Barbadian Prime Minister Mia Mottley has proposed the establishment of a regional renewable energy fund to finance the transition from fossil fuels to renewable sources of power.
“We do not have the capacity to easily finance our development in the transition. We’ve not been given the assurances, not even in adaptation funding that we can get it. You’re asking us to make a journey having already recognized the fact that countries were left at the point of independence without the development compact, without the ability to bring about stability or access to education, health, housing and the normal development trajectories captured in the sustainable development goals,” Mottley said while addressing the international energy conference and expo yesterday at the Georgetown Marriott Hotel.
The Barbadian leader centred her address on the event’s theme “Charting a Sustainable Energy Future” where she called for new energy exporters in the Caribbean region to invest at least 10% of their net revenues in renewable energy.
She said that the developing world has always been told what to do and what goals to meet, without consideration of their history, by the developed world. The Caribbean leader stressed that countries like Guyana and Barbados and others in CARICOM are all victims of colonization and were left to chart their course post-independence.
“We are people who have been victims of colonization and exploitation. Regrettably, in the efforts to close the gap, what we have done is to perpetuate the disparities. If we are to remove that disparity and offer to the people of the world, the opportunity to live in peace and then hope for a bountiful future, then it requires difficult conversations that do not perpetuate the inequity of the world of 1945,” she said while explaining the struggles faced by many colonized nations following the end of World War Two.
Speaking to the energy transition goals set at the international forums, Mottley said that the Caribbean and developing states are yet again faced with ultimatums and scant regards for their unique positions. Channelling the energy from her much-lauded COP26 speech in Glasgow, Scotland, the Bajan leader said that “inconvenient truths” must be talked through and that the goal of net-zero emissions does not translate to net-zero use of fossil fuels.
“Our world is matched by a failure to appreciate what we mean when we say net zero. We have a climate crisis. There is no two ways about it and we must fight to ensure that that climate crisis does not make migrants of us all. But at the same time, net-zero does not mean no fossil fuels. Net-zero means that we have to produce enough to offset the impact of fossil fuels and to that extent,” she explained.
She added that the Inter-national Energy Association sees forecasts of 0-20% usage of fossil fuel by 2050 as part of mitigating the effects of climate change but questioned who would be supplying the 20% fossil fuel. On that front, she called for global moral strategic leadership to ensure that the countries that were raped of their resources during the era of colonization and are now suffering the devastating effects of the global industrialization era be the ones to benefit.
“Will the world make the same mistake of 1945 or will the world accept that equity demands of us now and respect demands of us, conversations that allow those whose poverty has been cemented by centuries of extraction and exploitation by a few to catch up with those whose per capita income is multiple times that found in Ghana and Guyana and Suriname and Barbados and others. Or will the world just simply ignore the reality of that disparity and perpetuate the hypocrisy that regrettably has become too familiar with our condition as people across this world?” she questioned.
Prime Minister Mottley said that the time is ever ripe for the region to take a stand on the issues that are often overlooked by the global superpowers since they are the major perpetrators of global warming. She added that while the end goal is the preservation of the environment and reduction of greenhouse gases that must not and cannot be done at the expense of citizens.
She said that a balance has to be struck between the need to save the world and the reality of providing for the people.
“What is required of us know is to have the kinds of complex conversations and a thank you President Ali for your initiative in creating a forum such as this that will allow us to begin to say to the rest of the world we actually see what is going on and we don’t agree with it and we actually recognize that the commitment to be able to change the narrative without understanding and appreciating the realities of countries such as ours faced with a crisis of the climate, but faced with the complexity of poverty of our people and the lack of opportunities, that there must be a way that can be found that can meet both needs,” the Bajan leader said.
Framers of our own future
Further pushing her proposal for a regional renewable energy fund, the Barbadian Prime Minister said that the G20 countries produce 80% of the greenhouse gas emissions and many of them are still some of the biggest beneficiaries of oil and gas revenues. She added that the world is at a point where the global discussion must now address these issues.
She argued that if the new energy exporters in the region can put between 10-15% of their funds to finance renewable energy while ensuring that citizens are also beneficiaries of that renewable energy compact then that further advances the discussion on transition.
“We should commit to investing in a new international exchange of renewable energy investments. Projects listed there must meet minimum environmental social governance standards, local content and local ownership conditions.
“A single place for dedicated investors and common minimum standards will ignite investment and growth and provide for entrepreneurs literal opportunities and diversity and draw in new investors and entrepreneurs that hitherto would not have been there,” she said.
She boasted that Barbados is the world’s largest issuer of sovereign securities with natural disaster clauses explaining that the process to arrive at that was not an easy one. However, she stressed that it is an important move, particularly in the natural disaster-prone Caribbean region.
She stated that the time is now for the Caribbean to become the framers of its own future pointing out that it does not remove the region from its obligation of averting the climate crisis but it is a recognition that net-zero does not mean zero rather a limited amount.
“I believe that your country Guyana…has endured much and you cannot move from being (a) highly indebted, poor country to where you are today without being given the opportunity – one to bring along your people who have suffered the indignity of that poverty for decades. But secondly, without being given the opportunity to participate globally in discussions that will affect your ability to manage the development of your people,” the Bajan Prime Minister told the conference.
During a brief comment to the media, following PM Mottley’s speech, Guyana’s President Irfaan Ali said that he is not yet in a position to comment on the proposal for an integrated renewable energy fund since it is the first time the topic has been raised. He also said that the idea seem to be in its developmental stage and would have to be explored by all parties.
Tenants
In the backdrop of questions that have been raised over Guyana’s local content legislation, including the CARICOM Private Sector Organisation (CPSO) saying that it seemingly violates the CARICOM founding treaty, Prime Minister Mottley said the issue is not isolated to just Guyana rather it is a regional one.
However, she did say that a country’s failure to provide opportunities for its citizens to be able to benefit from its patrimony would be sowing seeds of destruction.
“We will have difficult conversations as well in CARICOM and we must … but those conversations recognize that in every country, there are even regional and local conflicts and disagreements and it is our duty to be able to smooth that over. But to ensure that at no stage as newly independent countries of the world do we leave our citizens as tenants in their own land, but make them owners…” Mottley said to a rousing round of applause by the conference attendees.
Mottley said that Barbados has been making advances on the energy front and creating opportunities for its citizens. She related that in November last year, BHP conducted a 2700 square kilometre 3D seismic survey within two offshore blocks under the terms of its exploration licences adding that the survey will help Barbados de-risk exploration and hopefully will lead to the discovery of hydrocarbon resources. She is hoping for significant discoveries of natural gas to help fuel the transition to a carbon neutral state by 2030.
