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However, to the extent that the plant displaced subcriticalcoal plants, it may result in emissions reductions of about10 percent—significant, but far less than the 40 percent differentialrelative to the existing coal fleet average that IFCcites in the project’s Environmental and Social Review.It is likely that IFC’s funding was required for the plantto secure financing, and its successful closure has helpedreduce doubts within the domestic banking industry aboutthe viability of such large competitively bid projects. Thusit is plausible that the project may help catalyze the Indianpower sector’s movement away from subcritical to moreefficient supercritical technologies. This provides a cleardemonstration of the WBG dilemma: the investment hassupported what will be one of the largest point sources ofCO 2on the planet, but may well have reduced them incrementallycompared to a scenario without IFC involvement.Appendix tables E.1 and E.2 summarize the five cases.The WBG had little direct impact on technology choice.Kosovo was the only case in which the WBG supported exante planning, but a definitive technology recommendationwas not made. In the other cases, technology was largelyor entirely predetermined by project sponsors before WBGinvolvement. Hence, the main potential channel of WBGinvolvement was through the decision on whether to supportthe project—and whether that decision was critical tothe fate of the project. This was likely in the case of TataMundra and possible for Maritza. There was no impact inthe cases of Lanco (which would have taken place anyway)or the Afsin-Elbistan A thermal power plant in Turkey.The WBG has little direct impact ontechnology choices.Did the WBG explore cost-effective alternatives to theseplants? (All these plants were appraised before the SFDCC.However, the IFC plants were subject to Performance Standard3, which requires investigation of alternatives.) Thebest case is that of Kosovo. The Kosovo analysis and the relatedsoutheast Europe analyses explicitly considered damagesfrom local air pollution and the systemwide impacts ofa shadow price on CO 2.Nonetheless, a recent World Bank study points to very lowelectricity tariffs in Kosovo, and high rates of nonpaymentby customers, with the result that “35–60 percent of the totalfinal energy consumption in households is technicallyor economically lost” (Renner and others 2009). Technicallosses alone are estimated at 18 percent. So there couldbe cost-effective ways to reduce excess demand, in partthrough increased technical efficiency or by boosting pricesand collections to financially sustainable levels. In the caseof India, the government reports that overall transmissionand distribution system losses are 27 percent (thoughlower in the areas served by the plant under construction).The scope for efficiency improvements in India appears tobe large and likely insufficiently tapped.Kosovo and southeast Europe analysesdemonstrate an approach for consideringdamages from local air pollution andincorporating the shadow price of CO 2.Do plant-level efficiency improvements, such as those arguablyachieved in India, promote or undermine systemwidelevels of energy intensity and CO 2intensity? It is difficultto answer this question quantitatively, but the channels ofimpact can be sketched out and in some cases the level ofimpact indicated.First, as seen in the case of the Indian power plant, WBGsupport could help reduce perceived risk of a new technologyin a new setting, catalyzing its adoption and reducingCO 2emissions against a business-as-usual scenario atsome plants. Second, such support could in theory reducethe price of coal power relative to gas or hydropower. Thiscould induce a country to shift, at the margin, to greaterinvestment in coal, counteracting the new technology’sefficiency gains.However, this risk appears to be implausible in the case ofa shifts to supercritical, ultrasupercritical, or IntegratedGasification Combined Cycle coal technologies. Thesetechnologies save fuel costs relative to subcritical coal, buthave higher capital costs and so, on balance, produce powerat about the same cost. Promotion of these technologieswould therefore be expected to reduce emissions but not toappreciably induce shifts from gas or hydropower to coal.Most difficult to assess is the symbolic or leadership impactof the WBG in supporting or disengaging from coal power.However, there are analogies in other sectors. The WBG hassupported global phase-out of leaded gasoline, prohibitionof project support for tobacco, and phase-out of gas flaringand venting. The leaded gasoline phase-out has had considerablesuccess. Tobacco and lead control offer large domesticbenefits, facilitating acceptance of the WBG role. Thegas flaring initiative also potentially offers domestic benefitsand has nominal support from many country partners.Does the WBG have a compelling role in support for makingcoal power plants more efficient? It is clear that “retail”WBG support makes little difference, one way or the other, toglobal generating capacity because of the vast scale involved.It is conceivable that such support might be essential toparticular low-income countries with poor credit and noalternative power sources. It is conceivable also that supportfor regulatory changes or pilots that promote efficient coal64 | Climate Change and the World Bank Group