A deadly irony

In yet another turnaround, President Rodrigo Duterte changed his mind and announced last Monday he will now allow the Senate ratification of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. After getting the inputs from his Cabinet advisers, President Duterte disclosed he would go along with the majority recommendation for him to sign and endorse to the Philippine Senate the instruments of ratification of the Paris Agreement.

Changing one’s mind though is not a sign of any weakness or a case of flip-flopping to cater to what is popular or not to the public opinion. In the exercise of his power as the Chief Executive of the government, the President merely demonstrated maturity and wisdom as the country’s chief foreign policy architect to consider what will serve the greater national interest of the Filipino people.

The agreement came into force last week. While he will now allow the country’s accession to the Paris Agreement, President Duterte, however, sought for an assurance of the clauses of the global pact on climate change will be enforced by all countries, especially by the heavy carbon emitters like the United States (US) and China.

He cited anew his concern our country committed to cut carbon emissions by 70 percent by year 2030 when the Philippines contributed miniscule amount of these carbon emissions that were blamed for the worsening climate change caused by global warming.

To date, 96 countries, including the US and China, both heavy carbon emitters, have ratified it out of 197 signatory parties, including the Philippines. It was former president Benigno Aquino III who inked the agreement during his trip to France last April to bind the Philippines to the global compact that seeks to slash greenhouse gases and keep global temperature increases to “well below” two degrees Celsius.

Most of these countries identified as heavy carbon emitters were also asked to set aside at least $100 billion yearly as financial assistance to developing countries like the Philippines to enable all countries to actualize environment-friendly renewable energy sources starting 2020.

But how can President Duterte reconcile our acceding to the Paris Agreement when he agreed to honor and proceed with the contracts entered into by the previous Aquino administration to put up a total of new 19 coal-fired plants – all heavy carbon emitters – all over the country?

At least, that is what Greenpeace is trying to say in its recent study, entitled “Coal: A Public Health Crisis – Diseases and deaths attributed to coal use in the Philippines” that we came across with. Of course, Greenpeace and other similar environmental groups have long been crying foul against coal.

According to the report itself, Greenpeace funded the Harvard research and the publication of its results. In the Philippines, Greenpeace collaborated with HealthJustice to write the report, with support from Health Care Without Harm – Asia and the Philippine Movement for Climate Justice.

What did the 35-page Harvard research study exactly say about coal use in the Philippines?

Quoting verbatim from the executive summary: “This report reveals for the first time the current health impacts of existing coal-fired power plants as well as projected health impacts of operating and planned power plants in the Philippines.”

“The data shows an estimated 960 premature deaths each year due to stroke, ischemic heart disease, other cardiovascular diseases and respiratory diseases. If the new power plants are to be developed, premature deaths may rise up to 2,410 or more than double the current number of people dying from coal-related pollution in the Philippines.”

Harvard’s expert researchers found out that of all the world’s available energy sources, coal releases the most carbon dioxide (CO2) and accounts for 43% of global emissions released annually from fossil-fuel combustion, with 28% emitted by coal-fired power plants.

The study faulted coal-fired power plants for their major role the increase of greenhouse gases that trap heat in the Earth’s lower atmosphere, causing the average global temperatures to rise.

For us ordinary mortals, that is simply climate change, whose growing threat has prompted numerous international conferences and accords in an attempt to reverse or even just stop global warming.

Now, this is an issue more familiar to Filipinos. Who can forget the deadly typhoon “Yolanda”? Internationally known as super cyclone “Haiyan,” its devastation is still being felt by hundreds of thousands of people in the Visayas who have yet to find a decent shelter to this day.

In fact, the report rightly pointed out that according to the latest data from the Climate Risk Index 2015, the Philippines ranks first in the world for countries most affected by climate change in 2013, with a 5th overall ranking between 1994 to 2013.

“More than one-third of the energy used to generate electricity in the Philippines comes from burning coal. Coal-fired power plants continue to be the country’s top producer of electricity since 2012, accounting for approximately 39% of the country’s power generation mix,” according to the Greenpeace-Harvard report.

“As of May 2015, the Philippines has 17 operating coal plants (30 boiler units), with 29 more (59 boiler units) approved by the Department of Energy (DOE) to begin commercial operations by 2020.

“Coal Operating Contracts (COC) for exploration have likewise been awarded to at least 39 companies in 2015. It should be noted that this number does not state which among them are already in operation, with some of them having been awarded with contracts as early as 2005.

“In official statements released by a high-ranking DOE official, the Philippines is looking at a dramatically increased 70% dependence on coal for electricity from 2030 to 2050.

“These statistics are alarming in view of the latest data from the Climate Risk Index 2015, where the Philippines ranks 1st in the world for countries most affected by climate change in 2013, with a 5th overall ranking between 1994 to 2013,” the report says.

All things considered, the report is really a sober assessment of where the Philippines is heading if we continue our dependence on coal as a source of power generation. Would our joining the Paris Agreement really do anything? But the plan to build more coal plants in the next six years will indeed be a deadly irony.                   

(To be continued)