Coverage of Selected Side Events at the
Lima Climate Change Conference - December 2014

This side event, moderated by Vladimir Maksimov, Head of the Unit for Ecology and Natural Resource Use, Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation, addressed the climate policy of the Russian Federation and its goals to: achieve low-carbon sustainable development; implement environmental management systems and ecologically effective technologies; and develop the recycling industry.

Noting his country’s active involvement in the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol, Alexander Bedritsky, Advisor to the President of the Russian Federation, Special Envoy for Climate, and Head of the Delegation of the Russian Federation, stressed the country’s objectives to achieve low-carbon development and utilize ecologically efficient technologies, while addressing its socioeconomic goals. He focused on the energy sector, as the biggest contributor to anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, saying that one third of all energy produced in the Russian Federation is currently provided by non-carbon sources. He addressed policies to increase the share of renewable energy and biofuels and highlighted the absorption capacities of boreal forests.

Maksimov presented on the Russian Federation’s path towards a green economy. He underlined that the strategic target of public policy is to ensure socio-economic development, providing for environmentally oriented growth, and conservation of biodiversity and natural resources. He noted successes, including growth rates in gas utilization, as well as areas for improvement regarding GHG emissions. Maksimov focused on the transport sector, pointing out that CO2 emissions from automobiles increased by 2.5 times from 2001 to 2011 and continue growing by 30% annually. On the energy sector, he warned that without further efforts, the goal to reduce energy intensity per GDP by 40% by 2020, will barely be achieved, and the objectives on renewables lag considerably in comparison to industrialized countries.

George Safonov, Director, Center for Environmental and Natural Resource Economics, National Research University, Higher School of Economics, addressed projections and mitigation potential for long-term carbon emissions in the Russian Federation. He highlighted, inter alia: dynamics of GHG emissions by sector; projections of GHG emissions in the energy sector; and decarbonization pathways, pillars and opportunities. Safonov summarized the main solutions, including: energy efficiency improvement; maximum decarbonization of electricity production; coal to gas transformation; increased use of renewables; and carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies.

Andrey Stetsenko, Moscow State University and President of CEI, focused on forests in the Russian Federation, noting that the sector is not only absorbing but also emitting. He presented projections of CO2 net-sink in Russian forests by 2050 and addressed carbon sequestration via afforestation projects in Siberian settlements and the Bikin area. He stressed that in the new climate agreement, no discrimination should exist between tropical and boreal forests.

In the ensuing discussion, participants addressed, inter alia: whether GHG emissions in the Russian Federation will reach a peak by 2030; the country’s position in relation to the New York Declaration on Forests; and future extraction of existing fossil fuel reserves.

This event, co-moderated by Edward Perry, Climate Change Policy Coordinator, Birdlife International, and Emma Woods, Senior Policy Adviser, the Royal Society, presented an assessment of interventions that can increase resilience to weather-related hazards and discussed fundamental elements to enhancing our resilience, with a particular focus on the role of ecosystem-based approaches to adaptation.

Virgilio Viana, CEO, FAS, in a keynote presentation, stated the problem of climate change lies in a combination of factors, including the lack of resilience to extreme weather and its uneven and escalating impacts. He noted there are three categories of solutions considered by decision makers, including ecosystem restoration, engineered solutions, and a hybrid of the two. He reported on research indicating that ecosystem-based solutions proved to be more affordable and had more positive consequences, particularly over the long term.

Xianfu Lu, Coordinator of the Nairobi Work Programme, UNFCCC Secretariat, reported on a wide range of activities, mandated under the UNFCCC, and said a growing body of knowledge products are being developed. She highlighted various provisions under the Convention offering opportunities to address key gaps and challenges, and cited the Lima Adaptation Knowledge Initiative announced at COP 20.

On the advantages of the two different approaches to adaptation, Saleemul Huq, Director, International Centre for Climate Change and Development (ICCCAD), said they are complementary and should not be separated. He warned that ignoring communities at the decision-making stage, would result in decisions with unforeseen consequences for the planners.

On addressing the impacts of climate change through adaptation, Kit Vaughan, Director for Climate and Environment, CARE International, urged collaborating with all possible actors, integrating ecosystem-based and community-based approaches into all adaptation activities at scale.

Stephen King’uyu, Ministry of Environment, Water and Natural Resources, Kenya, reported that 80% of his country is vulnerable to climate events such as flooding, drought and frost among others, and lamented that adaptation suffers from a lack of funding, monitoring and evaluation, and legal frameworks.

Perry said that building resilience to extreme weather requires holistic integration of all factors into policy and practice, particularly on the role of ecosystems in adaptation strategies. He warned against maladaptation, which causes a reduction in resilience of communities, and working in silos.

Moderated by Ryan Hobert, UNF, this event showcased innovative approaches to reach the "ambitious but achievable" goal of universal energy access by 2030.

Outlining key issues around energy access as a development imperative in addressing climate change, Hobert noted that one billion people have no access to electricity and almost 3 billion are without access to clean cooking solutions. He highlighted UNF initiatives to contribute to the UN Secretary General’s Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL) goal, through the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves and the Energy Access Practitioner Network.

Discussing what is needed to “make universal energy access happen,” Simon Trace, CEO, Practical Action, cautioned against replicating traditional grid-based energy planning policies in the renewables sector, characterizing them as “anti-poor.” He advocated a transformative, “whole ecosystem” perspective that: recognizes energy needs across home, work and community; measures energy services and not merely energy supply; prioritizes and adequately finances decentralized solutions; and acknowledges the roles of government, private sector and civil society in achieving “total energy access.”

Arthur Laurent, CEO, Microsol, discussed how the social enterprise is leveraging climate finance for sustainable universal access in Peru and the Central American region. Describing some results of the gold standard-certified Qori Q’Oncha programme in Peru, he said 106,000 households were equipped with certified improved cookstoves and almost 500,000 tonnes of CO2 were avoided between 2008 and 2013.

Highlighting the impact of the national ban on kerosene on poor households in Peru, Paul Winkel, General Manager, PowerMundo, discussed how the company sources, imports, distributes and raises community awareness on clean energy technologies. He identified finance, rather than technology, as the main barrier to scaling up access, stressing the importance of facilitating access to credit along the entire distribution chain through “Pay As You Go” mechanisms.

Priscilla Achakpa, WEP Nigeria, highlighted the Rural Women Energy Security Initiative (RUWES) which aims to reduce the estimated 100,000 deaths a year caused by smoke inhalation and address forest depletion due to high demand for fuelwood by 90 million households.

Asserting that “climate change is not just about CO2,” Bahijjahtu Abubakar, National Coordinator, Renewable Energy Programme, Nigerian Federal Ministry of Environment, described the RUWES initiative as a practical response that has introduced a sustainable, rural business enterprise model to provide cooking, lighting and energy solutions. She highlighted the main goals as: empowering five million rural women for energy enterprises through training, finance and technical support; disseminating two million cookstoves annually; gaining policy support for clean energy initiatives; and improving delivery and secure funding streams.

Discussing the kinds of policies needed to enhance energy access, panelists highlighted, inter alia, that: promoting market-based solutions such as feed-in tariffs and tax breaks for clean technologies are important, but public funding is necessary to achieve universal access; policy needs to move from output to outcome indicators to enable results-based financing; tapping emissions from the agricultural sector offers important added value; and policies must be translated into real implementation.

Regarding the links between energy access and the climate negotiations, participants highlighted: the need to think from the ground up by focusing on constraints faced at household level; seizing opportunities to leapfrog the limits of fixed energy infrastructure by building a flexible and resilient clean energy networks; tackling the role of trade policies in disincentivizing renewable energy solutions; and viewing climate change through a “climate justice” lens.

Moderated by Brice Böhmer, TI, panelists at this event presented capacity building tools for improving climate finance (CF) readiness, and shared experiences on related work on the ground.

Zakir Hussain Khan, TI Bangladesh, highlighted CF readiness capacity building in his country, drawing attention to TI’s capacity building tools, including e-learning courses, social media, and face-to-face training of local media, civil society and youth groups. Stressing the importance of addressing corruption, he drew attention to TI’s focus on capacity building for grassroots civil society organizations, highlighting their potential as CF watchdogs. He said the challenges faced in capacity building include the lack of coordination amongst civil society actors, and the absence of national implementing entities.

Yamil Bonduki, UN Development Programme (UNDP), noted his organization’s focus on capacity building in financial planning, access to finance, delivering finance, and monitoring and reporting. He drew attention to UNDP projects in capacity building for CF readiness, including a German-funded Green Climate Fund Readiness Support Programme currently being piloted in nine countries worldwide; and highlighted lessons learned through the implementation of a Low Emissions Capacity Building programme.

Belynda Petrie, OneWorld, shared lessons from CF readiness studies conducted in Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Mozambique, Zambia and Lesotho, noting that as most countries in Africa have limited capacities, they rely almost exclusively on unpredictable and elusive external financing for climate change adaptation and mitigation. She listed critical conditions for accelerating CF readiness, including: politically endorsed inter-ministerial institutional arrangements; aligned investment planning; policy incentives; and climate-integrated public finance.

Highlighting tools and approaches for CF readiness, Xing Fu-Bertaux, GIZ, described a diagnostic self-assessment tool or score-card that assists policymakers to develop a domestic vision on the use of CF. She noted that the tool is structured around readiness factors, including the availability of structures for accessing external funding, capacity for spending and implementation, private sector engagement, strategic planning, and the institutions involved in CF. She noted that the tool aims to assist in determining the aim of readiness.

Dennis Tänzler, adelphi, presented the CliFit Training Toolkit, designed to support and strengthen countries in: building coherent national CF frameworks; accessing international CF; and spending these funds effectively and transparently. Announcing that CliFit is already in use in countries including Chile, Togo, Viet Nam and Tajikistan, he described the ToolKit’s interactive training sessions, highlighting role-play, mapping exercises, case methods, and presentations as learning methods adopted by the trainers.