News

Stern Emphasises Carbon Capture And Storage In Poor Countries

Lord Nicholas Stern under klimamøtet på Bali.
(Foto: Anne Karin Sæther/Bellona)

Publish date: December 12, 2007

Written by: Anne Karin Sæther

Translated by: Eivind Hoff

Sir Nicholas Stern, known for the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change, believes carbon capture and storage (CCS) will be an essential tool in combating climate change. He supports the proposition to make CCS projects eligible under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), which enables rich countries to reach their greenhouse gas emission targets through emission reductions in poorer countries.

Notwithstanding increasing international support for CCS, Canada, the EU, Norway and others have met opposition in their efforts to make CCS eligible under the CDM.

Tremendous contribution
Sir Nicholas supports such inclusion:
“CCS for coal is always going to cost more than not doing CCS. If countries are to be encouraged to follow through with that, they have got to have proven technology and they will be looking for financial flows to support the extra cost,” Stern told Bellona Web in Bali.

“I think the CDM, or a revised and forward-looking CDM, will provide some of those flows and in so doing they can make a tremendous contribution,” he added.

More is needed
The purpose of the negotiations in Bali on making CCS projects eligible for the CDM is to agree on a process that will lead to a decision on the issue at the next climate summit, in Poland in one year’s time. If a decision is then taken to make CCS projects eligible, industrialised countries (known as Annex I Parties) will be able to buy CDM credits from poorer countries with CCS projects. The Annex I Party can then count the CDM credits against its emission ceiling under the Kyoto Protocol.

CDM is only one of several ways of promoting CCS internationally.
“CCS may become very significant, but I don’t think CDM credits alone will deliver the kind of scale we need,” Stern told Bellona Web.
He wants the international community to put in place a broad array of tools, such as renewable energy, but says that carbon capture from fossil fuel power plants will be required in any case. The reason is simple:
“In the next 20-30 years, coal is going to be used.”

Challenges Norway
Bellona president Frederic Hauge agrees with Stern that CDM is far from being the only way to promote CCS.
”CDM is just one out of many processes. We need to establish a roadmap for CCS. Norway should work hard to set in motion several parallel processes,” he said.