Climate Action 2010-2011

SPECIAL FEATURE | Empresas Electricas A.G.
© Creative commons/flickr/cesargp
Mitigating climate
change in Chile:
finding solutions together
Chile is working towards reducing its emissions and is
keen to address the issue of climate change. Chile’s per
capita greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are currently
about equal to the world average but the country faces a
projected rise in emissions of up to 300 per cent over the
next two decades.
Assuming responsibility for climate change in Chile is
a key issue, especially given the country’s recent accession
to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD). At the same time, Chilean
exporters, especially those exporting environmentally
sensitive consumer products such as food and timber,
have become increasingly aware of the need to reduce
the carbon footprint of their products and operations.
The positive environmental side-effects from mitigation
and carbon sequestration activities are also starting to
be better understood and a survey this year revealed that
around two-thirds of Chileans would be willing to pay
higher prices for electricity from clean energy sources.
The Chilean government has committed to a 20 per
cent reduction in CO 2
emissions by the year 2020 against
its base line. Studies have also been conducted into the
costs of different options for mitigation and the impacts of
climate change on different productive sectors. Scenarios
have been modelled, economists have utilised tools such as
cost-effectiveness analyses, and scientists are identifying a
range of the best available mitigation technologies.
However, these actions are only part of the necessary
response. For change to materialise and be sustained in
the long term there has to be a coherent and consistent
national strategy based on the participation of a broad range
of actors, private and public, non-governmental, business
and academic. Without open, transparent and frank
discussion, little genuine transformation will take place.
Six institutions: Empresas Eléctricas, Fundación Chile,
Fundación AVINA, Fundación Futuro Latinoamericano,
Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and Universidad
Alberto Hurtado have recognised the need for greater
climate change debate and together initiated a round table
discussion with a milestone event in November this year.
The initiative, called ‘Mitigating Climate Change
– effective and efficient solutions’ aims to establish a
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platform for discussing the measures and instruments
proposed to mitigate climate change in Chile. The
information should be useful for both the private and
public sector and both should be part of the discussions.
The measures will be analysed with regard to their costeffectiveness
as well as their technical feasibility, socioeconomic
and environmental impacts and their potential
effects on cultural change.
A steering committee of 30 institutions accompanies
the initiative, made up of 11 private companies, four
industry associations, four universities and a host of
NGOs, public sector and intergovernmental organisations.
First results indicate that there is a wide range of costeffective
measures which have not been implemented due
to technical and informational barriers and technological
and regulatory lock-ins. Consensus exists around strategic
topics such as the need to strengthen the National
Agency for Energy Efficiency, a systematic programme
of capacity building and the introduction of metrics
and measurable goals in different sectors. Taxing CO 2
emissions or developing a ‘cap and trade’ system are topics
that have only recently entered the national discussion
but there is general consensus that impact evaluations of
these instruments are urgently needed.
The initiative evaluates not only the cost-effectiveness
of measures but also their positive social and
environmental impacts. Raising energy efficiency in
agriculture is particularly attractive in this context, given
its positive relation with water efficiency, as are various
measures to improve the energy efficiency of housing,
through insulation or installing efficient showers.
The measures proposed by the initiative are all
technically feasible today and many of these could be
implemented with a public-private joint effort urgently.
Even then, there is still much to be done: it is estimated
that the measures proposed so far represent about one
third of the total range of applicable measures using
currently available technology.
Website: www.cambioclimaticochile.org
www.climateactionprogramme.org