India's National Green Tribunal (NGT) has ruled that it can listen to anyone's complaint that the environment requires protecting. The decision means any citizen can make a complaint against a project even if they are directly affected by it.
A surge in mega-hydropower projects across the world in the coming decade will only be affected marginally by last week's decision to delay building a large dam across the Mekong, Southeast Asia's longest river, Reuters reported Wednesday.
US-listed China Hydroelectric Corporation, a developer and operator of small hydroelectric power projects is selling its Yuanping hydroelectric power project, primarily to reduce corporate debt. The Fujian Dachuang Group is to pay USD22 million (including outstanding debts) for the 16-MW plant in Fujian province.
Malaysia's new renewable energy feed-in-tariff (FiT) regime has had mixed results since applications opened at the beginning of the month. While almost the entire allocation of FiT budget earmarked for solar photovoltaic (PV) projects through to the middle of 2014 was applied for within 24 hours, other types of renewables covered by the scheme have proven to be considerably less popular thus far.
The country is following the familiar FiT model but with a quota system for different types of renewable energy (RE), designed to avoid the bubbles in RE project development as seen in the European solar sector.
According to a press statement from International Rivers, 22,589 people from 106 countries have submitted an petition to the prime ministers of Laos and Thailand, calling for cancellation of the proposed Xayaburi Dam on the Mekong River in Northern Laos . The petition comes the week before the four Mekong governments meet on 8 December in Siem Reap, Cambodia, where they are likely to decide whether to proceed with the project
The Xayaburi Dam is the first of 11 dams proposed for the lower Mekong River.
India's Supreme Court has begun hearing a public interest litigation case that alleges the Federal Government and some state governments have been indiscriminately granting environment and techno-economic clearances for hydroelectric projects.
Indonesia is to receive USD600 million in US aid, half of which will go to the country's "green prosperity" program. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton signed the agreement which aims to kick-start economic development through clean energy and sustainable management of Indonesia's natural resources.
Talks between Philippines' President Benigno S. Aquino III and South Korea's President Lee Myung-bak in Manila, look set to boost clean business.
The two agreed on developing cooperation strategies to make the best of Korea’s development assistance to the Southeast Asian state and deepen ties
A report released in Beijing Friday said there is no scientific evidence that the Three Gorges Dam has caused change to the climate and is to blame for meteorological disasters in recent years.
The Lao Government's clean biz plans have been boosted by a USD465 million loan for a 440-megawatt hydropower plant supplying power-hungry Thailand.
As part of a public-private deal, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) money will help build the Nam Ngum 3 power plant, on the Nam Ngum River in northern Lao with the power being sold to Thailand and generating USD770 million. Of this USD200 million is specifically earmarked for poverty reduction and environmental protection programs.
While Thailand is to benefit from a new hydropower plant in Lao financed by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), it is also getting its own loan of USD170 million for a new clean tech power plant in Thailand.
Coming only days after a major Vietnam environmental group threw its support behind the latest Dong Nai Hydropower plans, the company behind it has signed an emission trading deal with Germany’s Deutsche Bank.
Trung Nam Power plans to sell emission credits from the Dong Nai Hydropower Plant No 2 for the first 10 years of its operation, generating USD2.1 million a year, according got the company.
One simply cannot ignore the Burma/China debate over the Myitsone hydropower plant project, which the Burmese president Thein Sein cancelled unexpectedly earlier this month. The story has the cynics guffawing in the aisles.
On the one hand you have a Chinese state administration spluttering out excuses as it attempts to get its collective brain around a poor and owing neighbour putting two fingers up at its attempts to "help" it develop. On the other you have a state media returning to the age of Chairman Mao with a series of nauseatingly fawning pieces of state propaganda.
Pakistan's 147 MW run-of-the-river Patrind hydropower plant has received a USD97 million loan from the Asian Development Bank (ADB). The private sector hydroelectricity plant is expected to bring jobs and ease the nation's critical power shortages.
In a move that has taken environmentalists by surprise, Myanmar's president has suspended construction of a Chinese-backed hydroelectric dam. Thein Sein made a statement to parliament saying the USD3.6 billion Myitsone dam was “contrary to the will of the people”.
Sinohydro Group, which is planning one of the largest IPOs in China this year, has lowered its initial fund-raising target.
The company, China's largest builder of dams – including the Three Gorges Dam – said it would reduce the number of shares released from 3.5 billion to 3 billion because of poor market sentiment. It was maintaining the same price range per share (CNY4.5 to 4.8) or 15-16 times 2010 earnings.
This report by the World Bank spells out what the world would be like if it warmed by 4 degrees Celsius, which is what scientists are nearly unanimously predicting by the end of the century, without serious policy changes.
Companies in Asia reveal expectations that regulations that could lead to rising costs for reporting and reducing GHG emissions will also be the main sources of climate-related business opportunities.
.png "The Climate Group logo"){kind=logo}
