Ross Sheil, Staff Reporter
( L - R ) SAMPSON AND CLAYTON
BY 2050 scientists predict that global climate change will have reached its 'tipping point'.
According to Anthony Clayton, Alcan Professor of Sustainable Development at the University of the West Indies (UWI), the rise in temperatures and the resulting rise in sea levels after this point will be irreversible.
Professor Clayton was speaking to The Gleaner last week on the bus journey to the inagural climate change conference (C3) at Rose Hall Resort and Country Club in Montego Bay, St. James.
Organiser Maikel Oerbekke, of the Westmoreland-based Eco-Tec, said C3 aims to bring about a tipping point of its own, in public awareness of climate change caused by global energy consumption.
RISING SEA LEVELS
But inside the conference room, the air conditioning had delegates almost shivering. On at least two occasions, the light briefly cut out. And, each day, speaker after speaker noted that Jamaica's energy-use is unsustainable.
The national oil import bill exceeds US$1 billion - 66 cents of every dollar earned from Jamaica's merchandise export earnings needed to pay this bill. More painfully still, rising sea levels caused by climate change are expected to see much of Jamaica's coast and low-lying development threatened in future years. The heating of the sea, which causes this rise, is expected to lend itself to more frequent and more severe hurricanes.
Though the Jamaica Energy Policy Green Paper 2006-20 is before Cabinet, energy adviser to the Prime Minister, Dr. Cezley Sampson, complained that the press, public and the private sector are more concerned by gas price rises.
"We have some of the lowest priced gas in the world for a non-oil producing country," Dr. Sampson said. "It's comparably under-priced. Looking at water when the price was raised people actually conserved. But the oil price, that's what seems to sell newspapers."
He encouraged Jamaicans to join the national energy debate before it is made law, without their input. The green paper is viewable online at www.cabinet.gov.jm.
Dr. Sampson said Government would be fortunate to see six replies via the return email address: energy.policy@ cabinet. gov.jm.
Among C3 delegates, the already converted, there were several examples of persons already embracing renewable energy.
HYDROELECTRIC POWER
Dr. David Harrison, University of Technology (UTech) lecturer in architecture, who is working on the development of the National Building Code, said correct building construction can see large scale energy-saving. He claimed to have cut 80 per cent of his own home electricity bill by following his own advice.
Ava-Gail Gardiner, owner of the Summerfugl Organic Farm at Cascade, in the Blue Mountains of Portland, has developed a proposal to provide hydroelectric power to residents of the local community. Operating on a hyphonate basis she hopes to provide electricity at one-third the cost of the Jamaica Public Service Company Ltd.
In one month's time Ms. Gardiner said, she will know whether her project, currently on an interna-tional shortlist, will receive US$100,000 in funding at the World Bank Global Development Marketplace Awards.
"We need to empower our own national develop-ment, we need to provide cheaper and more sustainable energy for our own production because, right now, it is so high and making us uncompetitive," she said.
Publicised at the conference, Eco-Tec intends to start a non-governmental organisation, 'The C3 Group' to coordinate interested groups and raise awareness. As a company that has commercial and tech-nical knowledge, Eco-Tec sells renewable technologies and carbon credits as well as conducts energy audits.
"We feel there is so little awareness that we feel we need to start a movement, to be able to organise workshops and to be able to be taken seriously by funding agencies," said Mr. Oerbekke. The first such workshop should be held in Kingston within a month.
Energy consumption
Jamaican per capita energy consumption, measured by barrels of oil equivalent (boe):
1975 - 8.4
1980 - 6.9
2003 - 10.31
Reduction between 1975 and 1980 attributed to energy saving measures adopted in response to oil price shocks of the 1970s.
(Source: The Jamaica Energy Policy 2006-20 Green Paper.)
Some renewable energy developments in Jamaica
The Wigton Wind Farm has a nine-year US$3.1 million agreement to supply certified emission reductions (CERs) to the Dutch government. Under the Kyoto Protocol agreement, carbon emission reductions resulting from adoption of more efficient and environmentally friendly technologies can be brokered on the international market as commodities. In 1999 the World Bank alone set up a fund of US$1.8 billion to finance such projects.
Government has begun a trial with a view to replacing MTBE with ethanol as the 10 per cent additive to gasolene. Such ethanol could be produced at the Petrojam refinery on Spanish Town Road and the feedstock from sugar cane, produced locally.
The National Housing Trust (NHT) is offering solar water heater (SWH) loans of up to $100,000. Costs for a SWH unit begin at $75,000 for a family of four with a return expected within two to three years. Water heating currently accounts for up to 30 per cent of a domestic light bill. In conjunction with Government's US$10 Energy Efficiency Fund the NHT is also expected to offer further loan packages to enable domestic energy efficiency measures.
A list of 30 renewable energy/energy saving products is currently being reviewed by the Ministry of Finance and Planning for possible tax and import duty exemptions.
