In an email interview with Reuters earlier this month, William Gaillard, Asia Pacific sales vice-president of wind turbine provider Vestas, said that without the FiT, projects face huge uncertainty over their future revenue, if not a risk of default under their project finance terms.
Category: Region
Selected environmental stories from media outlets in the Mekong region and beyond.
Cambodia counts the cost of its push to expand coal-fired power
Bridget McIntosh, country director of EnergyLab Cambodia, said there was still an opportunity to change course. “Cambodia can take existing coal and hydro and build the rest out with solar, wind,” she said. “Balancing the analysis shows this will be reliable and cheaper than current plans.”
“Building Back Better”: Southeast Asia’s transition to a green economy after COVID-19
Through its assessment, APHR found that only minimal green policy measures have been adopted as part of the national COVID-19 recovery plans. Moreover, the few positive measures approved were critically undermined by the widespread adoption of those that contribute to global warming and create significant barriers to a low-carbon economic transition. Countries in the region clearly lacked a unified strategy on a green recovery from COVID-19.
Mekong-ROK Cooperation Fund
The Republic of Korea (ROK) is the donor of the MKCF. From 2013, ROK provided US $ 10.42 million to foster regional support and cooperation among the Mekong member countries. The ROK pledged additional contributions of $ 4 million into the fund in 2021 in advancing needs-based cooperation in the Mekong region.
Vietnam should walk the talk in climate actions
The “critically insufficient” rating indicates that Vietnam’s GHG target in 2030 reflects minimal to no action and is not at all consistent with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C temperature limit. If all countries were to follow Vietnam’s approach, warming would exceed 4°C.
Lao villagers displaced by Xayaburi Dam still lack farmland, water
Another project, the Sanakham Dam, is scheduled to move ahead despite local villagers’ complaints.
Farmers warned they need to adapt
With results showing that under combined stressors of climate change and land-use change, the research team suggested the duration of agriculture droughts of a 10-year return period will increase by 50% and the severity of droughts will increase by more than 150%.
ADB gives $82M for roads
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved an $82 million loan to improve approximately 48km of national and provincial roads in Prey Veng and Kandal provinces to boost economic development along the Greater Mekong Subregion’s (GMS) southern economic corridor.
CSOs after the coup: Operations squeezed, funding crunched
Civil society organisations proliferated with government encouragement after the transition to democracy got underway in 2011 but are struggling under a regime that is squeezing the life out of civic space.