Going green
May 3, 2011
Russia remains the third-largest emitter of greenhouse gases after China and the US, according to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. And it has one of the highest per capita energy-related Co2 emissions in the world.
“There is a lot at stake for Russia to deal with its environment problems seriously and take real action,” Alexei Kokorin, climate expert at World Wide Fund in Moscow, said.
But Russia has often done just the opposite. Kokorin pointed out that global warming skeptics and conspiracy theories have long dominated the climate change debate.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin once famously joked that a slight increase in temperatures would not be a bad thing for his cold country since people would no longer need fur coats. Russian state television has screened documentaries full of doomsday images on the “myth” of global warming.
As a result, activists say, public attitudes are often mired in ignorance and environment issues are low down on the list of Russians' priorities.
“People in Russia read about climate change in newspapers and still think it happens far away in the Arctic or the US,” Kokorin said. “They don't believe their behavior contributes to it. So they don't change it.”
Little incentive to go green
Russia has pledged to ensure that greenhouse gas emissions in 2020 are 15-25 percent below 1990 levels. But because the post-Soviet industrial collapse severely cut output in energy-hungry sectors, Russia's emissions are already a third lower than in 1990.
Thus, the Russian economy can continue to grow for some time before it becomes necessary to go green.
“There's no real awareness or political will to create a green industry and invest in renewables and other new technologies,” Stefan Meister, an expert on Russia at the Berlin-based German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), said.
He pointed out that Russia continues to use obsolete, energy-intensive Soviet-era industrial infrastructure. The country's hinterland is dotted with coal-fired plants, nickel production facilities and smoke-belching aluminum factories. And since 2000, Russia's oil-driven economic boom has produced an explosion in new cars, leading to traffic nightmares and increased urban pollution.
‘A black hole'
Yet, there are signs that Russia can no longer continue with business as usual. In recent years, it's been exposed to a host of climate change issues - an increase in floods, storms, forest fires, melting permafrost and heat waves.
In 2009, Moscow adopted a climate ‘doctrine,' accepting for the first time that human activity has contributed to global warming.
But the biggest shift is reflected in Russia's recognition that it has huge potential to lower its energy consumption and minimize losses due to leakage and decrepit infrastructure.
President Dimitry Medvedev has singled out Russia's heating and public utilities, describing them as “atrociously inefficient” and the building infrastructure as “a kind of black hole that sucks in enormous amounts of energy resources.”
Experts point out that the rhetoric is not prompted by concerns about the fate of polar bears from global warming or pollution problems. Rather, it stems from the recognition that energy efficiency will help modernize and diversify the export-reliant Russian economy and allow it to compete globally.
“In Russia, nothing is driven by climate policy,” Anna Korppoo, an expert on Russia's climate policy at the Fridtjof Nansen Institute in Norway, said. “But that's not necessarily a bad thing. Economic drivers are much more important than any climate concerns in changing policy,” she said.
Significant payoffs
Moscow plans to slash energy wastefulness by 40 percent by 2020. New approved energy-efficiency laws include introducing metering systems, energy efficiency standards for new buildings and phasing out incandescent light bulbs.
The big question now is whether the measures actually see the light of day.
“At the moment there is a mismatch between the government's legislation and implementation on the ground,” Korppoo said. She added that accompanying administrative, financial and energy pricing reforms will be needed if the ambitious plans are to work.
The payoffs however will be significant with reduced greenhouse gas emissions, increased savings and Russia's arrival - not in the top polluters' league but among climate-change-conscious nations.
Author: Sonia Phalnikar
Editor: Philipp Bilsky