The United Nations (UN) climate change secretariat has added its voice to concerns being raised about a proposal made by China’s Jiuquan Iron and Steel Company (JISCO) for the construction of a coal-fired plant in St Elizabeth.
The proposal was announced after JISCO completed a deal to acquire the Alpart alumina factory from Russian company, UC Rusal. The new Chinese owners plan to upgrade the plant with an aluminum smelter that would be powered by a 1,000-megawatt coal-fired plant.
Based on calculations provided by the CoalSwarm Global Plant Tracker, a 1,000 megawatt coal plant would produce 5.6-5.8 million tonnes of CO2 annually, increasing Jamaica’s emissions of CO2 by 79-82 per cent. Greenpeace campaigner Lauri Myllyvirta has said that the construction of the plant would violate the Paris Agreement signed under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
Commenting on the possible impact of the proposed coal plant on Jamaica’s UNFCCC standing, Nick Nuttall, UNFCCC spokesperson, pointed out that Jamaica had submitted an ambitious national climate action plan to the UN aimed at achieving a nearly eight per cent emission reduction by 2030. He also argued that the action plan promised commitments of greater investment in greener sources of homegrown energy such as wind and solar power rather than increases in oft-imported fossil fuels.
He argued that economic growth and job creation were not antithetical to environmental protection.
“Many complex choices will be made by governments over the years and decades to come, including with regard to energy sources, but today, there is an ever clearer consensus that overcoming poverty and growing GDP, which are critical for developing countries, can go hand in hand with generating new kinds of high-tech jobs; creating healthier, less polluted societies and a transition to a low carbon economy …,” he said in an email response to The Gleaner.
Prime Minister Andrew Holness has said that the Government is committed to balancing its economic-growth aspirations with its environmental and international commitments.
Comments solicited from Jamaica’s mission to the UN and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs were not forthcoming up to press time.
Director of the CoalSwarm Project Ted Nace has said that Jamaica will be unable to meet its target, of 7.8 per cent reduction in carbon emissions by 2030, should it go ahead with the commissioning of the proposed 1,000-megawatt (MW) coal-fired plant at the Alpart alumina plant which has recently been acquired by Chinese firm Jiuquan Iron and Steel Company Ltd. (JISCO).
Using the CoalSwarm Global Coal Plant Tracker, Nace shared calculations with The Gleaner, which show that a 1,000 coal plant would produce 5.6-5.8 million tonnes of CO2 annually.
Jamaica produced 7.1 million tonnes of CO2 in 2012.
“A coal plant would increase Jamaica’s emissions of CO2 by 79 per cent (for a “subcritical” plant) – 82 per cent (for a “supercritical” plant), assuming it were run at an 80 per cent capacity factor,” the coal expert said.
Pointing to the Paris country brief for Jamaica, which outlines Jamaica’s commitment under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Paris Agreement, Nace said, “such an increase would destroy any chance of meeting Jamaica’s commitment”.
VIOLATION OF AGREEMENT
Greenpeace campaigner Lauri Myllyvirta has argued that constructing the plant would violate the Paris Agreement.
“All signatories to the Paris agreement have accepted the goal of limiting global warming to 1.5-.2.0 degrees celsius. There is no more space for any new coal-fired power plants to be built under this goal, so in that sense the project does violate the basic aim of the agreement,” he said in an email response to The Gleaner.
According to the climate action plan, submitted to the UNFCCC by the Jamaican authorities, Jamaica has committed to a 7.8 per cent reduction in emissions by 2030 under its Intended Nationally Determined Contribution (INDC).
POSSIBILITY OF COAL SPILL
Jamaica signed the Paris Accords in April of this year but is yet to ratify the agreement.
“While the construction of a coal plant can produce a number of construction jobs in the short term, the number of long-term jobs is much lower, certain far lower than the number of jobs in the tourism sector,” Nace told The Gleaner.
According to the Nace, Jamaica could face the possibility of a coal spill given that coal terminals will have to be built to facilitate the importation of coal.
“Jamaica is not a major coal producer and as such coal would have to imported from a neighboring producer such as Colombia or the United States. This would mean construction of a coal terminal and the possibility of a coal spill,” he explained.
Mahlung
Kamina Johnson Smith, minister of foreign affairs and foreign trade, will this Friday represent Jamaica during the official signing of the Paris climate-change agreement in New York, following last November’s conference in France.
Some 200 countries had gathered in Paris for the COP 21 climate conference and, in December, adopted the new agreement, which aims to limit carbon emissions.
Clifford Mahlung, project administrator at the Climate Change Division in the Ministry of Economic Growth and Job Creation, told The Gleaner that the signing is a significant step towards strengthening the work that has started to mitigate the effects of climate change.
“We will be among the other heads of state who will be there. This is the first step towards becoming a party to the Paris agreement because this has to be followed up by ratification,” he said.
“The process towards ratification will require government approval, and so that process is on the way. We should be complete before the year ends.”
Mahlung said now that the agreement is open for signature by the parties to the convention, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has been asked to convene a crucial ceremony, which will be attended by United States President Barack Obama, among others.
NEED FOR SENSITISATION
Making reference to a post-COP 21 discussion held last week at the Four Seasons Hotel in New Kingston, Mahlung said it was important that Jamaicans are sensitised to the importance of the agreement, especially as it relates to carbon emissions.
“With the significance of COP 21, we decided to have this discussion one week before the official signing. This new climate-change agreement builds on the convention and provides the basis which will accommodate further work, with respect to the climate-change process,” Mahlung said.
The agreement itself consists of many areas, including the new long-term goal in keeping future temperatures well below 2˚C and pursuing efforts to keep those temperatures as close to 1.5˚C as possible.
“Even though we contribute less than one per cent to the global emissions, it is important that we do our part to control our energy output, which will signal to the emitters that we are serious about climate change, which will mean also that they have no excuse but to reduce their emissions as well,” he said.
Small island states lost out to their larger, more industrialised seniors at COP21.
The results of the climate change conference in Paris (COP21) give no reason for small island states to cheer. The agreement reflects many promises and little action.
The one item of concrete action is merely an undertaking to evaluate carbon emissions every five years — and even that has no teeth.
What is not in the agreement is a firm, legally binding commitment to limit average global temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Also, not in the agreement is a legally binding commitment to provide developing countries with the funds needed to adapt to, and mitigate against the effects of climate change.
There isn’t even a commitment to a fund, in the sum of US$100 billion a year, that was frequently touted before the conference began.
Once again, the industrialised nations of the world — the worst polluters — took advantage of the weakness of the smallest countries of the world, which are the least polluters and the biggest victims of climate change.
To their credit, though, through the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), representatives of small states did put up a good showing in Paris. Armed with the latest statistics and bolstered by a structured expert report released by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, they argued for the containment of global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, showing that, at 2 degrees, destruction would be widespread and irreversible. But, in the end, despite all the hoopla, applause and celebration, small states lost.
Representatives of AOSIS countries might have been flattered by a brief visit to them by US President Barack Obama, when he declared: “These nations are not the most populous nations, they don’t have big armies, they have a right to dignity and sense of place.” But, while President Obama was undoubtedly sincere in what he said, he also knew, even as he was saying it, that he could not deliver ratification by the US Congress of any agreement that limited carbon emissions or bound the US legally to warming no higher than 1.5 degrees Celsius.
So, the world has a so-called agreement, still to be ratified by the 196 participating countries, that only expresses an objective to limit global warming to “well below two degrees above pre-industrial levels”. The goal of 1.5 degrees Celsius, as described by Amber Rudd, the British minister for energy and climate change, is merely “aspirational”. In making her statement that the target of 1.5 degrees is aspirational, the minister was sending a clear signal to the British industrial world that driving down carbon emissions from fossil fuels is not an immediate objective and therefore will not affect their business.
In truth, the climate change action plans submitted by 188 countries would lead to a temperature rise as high as 2.7 degrees Celsius. And, if that is not bad enough, the signatories to the Paris agreement are under no legal obligation even to meet that objective; they are legally free to enlarge carbon emissions further. So, no cause for small island states to celebrate over that one, and profound reason for them to worry.
At three degrees, the size of islands will shrink, productive areas will be under water, people will have to move habitats inland and many will be forced to migrate, legally and illegally. We have to hope that all the scientists who predict this scenario are wrong.
On the money side, the developed countries declined to insert into the Paris agreement their often-made oral commitments to transfer funds to poorer countries in order to help them adapt. Yet, all the studies show that even the US$100 billion a year that was promised would not be enough to help developing countries build up a power system quickly or cheaply enough on renewable energy sources rather than coal or oil. Incidentally, even if the US$100 billion a year fund was achieved, access to it by small states in the Caribbean would be long and arduous, particularly if the criterion of “per capita” income continues to be applied as it is now by international financial institutions. The portion available to the Caribbean region would be a small fraction of the total sum.
Some may argue that there are two aspects of the Paris agreement that are beneficial to small states, therefore, attention should be paid to them. The participating countries recognised “the importance of averting, minimising and addressing loss and damage associated with the adverse effects of climate change, including weather events and slow onset events”. But, liability is completely ignored because it was opposed by the polluting industrialised countries. Recognition of a problem is far removed from committing to action to cure it.
Then there is the single binding legal requirement in the agreement. Every country is now required to come back every five years with new targets for reducing their carbon emissions. But there is no sanction if they fail to meet their previous commitment, and no sanction if they simply carry on business as usual.
COP21 in Paris may have been a triumph for some nations, but no self-respecting small island State should claim any satisfaction.
That is why each small State, individually and within the many organisations in which they are members — including AOSIS, the Commonwealth, La Francophonie, the Organization of American States and others — must now redouble their efforts to work on the developed country governments, but also to move beyond them to the conscience of the people of the industrialised world.
This is about survival and development — two defining challenges of this century for small states. It is the work of everyone; governments, businesses and civil society, all are involved and all could be consumed.
