10 Responses to Energy and Global Warming News for 11/12/09: Germany to help develop Moroccan solar-thermal energy projects; Clinton calls Copenhagen “steppingstone”; Military’s growing thirst for oil is costing lives — report
Germany plans to help Morocco develop a water-desalination plant and electricity generators using solar power as part of a larger program to expand the use of renewable energy in the North African nation.
Funding and specifics of the solar accord will be discussed at talks next week in Rabat between the two governments, Sabine Brickenkamp, a spokeswoman for the German economic cooperation and development ministry, said in an interview.
Morocco, the only country in the region with a power cable to Europe, imports 97 percent of its energy. The nation is vying with Algeria, Tunisia and Libya for 400 billion euros ($596 billion) of investments in solar-energy systems over the coming decades as the EU seeks to trim emissions from coal and natural gas power plants by importing clean power from the Sahara.
The nation of 36 million people this week announced a plan to invest $9 billion to install 2,000 megawatts of solar power through 2020, the equivalent of about two nuclear power plants and about 20 percent of Morocco’s electricity consumption.
German companies including Munich Re, Siemens AG and RWE AG in July announced a plan called Desertec to probe the potential to generate electricity in North Africa using solar-thermal systems to pipe power in cables under the Mediterranean Sea to provide 15 percent of Europe’s electrical needs by mid-century.
Solar-thermal systems heat a fluid by concentrating the sun’s rays on a tube. The liquid produces steam that turns turbines. The world’s largest solar-thermal system is in California’s Mojave Desert, operated by a group of U.S. companies.
Details of the desalination plant, which will use energy from the sun to extract salt from sea water, will be worked out next week, Brickenkamp said.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton today called U.N. climate talks in Copenhagen a “steppingstone” toward a global, legally binding climate agreement, and spelled out U.S. priorities for the talks.
Her comments at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Singapore are an acknowledgement from the nation’s top diplomat that next month’s talks will not result in a final international deal to curb greenhouse gas emissions.
But Clinton also said the meeting would be pivotal and declared that the United States — the world’s second-largest emitter of greenhouse gases behind China — is “prepared to assume our share of responsibility” to address climate change.
“If we all exert maximum effort and embrace the right blend of pragmatism and principle, I believe we can secure a strong outcome at Copenhagen, and that would be a steppingstone toward full legal agreement,” she said.
Clinton warned against allowing the “pursuit of perfection” to block progress, but added that there are nonetheless metrics the United States will use to judge the outcome of the talks, which run Dec. 7-18.
The first, she said, is that all countries do their fair share. The next, she said, is that a deal should cover all major issues, which she said include adaptation, financing, technology cooperation, dissemination of technology and forest preservation.
Clinton also said the talks should address funding mechanisms to help developing nations.
“We are prepared to support a global climate fund that will support adaptation and mitigation efforts and a matching entity to help developing countries match needs with available resources,” Clinton said.
“Funding through the new global climate fund and a technology mechanism will help developing countries identify what they need, where to get it, and how to finance, operate and maintain it,” she said.
Clinton’s view that Copenhagen won’t result in a final deal reflects the views of other key negotiators.
“I don’t think we can get a legally binding agreement by Copenhagen,” U.N. climate chief Yvo de Boer said earlier this month in Barcelona, Spain (Greenwire, N