Dear friends,
The CDM Executive Board will hold its 53rd meeting from 22-26 March 2010. CDM Watch takes again the opportunity to read between the lines of the annotated draft agenda (PDF) in order to bring some transparency to the decisions of the Executive Board. The annotations to the draft agenda are published ahead of every Board meeting and are supposed to give a clearer overview about the Board’s agenda. However, due to the complexity of the issues, they are kept in a highly technical language and don’t seem to aim at revealing what’s really at stake. As a response, CDM Watch adds some meaning to the language by exposing the critical items and providing recommendations.
A recent analysis of all coal projects ever submitted to the CDM and the underlying methodology reveals that methodology ACM13 fails to ensure the additionality of CDM project activities. While CDM Watch commends that the Board is looking into revising the existing methodology during this meeting, it urges that these severe shortcomings can only be addressed by a more fundamental revision of ACM0013 and is demanding the immediate suspension of ACM13.
CDM Watch has also followed up on the requests from Copenhagen that Board members must publish their curricula vitae (CVs) on the UNFCCC CDM website. However, the number of Board members that have followed this request is not impressive: only 5 out of 9 members and 2 out of 10 alternate members have made their CVs public.
Further to a call for input on draft procedures for requests and reviews for registration of CDM project activities and issuance of CERs, CDM Watch makes specific recommendations that would benefit the procedures. These recommendations include inter alia extending the right to request a review to the public and to publish the secretariat´s final assessment and recommendations of reviews.
Noteworthy, the Board is likely to agree on a definition of forests that excludes palm trees and bamboos from being eligible for afforestation and reforestation CDM project activities until a country states that they should be included. Currently no host country has officially stated so which to date excludes both, palm trees and bamboo from A/R activities. This is extremely important as plans to restore carbon-rich natural forest ecosystems would be hindered by including these types in the CDM.
Finally, you will find a case study about one of the most controversial projects ever submitted to the CDM Executive Board. The heavily criticized Plantar project is currently being reviewed not because of its enormous environmental, social and climate debt, but because the project has failed to comply with the public commenting period requirements. Hence, no comments were ever received during the pubic commenting period. Yet, more than 60 organizations have heavily criticized the latest registration request of the project in a letter.
Happy reading!
Table of Contents
• Supercritical Coal Projects Violate Kyoto Protocol
• More than half of Board members do not take transparency seriously
• Public participation in procedures for request and reviews for registration and issuance needed
• Palm trees and bamboos not eligible for A/R CDM project activities
• Controversial CDM project “Plantar” deemed to be rejected
Happy Reading!
