PH far from hitting greenhouse gas emission reduction target

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The full implementation of the government’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) program for the transport sector will lead to the achievement of the NDC unconditional commitment, but still far from the overall target of 75 percent emissions reduction by 2030, according to a report published by the World Bank.

An NDC is a climate action plan to cut emissions and adapt to climate impacts. Each party to the Paris Agreement is required to establish an NDC and update it every five years.  Countries set targets for mitigating the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that cause climate change and for adapting to climate impacts.

The Philippines signified in its NDC to lower economy-wide GHG emissions by 75 percent for the period 2020 to 2030.

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Out of this 75 percent, 7.71 percent will be through unconditional actions with the remaining 72.29 will be conditional.

“An accelerated, more ambitious decarbonization program is needed, following an Avoid-Shift-Improve (ASI) framework, that is, avoiding motorized transportation activity, shifting transportation activity to less emissions-intensive modes, and/or improving the efficiencies and emissions performance of vehicles and fuels,” according to the World Bank’s Philippines Country Climate and Development Report: Background Paper on Transport.

The government’s NDC program for the transport sector includes the retirement of old public utility vehicles, development of mass transit system, the full-scale deployment of a motor vehicle inspection program, development of Non-Motorized Transport (NMT), development of high-capacity urban rail and bus rapid transit and inter-regional rail, electrification of vehicle fleets, and improvement of new standards to Euro 6 engines.

The report pointed out the transportation sector takes up the biggest share of total final energy consumption in the Philippines. The sector also has the second highest growth rate in final energy consumption.

As a result, the transport sector accounts for 13 percent of economy-wide GHG emissions and the largest source of urban pollution.

“ASI measures to accelerate decarbonization, based on the readiness and the local context of the Philippines, include scaling up mass transit development with fleets electrified using renewable energy, expanding the development of NMT, promoting inter-regional rail development, encouraging telecommuting and the development of compact cities,” the paper said.

According to the report, a simulation of the full implementation of these accelerated decarbonization measures plus the government NDC program will lower transport-related GHG emissions from the business-as-usual scenario cumulative emissions of 401.7 million tons of CO2e (MtCO2e) to 326.8 MtCO2e for the period of 2020-2030.

“However, this will not enable the sector to achieve its NDC target for the sector (estimated at 100.4 MtCO2e cumulative for the same period), more so achieve net zero emissions. This shows that the NDC target is very challenging to achieve, even with an aggressive vehicle electrification scenario coupled with 100 percent renewable electricity (estimated cumulative 298.8 MtCO2e),” the paper said.

“To achieve net-zero emission from land transport by 2050, the Philippines needs to completely decarbonize the sector by converting all land transport to electric vehicles (EV) and utilizing 100 percent renewable energy in power generation, or use of biofuels for non-EVs. Avoid-type measures (for example, telecommuting and compact city development) will also play a very important role in achieving net zero target by slowing down the growth of transport demand and reduce the cost of shifting to 100 percent EV and/or biofuels and full decarbonization of the power grid,” it added.

The paper said enhancing institutional set-up and capacity to implement low carbon transport programs is important to the success of achieving a low carbon pathway for the sector.

“Overlapping mandates among government agencies, lack of proper budgetary planning and weak implementation capacity have resulted in slow implementation of the government’s NDC program,” the paper said.

“Some actions needed to address these bottlenecks include institutionalization of low carbon transport programs to ensure annual budgetary allocation for implementation, strengthening overall institutional set-up particularly rationalizing the mandates and functions of government agencies and improving inter and intra government coordination, improving inhouse capacity of government agencies and strengthening monitoring, evaluation, reporting and verification of the implementation progress and achievement of low transport programs,” it added.

To Implement a low carbon transport program and achieve the country’s NDC, the World Bank report said the government would need to make full use of private sector efficiency and access to capital and technology.

“Encouraging greater private sector investments in low carbon transport initiatives requires improving the overall enabling environment for public-private partnerships such as proper project preparation including risk identification and distribution between the private and public sectors, enhancing government capacity to manage fiscal costs and contingent liabilities, and deepening domestical capital markets to finance green investments,” it said.

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