No. 9 May 1997 Supplement

Country Study News

The Newsletter of the UNEP Collaborating Centre on Energy and Environment

Andean Region Climate Change Mitigation Study

Arturo Villavicencio, UNEP Centre

Andean countries have made significant progress with GHG inventories and mitigation analysis. Following the IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Inventories, national teams in Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela have already established their preliminary inventories. Mitigation studies have been completed by Peru and Venezuela and they are in progress in Bolivia, Colombia and Ecuador.

The regional mitigation study for the Andean region will focus on two main issues: (i) the opportunities and incentives for countries to cooperate on implementing regionally­coordinated mitigation actions; and (ii) the policies, strategies and institutional arrangements necessary to promote such regional cooperation. The ultimate objective is to analyse the possibilities for improving the cost effectiveness of national actions, policies and strategies by exploring additional options whose implementation requires regional cooperation.

The reasons for selecting the Andean countries as a regional study case were identified. The first is the already established institutions and mechanisms for economic and political integration among the Andean countries; and the second is the relative homogeneity among the countries which suggest it may be easier to take advantage of potential complementarities.

The study intends to analyse three types of regionally concerted actions which could be relevant to the Andean countries context. They are as follows:

• actions which involve the exploitation of a binational or multinational shared natural resource and which require the construction of a binational or multinational facility. A number of experiences within Latin America (Brazil­Paraguay, Argentina ­ Uruguay, Ecuador ­ Peru, among others) will provide the study with concrete examples on actors, institutions and agreements involved in these types of multinational projects;
• actions which seek to take advantage of the potential complementarities between national energy systems. The idea is that one country's comparative advantage (in terms of energy resources, for instance) could also benefit other countries within the region provided that their energy systems could be integrated; and
• actions that could be adopted by an individual country provided that one or several countries within the region proceed in the same direction. These kind of actions are aimed at implementing policies and strategies on environmental standards and regulations, as well as to promote intraregional trade of environmentally sound energy technologies.

The study is conducted jointly by the UNEP Centre and the Institute for Energy Economics in Argentina in collaboration with the Latin American Energy Organisation. A first regional workshop is scheduled to take place at OLADE headquarters in Quito, Ecuador in May 1997.