Since 2004 PA Consulting Group has been working with the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Government of Armenia to identify financing solutions for its struggling water resources and supply sector. At the August 16, 2009 meeting of the Steering Committee on Sustainable Water Sector Financing, PA’s recommendation to move toward a Water Sector Revolving Fund was unanimously adopted as the future course for Armenia’s long-term water security.
This achievement followed nearly a year of careful and in-depth analysis and debate by the PA team and a high level technical working group comprised of economists and water sector specialists. PA project manager, Robert Cardinalli commented, "Creating a water sector revolving fund requires government and private sector commitment to guarantee sustainable and high quality services."
The revolving fund will channel investments into the water sector, including but not limited to the sources of fund capitalization of state fees from water use and effluent discharge, development fees, private investments, donor and IFI support, revenues from cash management and operations with securities and bond issuance. The next steps are to detail the institutional organization and the legal and regulatory framework that need to be set in place, and to fund operational and financial structures to secure ratification by the Prime Minister and National Assembly.
In his closing comments at the policy level meeting, the Armenian Deputy Minister of Finance remarked "…what the PA team has achieved with limited resources and in a few months is a rare achievement. To get Armenian government officials to agree on anything including the kind of bread to order at lunch is very challenging. To reach a consensus on something as complex and important as the future financing mechanism of water in our country is nothing short of a miracle."
PA recently reached an important milestone in our work with a power distribution company, Bangalore Electricity Supply Company (BESCOM), which has secured agreement on the first agricultural demand-side management project of its kind in India. The project is part of the Water-Energy Nexus Activity (WENEXA), supported by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID/India), which aims to exploit the nexus between water and energy.
An estimated 23% of India's power consumption is used for irrigation, including a significant proportion of wasted energy, due to water pump inefficiency. The WENEXA project has been focused on developing a workable pump replacement model for the BESCOM site. This model draws on project research, including a survey of prior pump efficiency projects and economic analysis of the proposed initiative. The solution comprises a pump replacement element, farmer education and a usage monitoring segment that together bring a total reduction of 46% in current consumption. If a similar initiative were rolled out across the country, it has the potential to save about 82,000 million KWh units of energy annually.
Dr. Gaurav Bhatiani, Principal Energy Specialist & Mission Environment Officer at USAID/India praised PA’s "excellent work... on a very difficult assignment. USAID/India deeply appreciates the commitment and leadership demonstrated by you in designing and successfully bidding the first ever ESCO Contract for Agricultural Demand Side Management in India."
PA Consulting Group participated in the US Energy Association (USEA) Global Workshop on Grid Connect Renewable Energy held in early September for participants from around the globe representing Afghanistan, Central Asia, Egypt, Indonesia, Liberia, Morocco, and the Philippines.
PA’s Bill Meade gave a presentation on, "The application of CDM to Renewable Energy Projects in Emerging Market Countries". Bill emphasized that most countries are continuing to face some very real and practical issues in implementing the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) - one of the cooperative mechanisms in the Kyoto Protocol of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
As of 2008, there are currently 978 registered Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects all over the developing world. The geographic distribution of CDM projects around the globe shows that a majority of renewable projects are based in India (34%) with South America (20%) and China (17%) coming in a close second and third place. PA’s research shows that the most common types of registered CDM projects include biomass energy, hydro, wind, landfill gas, and biogas.
For CDM projects to qualify for Carbon Emission Reduction units (CERs) the project must meet four criteria:
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Sustainability – host country determines whether project meets “sustainable development” criteria
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Environmental additionality – the project would not exist without CDM financing, i.e., additional emission reductions, and therefore not “business-as-usual”
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Financial additionality – CERs are not financed with Official Development Assistance (ODA)
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Governmental approval – both host and buyer country Designated National Authorities (DNAs) must approve CDM project activity.
During the presentation the participants learned of the range of financial benefits that are associated with implementing CDM projects, such as: 0.5 – 7% points Internal Rate of Return (IRR) boost or US$5-16 /MWh for renewable energy projects from CDM financing; 5 – 60% points IRR boost for landfill gas and other methane reduction projects, depending upon the project type and emissions factor (baseline); up-front payments for CERs possible to improve project cash flow; and, that CDM projects can leverage additional conventional financing (bank loans, etc) or qualify for concessionary financing from the new Carbon Investment Fund administered by The World Bank.
PA has a long history of working with the U.S. Agency for International Development and other donor agencies in implementing energy and environmental programs that support national sustainable development priorities. USEA plays an important role in facilitating the international exchange of ideas and application of "best practice" in the energy sector.
The Methane to Markets (M2M) Partnership is an initiative led by the US Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) to reduce global methane emissions to enhance economic growth, promote energy security, improve the environment, and reduce greenhouse gases.
M2M focuses on four key sectors: 1) agriculture: livestock (e.g. dairy, swine) and agro-industry (e.g., distilleries/ethanol plants, sugar mills, fruit and juice processing, starch processing); 2) oil and gas; 3) landfills; and, 4) coal mines (coal bed methane). The objective is to develop sustainable markets for methane capture and use in the four key sectors in developing countries.
As part of this work PA has:
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Developed country profiles and resource assessments to determine sector characteristics and the potential to reduce methane emissions;
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Implemented pilot projects that use recovered methane;
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Developed implementation guides for methane capture projects;
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Conducted preliminary feasibility studies of methane reduction projects; and
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Strengthened local institutional capacity in methane management.
Specific results from PA’s assistance include country resource assessments for Argentina, the Philippines and Thailand, with studies under way in other countries in Latin America and South/South East Asia. These resource assessments demonstrate the important contribution methane recovery can play in support of both energy and environmental objectives. For instance, PA estimates that Argentina can reduce over 2 million tonnes CO2e/yr currently being emitted by the livestock and agro-industrial sectors through methane capture and utilization. PA has also conducted feasibility studies for anaerobic digester systems in Mexico, China and Georgia,
M2M Partner countries are: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Ecuador, European Commission, Finland, Georgia, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Mongolia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Poland, Republic of Korea, Russia, Thailand, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States, and Vietnam.
The September issue of Condé Nast Traveller features an in-depth look at Jordanian nature reserves and eco-tourism, spotlighting the work of the Royal Society for the Conservation of Nature (RSCN). The Society – one of the leading and most respected conservation NGOs in the Middle East – has retained PA Consulting Group to develop a transformation strategy that will enable it to expand its vital conservation work in Jordan while strengthening Jordan’s place as a world-wide ecotourism market. PA’s work has been highly profiled among the decision makers in Jordan as well as in the media (see insert picture of HMQ Rania of Jordan on the cover of the feature issue of Condé Nast).
In exploring “the Power of Travel to Transform,” Condé Nast extols the efforts of the RSCN to protect the Jordanian environment and improve livelihoods while encouraging and harnessing the power of tourism. The RSCN’s socio-economic projects – which employ local Jordanians as reserve managers, hiking guides, and producers of locally-sourced foodstuffs, candles, olive oil soaps, and handicrafts – not only offer “authenticity to travellers tired of hotel chains but also link rural communities to the modern economy while allowing them to remain in landscapes they know intimately.” This observation highlights the core of PA’s mandate on this assignment, which entails the preservation of the environment through the engagement and involvement of local communities and the public, while ensuring sustainable business operations.
Eco-tourism has proved to be a primary nexus at which conservation and sustainable business development intersect for the RSCN. The RSCN currently manages six nature reserves that not only protect some of the most unique and singularly biodiverse ecosystems in Jordan but also provide an impressive variety of tourism business experiences. Through PA’s work, the Society intends to inaugurate an additional nine reserves in the near future, more than doubling the area under its guardianship and further expanding its tourism enterprise into new products as well as boutique and niche markets.
PA will be working with the RSCN over the coming months on a transformation strategy that will facilitate this exponential growth while ensuring that that the Society’s dual commitment to nature and people is strengthened through staff capacity building, business-oriented growth strategies, and private sector partnership. Through the use of PA’s holistic One Page Strategy Toolkit and with PA’s ROI-driven benefits modelling techniques, the RSCN expects to realize a transformation that will empower its growth and serve as a model for innovative conservation practice in the region.
For more details on the RSCN’s protected areas or to plan a trip to Jordan please visit www.rscn.org.jo.
PA's Joellyn Murphy was recently honored with an "Outstanding Service Award" by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the U.S. Embassy (State Department) for her efforts in leading the U.S. government funded Kyrgyzstan Energy Advisory Services Project where PA is advising the Prime Minister and Minister of Energy on critical national electricity issues. The purpose of the award, USAID’s highest to a non-employee, is to bestow recognition on an individual who has made a significant contribution to the agency's mission.
Ms. Murphy has been making a significant contribution to help transform people's lives since 1993, working primarily with governments and energy sectors in transitioning economies. In those early, difficult days from 1994-1999, she lived in Bishkek and worked for PA (then known as Hagler Bailly) where she led PA’s energy projects in Kyrgyzstan. In May, 2008 she returned to Bishkek to lead PA’s current energy project – arriving just in time to provide advice on how to mitigate the effects of the country’s most severe winter energy supply shortage in decades.
Ms. Murphy is from California, by way of nearly a decade spent in the senior civil service in Washington DC, and another decade in New Mexico as Vice President of an electric and gas utility. She has been working in energy policy and energy economics for more than 30 years, having started her federal career in the Executive Office of the President at the time of the United States’ own energy crisis just after the first Arab oil embargo in 1973.
Ms. Murphy is a graduate of Stanford University with a BA in Communication and an MBA. She is also an emeritus member of the Board of Trustees of Stanford University.
Upcoming PA events
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Energy Efficient Data Center Practices on Campus Workshop, Albany, NY
September 28, 2009
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International Conference on River Basin Management and Cooperation in the Euro-Mediterranean Region, Beirut, Lebanon
October 6-9, 2009
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3rd International Conference of Responsible Tourism in Destinations, Belize
October 19-23, 2009
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Society for International Development (SID) Career Fair, Washington, DC
October 9, 2009
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World Business Council on Sustainable Development (WBCSD) Council Meeting, Washington, DC
October 14, 2009
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World Energy Engineering Congress, Washington, DC
November 4-6, 2009
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World Travel Market, London
November 9-12, 2009
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Methane 2 Markets (M2M) Workshop sponsored by USEPA and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Delhi, India
November 18-19, 2009.
To learn more about PA's sustainable tourism capability, please contact us now.
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