A Critical Conversation on Climate Change ... - Green Choices

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284 development dialogue september 2006 – carbon tradingnologically novel in the Thai context. 132 Later on, the project developeralso noted that the project was sufficiently financially shaky thatit had to be put on hold in 2002.But even if that’s true, that wouldn’t prove that the project could be undertakenonly with carbon fi nance.No. And there’s a lot of evidence that, in fact, the prospective carbonincome of the project has no weight at all with the investors. For example,uncertainty about whether the project would ultimately be allowedto be registered with the CDM, or about whether the Thai governmentwould overcome its initially sceptical stance towards CDMprojects, does not seem to have had any effect on the project’s originalconstruction schedule. What’s more, Sarath Ratanavadi, managing directorof Gulf Electric, was quoted in the Bangkok Post on 13 June 2003as saying that Gulf Electric and EPDC ‘will go ahead with the 800 millionbaht project [Yala biomass] even without CDM’.What was DNV’s response to that?It protested that the project’s business-as-usual status ‘is not as obviousas asserted’ 133 and said it had consulted with EPDC about Sarath’sstatement.From a scientifi c point of view, that’s not terrifi cally convincing.No. For this project to be registered with the CDM would, in fact,probably be a net loss for climatic stability, since it would enable theJapanese government to write down its Kyoto commitment by half amillion tonnes of carbon dioxide without providing anything verifiablein return. Nevertheless, the controversy over Yala is representativeof the level of debate that still prevails in front of the UN committeesand panels responsible for overseeing the CDM.Well, if the project’s benefi ts for the climate can’t be verifi ed or quantifi ed, perhapswe should forget about looking at it as a carbon project and just view it asa standard development project with an unusual prospective source of funding.Does it at least provide some benefi ts for local people?Many local residents in fact quietly oppose the new development onAsia Plywood’s Yala site as being likely to reinforce local imbalancesof power over air and water quality. They’ve long felt animosity towardAP for causing pulmonary health and other problems throughsmoke and ash pollution of local air, water and land, and profess ‘notrust’ in the firm. Subdistrict officials even allege that the firm has notpaid its full share of taxes.
offsets – the fossil economy’s new arena of conflict 285Biomass is not alwaysbenign. Noo Nui, acomic figure from theshadow puppet folkloreof Southern Thailand,registers his oppositionto a proposed powerplant using wastebiomass on the groundsthat it will ‘destroythe environment’. Theproject in questiondidn’t try to gain accessto carbon finance, butis similar to one in thesame region that did.But why should any of that make any diff erence to their view of the new project?Because for them, the important thing about the project is not thetheory behind it, but who is going to carry it out. Local people mightwell agree with DNV that the disposal of rubber wood residues atAsia Plywood and other installations is ‘one of the most serious environmentalproblems in the Yala community’. But they view corporatereliability as a more important prerequisite for solving such problemsthan technical proposals. Refusing to abstract from the local politicalcontext, they see narrowly technical factors such as new equipmentor CDM certification as irrelevant as long as underlying confl icts betweencompany and community are not tackled. ‘If current problemsare not solved’, one local health official interviewed asked, ‘how arenew problems going to be addressed?’Shouldn’t DNV have taken account of such views?DNV was well aware of local people’s view that AP should solve its existingproblems with ‘noise, wastewater and solid waste’ before attemptinganything else, and should communicate the details of constructionto the community as well as involve it in monitoring. Yet it had fewincentives to take villagers’ political and social analysis seriously.DNV did write about a ‘comprehensive public participation programme’to ‘accurately inform local residents, government officialsand other concerned members of the public about the Project and expectedimpacts’ and ‘obtain feedback, mainly from the local communitiesand concerned government agencies, with regard to their opinionsand concerns about the Project’. Those to be consulted included
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PRESS RELEASEContact:Linda Chiavaro
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ContentsEditorial note 2Chapter 1 I
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editorial note 3in Dorset, UK - poi
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6 development dialogue september 20
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Chapter 2‘Made in the USA’A sho
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ways forward 335more stringent than
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ways forward 337Unlike carbon tradi
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ways forward 339hold little appeal
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ways forward 341Waiting their Chanc
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ways forward 343ways - many of whic
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ways forward 345energy - loan benef
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ways forward 347From an Open Letter
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ways forward 349be answered in the
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ways forward 351rogated by Indian v
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ways forward 353argue, they’ve he
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ways forward 355‘The US alone acc
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appendix - the durban declaration o
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appendix - the durban declaration o
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