.
In Nepal, biogas project is considered a clean technology that helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions by displacing conventionally used fuel sources for cooking, such as firewood and kerosene.
Rai said once the UN body issues CERs, the biogas projects will get money as compensation for offsetting the carbon in the atmosphere as the donor will buy the CERs from Nepal. “The World Bank (WB) has agreed to provide payment annually for both the projects,” he added.
Meanwhile, the country is already getting payments annually for the two biogas projects registered as CDMs in 2005. The WB had signed an agreement with the Alternative Energy Promotion Centre under the Ministry of Environment to provide around $400,000 ($1 is equivalent to Rs 74) annually for the next seven years for the first and second projects from 2004 and 2005, respectively.
Under an agreement signed in 2006 by the Community Development Carbon Fund, WB will pay Nepal to reduce its emissions by one million tonnes over the next seven years by increasing the use of biogas units.
The WB released $848,784 for the projects from 2004 to 2006. However, the money was not released after 2006 — following the CDM decision not to issue CERs citing ‘unacceptable’ monitoring report. The report needs to be submitted annually to the CDM executive board.
The CDM board in 2007 objected to the methodology and refused to issue CERs stating that the user survey, on which the emission reduction reports are based, was not project-specific and lacked enough information to show that the biogas plant was displacing fossil fuels.
“Having recently submitted a revised monitoring report with improved Biogas Users’ Survey in line with the board requirements, we are awaiting the final approval,” he said. “I am confident that we will be able to claim the payments halted after the issuance from the UN body soon.” With the nod, Nepal will get around $1.6 million arrears for the years from 2007 to 2010 for the first two projects.
Posted on: 2010-08-10 08:57
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