Carbon Trading and Converging World

The events at the 100 days exhibiton at the Arnolfini emphasised the disaster of carbon trading and offsetting as a way of tackling climate change.  Yet this is the main function of COP15.  The carbon market is now the fastest growing financial sector, and is progressing along the lines of other doomed commodity markets with financial instruments such as derivatives and bundling of commodities.

It is therefore particulary important that Western activists avoid ANY offsetting as a "solution", but instead look to real ways of reducing emissions, preserving and creating sinks, and conserving all the world's resources.  And stop expecting the majority world to do the job for us.

Assuming emissions savings from donated windmills in India which feed into the national grid, by assuming inevitable economic growth, and assuming it will replace some future coal use there (still with me?), then creating carbon credits for one-off use in the UK, is quite simply deceptive.  It does not realistically reduce emissions either in India or in the UK, does nothing about the pressure on other resources (may arguably increase them), and works as a charity rather than a sustainable community empowerment.

None of which would matter very much as it's actual impact is likely to remain small, but Converging World seems determined to become a major player in the environmental movements in Bristol.  It has already high-jacked the excellant 350 campaign, which should not be about offsetting.  Rather than purporting to teach others, CW should inform itself better about how to protect the climate and promote social justice.

Previously diane jones wrote:

... Rather than purporting to teach others, CW should inform itself better about how to protect the climate and promote social justice.

This ill-informed post seriously misrepresents the work of teh charity The Converging World. The Converging World is NOT advocating carbon offsetting as a solution to climate change; instead, it works to provide renewable energy in India, the sale of which helps provide income to fund vital development projects by an Indian NGO, Social Change and Development (SCAD) and funds further renewable energy, currently provided by wind turbines.

Around 60% of India's current energy comes from coal, and a developing economy simply needs more energy as people are lifted out of poverty and hardship. Isn't it better to help provide this vital energy by clean, green renewable sources?  I really can't see what's wrong with that, and there's plenty that's right. If you can then use part of the income from selling this energy to fund education and health projects, that's positive, not negative. That's the main thrust of the work. The carbon credits are incidental, not the core reason for the wind turbines.

The carbon credits produced are of a high standard. Sale of these can help fund more development work, both in the UK and India. But The Converging World does not promote carbon-offsetting as a solution to climate change. The charity is working in the UK to promote carbon reduction and greater energy efficiency, and to raise awareness of the issues. This is "convergence" in action.

The basic idea is to use renewable energy to help tackle social and economic problems at the same time and that's a positive thing, surely. Anyone interested in judging for themselves can visit the TCW website:

www.theconvergingworld.org

I'm afraid you haven't convinced me, largely because CW is based on the assumption of economic growth.  You see this as inevitable and even desireable.  The use of offsetting and the generation of carbon credits is part of this financially conservative view of the world which has made a way forward impossible at Copenhagen.  The use of carbon credits is not "incidental", even though CW is not a carbon trading business.  The credits are an intregal part of this rather convoluted scheme.

The scheme is about reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and at the same time tackling poverty.  Unfortunately I don't see how either is achieved.

Economic growth cannot happen without increasing supplies of energy.  Renewables can only fractionally replace fossil fuels.  There is never likely to be energy available that comes anywhere near the vast efficiency of fossil fuels.  As fossil fuel use is progressively reduced, either in a planned or unplanned way, economic growth will become virtually impossible.  CW does not appear to have evidence that windpower in India will now replace any coal, rather than being used as an additional energy as long as coal lasts.  The fact that this energy is fed into the national grid also means that it will be used primarlly for the benefit of industry and better-off consumers. There is no reason to believe that emissions will be reduced overall.

Economic growth is not the answer to poverty either, but rather increases the wealth gap between rich and poor.  In terms of making clean energy available, local micro-generation with appropriate technology would be an infinately more empowering and sustainable method.  Without of course involving carbon credits.  Tackling endemic poverty through charities rather than structural changes is a difficult area - some can do brilliant work particularly if focused on a defined problem, but some can and do go horribly wrong (Bob Geldoff).

Promoting energy efficiency in the UK is laudable, but many other organisations and individuals manage to do this without involving carbon credits.  In fact I would respectfully suggest that this is where CW should concentrate their contribution - where emissions are about x5 those of the average Indian.  Perhaps a drive to reduce energy use in Bristol, with any savings made available to poor communities in the majority world to use as they see fit.  

Our ecological life support services are under increasing stress.  Even if we were all living at the level of the poorest people, there would barely be enough for us all.  And this is without the expected continuing population increase and resource depletion.  Rather than concentrate on reducing emissions where they are currently low, and trying to improve material security without redistribution from rich to poor, perhaps the focus should be more on helping the rich to drastically lower their carbon emissions and their use of resources..

After all this is what failed at COP 15.