Grenada is to benefit from a multi-million dollar Chinese project aimed at adapting to climate change.
Under an AOSIS-China Climate Change Adaptation Pilot Programme (CAAP), Grenada will receive more than US million in technology assistance in the first tranche, over a five-year period.
The announcement was made by China’s Vice Minister of the National Development and Reform Commission, Xie Zhenhua, on the sidelines of the 17th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP17) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) held here.
The project is characterised by a capitalised Revolving Fund as the key mechanism to help Small Island Developing States (SIDS) adapt to climate change.
Grenada’s Foreign Affairs Minister Karl Hood said that the technology transfer revolving fund/CAAP would provide private and public sector agencies in SIDS with financing for the acquisition of hardware, equipment and training from China, on loans, with repayment linked to the savings in fuel imports.
“Such upfront financing is considered critical to the successful development of a sustainable energy sector in SIDS,” he said.
“South-South cooperation is not new and China has consistently demonstrated this,” said Minister Hood. “What is new, additional and is very promising, is the application of these efforts to climate change and climate change adaptation, mitigation and financing.”
The immediate beneficiaries of the project are major public buildings including the ministerial and financial complexes, hospitals and police and fire stations.
Lighting and cooling technologies will be implemented under the first phase of the project with the replacement of fluorescent bulbs with the LED equivalent and fitted with an adaptor.
More than 20,000 LED equivalents will replace the fluorescent bulbs and about 1,000 incandescent 100 watts bulbs used for exterior security lighting with the LED equivalent with photocells, according to Energy and Sustainable Development Advisor Hugh Sealy.
The plan is also to replace approximately 3,000 existing High Pressure Sodium street lamps with the LED equivalent.
Sealy said Grenada is also interested in the use of solar technology to achieve space cooling.
“It’s estimated that up to 50 percent of the energy costs for buildings is for air-conditioning,” he said. “We are particularly interested in using solar hot water and absorption chillers for air-conditioning.”
(Source http://www.caribbean360.com/index.php/news/522042.html#axzz1fzJi4paE)
