Report of US Participation in Korean International CoControls Analysis Program (ICAP) Workshop for Technical and Policy Review
Paul Schwengels, Hong-Jin Kim and Collin Green October 2000
Draft 10/18/00 Report of US Participation in Korean International Co-Controls Analysis Program (ICAP) Workshop for Technical and Policy Review Summary Paul Schwengels and Hong-Jin Kim of US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Collin Green of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) visited Seoul for meetings on October 16-17, related to the Korean Integrated Co-Control Benefits Analysis Project (ICAP). This project is part of a multi-country program supported by EPA in cooperation with partners in Argentina, Brazil, China, Chile, Korea, Mexico and South Africa. The program supports development and application of capabilities for analysis of public health and environmental benefits of integrated strategies for greenhouse gas mitigation and local environmental improvement in developing countries. The review meeting on 16 October 2000 was attended by the Korean ICAP study team lead by the Korean Environment Institute (KEI), Korean policy makers from key ministries and the Korean legislature, Korean technical experts, and technical experts from the USA. The meeting fulfilled goals of presenting the analytical methodology and the outcome of the project to Korean policy makers and technical experts and obtaining feedback on the usefulness of the project approach and results for enhancing effective policy making in Korea in the areas of GHG mitigation and air quality management. The meeting stimulated technical discussion which identified several key limitations of the initial study and developed recommendations for improving the methods and scope of future efforts. The project was recognized as a step forward on climate and sustainable development issues, and continuation and enhancement of this capability was strongly supported. On October 17, the US team met with counterparts and discussed next steps including a presentation of Korean analysis results in a side event at the 6th Conference of Parties to the UNFCCC in November. Key Points of Discussions Participants in the October 16 workshop included representatives of the Ministry of Environment (MOE), the Ministry of Commerce Industry and Energy (MOCIE), and the staff of the Korean Legislature, as well as a large number of key technical experts in economics, air quality modeling, public health assessment and energy policy, and some representatives of Korean private industry. The technical discussion highlighted a number of specific limitations of the analysis to date and identified opportunities for improvements in methods and results which could be achieved with additional time and resources in future work. In general, these limitations suggest that the initial estimates are very conservative and that future work will likely produce much higher numbers. The Korean Ministry of Environment has already launched a follow-on project which will address many of these limitations. Despite the limitations if the initial analysis presented at the workshop, it was recognized as a significant step forward and contribution to the policy development efforts in Korea on both climate change and local air pollution issues. The draft report identifies public health benefits of GHG scenarios which are in the range of $20/ton of carbon. This level of benefits is sufficient to justify the cost of many available GHG mitigation options.
In addition, the ICAP effort was recognized as a valuable step toward approaches for dealing with climate change and air pollution issues jointly in the context of long-term sustainable development. Representatives from the Ministry of the Environment (MOE) noted that while in general in Korea, policy makers place greater value on actions to improve local air quality than on actions to mitigate GHG emissions, the approach followed in this project could be used to develop cost-effective integrated strategies to address both types of concerns simultaneously. The representative from the Legislature staff pointed out that the Korean government already expressed a keen interest in climate change issues and lawmakers are very interested in the issue of ancillary benefits of climate change mitigation actions. The legislature has recently established a special committee on climate change in congress to investigate policy matters related to climate change issues in greater detail. Policy makers noted the importance of widespread dissemination of these concepts and analytic results to support design and implementation of sustainable policies in the future. Thus, one benefit of this project and it’s results would be to assist with educating the general public about the potential economic and social benefits of taking action on climate change issues in a way that allows them to better relate to these issues on a personal level and comprehend the costs and benefits of policy decisions. Korean participants were interested in how the co-control benefits analysis can be a valuable tool to identify and target opportunities for Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects under the Framework Convention on Climate Change, which can help address local pollution problems and contribute to sustainable development. On October 17, the US team met with the Korean technical experts to discuss remaining steps to completion of the initial ICAP project by the end of the year, and possibilities for follow on cooperative work. Results of the Korean ICAP work and the policy review meeting will be presented at a side event at the 6th Conference of Parties to the UNFCCC in November, and incorporated into a final report to be available by December 2000. One result of the project is that the Korean Ministry of Environment has already launched an expanded project to analyze the national ancillary benefits of SO2 and NOx reductions associated with clean technology and fuels strategies for greenhouse gas mitigation. EPA has committed to provide continued technical assistance to this project, and is considering additional financial support to enhance the project in a number of specific areas.