World Bank Climate Funds Under Fire
The groups released a report today titled "Dirty is the New Clean: A
Critique of the World Bank's Strategic Framework for Development and
Climate Change."
The report
argues that the World Bank's track record disqualifies it from managing
clean technology transfer and climate adaptation funds. Instead, the
groups argue, such funds should be established under the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change, in order to ensure they are used
equitably and effectively, in accordance with the principle of common
but differentiated responsibility, and that nations receiving financing
are thoroughly involved in funds' design and implementation.
"The World Bank has a very troubling track record on climate change. It
has repeatedly invested in dirty projects and called them 'clean,'" said
Janet Redman of the Institute for Policy Studies and the lead author of
the report. "It is beyond ridiculous for the World Bank to continue to
claim that projects such as the Tata coal plant in India—expected to be
one of the world’s top 50 global warming polluters—are part of the
solution to the climate crisis. The World Bank cannot be trusted to
oversee climate change funding."
The groups’ analysis shows that World Bank Group lending to coal, oil
and gas in 2008 increased 94 percent from 2007, reaching over $3
billion. Coal lending alone increased an astonishing 256 percent.
The World Bank claimed major increases in fiscal year 2008 in its
renewable energy and energy efficiency lending, but the vast majority of
that comes from environmentally and socially destructive large
hydropower projects and energy efficiency. Lending for “new”
renewables—wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, and hydropower projects
that produce up to 10 MW per facility—only increased from $421 million
to $476 million from last fiscal year, representing a 13 percent
increase, not the 87 percent that the World Bank claims.
“The World Bank provided political and financial support to Exxon and
the Chadian government for the Chad-Cameroon oil pipeline. Precisely as
we warned the World Bank years ago, its support for this pipeline
established a new petrol dictatorship in Africa. The World Bank is now
withdrawing from the project, but who is left to deal with the monster
that it created? Our people are worse off and the local environment is
ravaged. We are outraged by the suggestion that this same World Bank is
now planning to administer climate change funds,” said Samuel Nguiffo of
Friends of the Earth Cameroon.
Under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, to which the U.S.
is a party, industrialized countries most responsible for global warming
are obligated to finance clean technology and adaptation to climate
impacts in developing countries.
"Developing countries have clearly articulated at multiple UN climate
negotiations that financing for climate change mitigation and adaptation
should be fully accountable to the UN Framework Convention on Climate
Change. It is simply wrong for the World Bank—an undemocratic,
unaccountable institution—to have any role in controlling climate
financing,” said Karen Orenstein of Friends of the Earth-U.S.
The groups are:
FRIENDS OF THE EARTH INTERNATIONAL
INSTITUTE FOR POLICY STUDIES
OIL CHANGE INTERNATIONAL
CAMPAGNA PER LA RIFORMA DELLA BANCA MONDIALE
ACTION AID USA
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT
in WASHINGTON:
Nick Berning, Friends of the Earth US, Tel: +1-202-222-0748
Janet Redman, Institute for Policy Studies, Tel: +1-508-340-0464
Steve Kretzmann, Oil Change, Tel: +1-202-497-1033
MORE INFORMATION:
Two page factsheet on World Bank's "Climate Investment Funds":
http://www.ips-dc.org/reports/#770
New "Dirty is the New Clean" report on World Bank's climate framework:
www.ips-dc.org/reports-list.php#780
Two-page World Bank and Climate factsheet:
http://www.foe.org/Climate_Investment_Funds/WorldBank-ClimateOverview.pdf
