I am indeed proud of the achievements of “my” agency UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme) of first warning world governments and industries about “climate change”, “global warming”, the risks and consequences of Arctic/Antarctic meltdown leading to “sea-level rise”, and, of course, the measures taken to combat these, starting with the Montreal Protocol of 1987. Much credit to that scientific visionary, then executive director of UNEP, Dr M.Tolba!

Today these ice-caps have started to melt! No one in the world has escaped noticing (in some cases suffering from) irregular climate patterns, from the formation of super cyclones/hurricanes/typhoons, to sufficient temperature rise in Camargue in the south of France to “support” an Aedes population and its Chikungunya parasites, from simultaneous droughts in Ethiopia and severe flooding in Mozambique some years ago, from giant storms sweeping unprepared Europe regularly. The list is long.

A very useful development, part of the Kyoto agreeement on cutting emissions of “greenhouse gas”, is the provision for developing countries to reduce their emission of carbon into the atmosphere, obtain carbon-credits for it and subsequently sell these credits to enterprises in industrialised countries, to enable them to meet their “carbon-emission quotas”. The emission of carbon gases on the planet will not be reduced by this clause alone, but by the overall decision to cut level of carbon emissions. The accumulation of carbon credits will be based on the introduction of new clean technologies and will hopefully form a “habit” to go for these clean technologies, which is a sine qua non condition for industrial survival from now to 2020.

An excellent example of such a project is that of converting 300 tons of waste… into compost, using a bacteriological process developed in India, which is clean and requires only intermediate, biological technologies. It seems that government approval has been obtained as well as the funding, with, not the least important, an enthusiastic promoter to direct it! The results will be a considerable degree of self-sufficiency in composts for the country, effective re-use of wastes, liberating the fertiliser manufacturers to export part of their products, less dependence on imported fuel, extended life-time of Mare-Chicose and other land-fills and negociable carbon-credits! Other such projects convert wastes into methane (for cooking, but here no carbon-credits become available), or to generate electricity.

Some technical details, which some readers may wish to skip: the Kyoto Protocol, signed by all countries of the world, provides for a Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), a flexible mechanism by which industries in developing countries can earn Certified Emission Reduction(CER or carbon credits) and trade them. Composting of municipal wastes achieves methane emission reduction and earns CERs. For example, 500 tons of waste composted per day as part of an approved CDM project can generate up to 200,00 CER per year! At present one CER trades for 3 to 10 US$ each on carbon markets, a price likely to increase, unlike the value of our rupee. Needless to say, any such project has to be successfully registered with the appropriate office at the United Nations Framework Convention On Climate Change before CER become available. Recently their use by China has been queried by several industrialised nations and the CDM may be reviewed in future...

Dr.Michael ATCHIA</B> <I>[email protected]</I>