Climate Action 2009-2010

POLICY
NATIONAL AGENDA
From a mitigation standpoint, Costa Rica is taking action
to become carbon neutral (C-Neutral) while integrating
the complex environmental, economic, human, social,
moral, cultural, educational, and political issues involved
in climate change, as well as enhancing national
competitiveness. Cost reductions are being brought
about through efficiency gains and technology as well as
increased differentiation based on growing consumers’
awareness on global warming and preferences on
goods and services with low carbon footprints (and
eventually carbon neutral). Mitigation actions will
include emissions reduction by source, carbon sinks
enhancement through reforestation and natural forest
regeneration, as well as avoided deforestation, and
the development of carbon markets and the C-Neutral
brand. The birth of C-Neutral products and services,
companies, regions and communities, among other
stakeholders, will provide incentives for action and
an additional differentiation factor for the country and
businesses’ competitive strategies.
“‘Climate quality’ will become
an important differentiator in
the marketplace
“
Costa Rica has historically devoted its electricity
generation to clean, renewable sources such as hydro,
geothermal, and wind power. In fact, 93 per cent of Costa
Rica’s electricity generation comes from these sources.
Thus, Costa Rica has a unique energy situation, as the
larger share of greenhouse gas emissions come from
the transportation sector.
In order to set the necessary frameworks to secure the
transition towards cleaner, more efficient transportation
mechanisms, the government is currently establishing
various incentives for the acquisition of clean technology
vehicles, such as a decree to reduce taxes on clean
technology vehicles and batteries. However, policies
may only be well implemented by jointly promoting the
use of cleaner transportation mechanisms through
the construction of large-scale projects such as an
urban electric passenger train, which will save enough
money through avoided oil importation to build one new
hospital every two years. Financial tools will be created
to cover the higher initial costs of cleaner technologies
in order to ensure future savings, while an appropriate
services platform, including battery recharge stations
and adequate electric distribution facilities, will be built in
order to support the success of such an ambitious project.
In the agriculture and livestock sector, Costa Rica
is currently working on various projects to calculate
more tropicalised emissions indexes in crops, derived
from IPCC standards, according to the country’s own
climate conditions and crop management practices, in
order to obtain more precise estimates for the National
Greenhouse Gas Inventory submitted in compliance
with the UNFCCC mandates. Methodologies are being
developed to detect nitrous oxide emissions levels in
coffee and banana plantations, as well as to directly
measure methane emissions in livestock, in a measurable,
reportable, and verifiable manner, in order to maintain
international credibility with the results. These experiments
are also designed to identify the best mitigation options, as
various new generation low-emission fertilisation options
are being handled and measured.
From the carbon capture and carbon sinks enhancement
perspective within the mitigation axis, Costa Rica is
implementing a new tree planting campaign (“…A que
sembrás un árbol”, a Spanish phrase which translates
into English as “We dare you to plant a tree”). In 2007,
Costa Rica planted more than five million trees, and in
2008, the figure rose to seven million, which translates
into approximately 1.5 trees per capita. This turns Costa
Rica into the nation with the highest percentage of
planted trees per person in the world.
Costa Rica has effectively managed to reverse the
process of deforestation, allowing for a forest cover
today that more than doubles that during the 1980s.
Thus, Costa Rica today has more than 25 per cent of
our national territory covered with protected forest
areas, enhanced in part through conservation and
sustainable forest management practices. Furthermore,
we are currently developing and putting in practice a
legal and institutional framework that promotes the
protection and recovery of private forests through the
payment for environmental services program (more
than 700 thousand hectares), with which the conservation
of biodiversity, scenic beauty, water resources, and
carbon fixation are being recognised. This framework
is based on the ‘polluter pays’ principle, by taxing fossil
fuels and though an enormous fiscal sacrifice.
Trends indicate that in the future, many consumers will
prefer products and services that have a reduced carbon
footprint and preferably zero climate impact (C-Neutral).
‘Climate quality’ will become an important differentiator
in the marketplace. The Government is making joint
efforts with various institutions, organisations, business
and regions that have committed themselves to
contributing towards a low carbon society, and has
established the C-Neutral brand to officially encourage
actions to reduce the carbon footprint in different socioeconomic
sectors.
Tourists will be able to fly to Costa Rica by compensating
all emissions through a clean trip initiative, and
companies will be able to promote their products, goods,
and services, as ‘Made C-Neutral in Costa Rica’. For
example, Expotur 2009, Central America’s main tourism
trade market, became the country’s first carbon neutral
fair by monitoring energy use, using climate friendly
materials, compensating all emissions, and promoting
the clean trip initiative among attendees.
Furthermore, Costa Rica is participating in the National
Economic, Environment and Development Studies
(NEEDS) for Climate Change Project, which will allow
us to identify, based on the evolution of greenhouse gas
emissions determined through the Second National
Communication, the necessary sectoral mitigation
actions, associated costs and financial and investment
fluxes, and institutional arrangements required to reach
zero net emissions by the year 2021.
In spite of these efforts, we recognise that our
development, based on renewable sources, is very
vulnerable to climate change. Costa Rica considers the
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