Spain approves first JI project

Spain has approved its first JI project, a plan to modernise a steel mill in Ukraine.

The letter of approval was announced yesterday following a meeting of Spain’s designated national authority, which issued positive reports on five new emissions-cutting projects under the Kyoto protocol.

The so-called joint implementation (JI) project, presented by the World Bank for the Spanish Carbon Fund, involves the revamping and modernisation of the Alchevsk steel mill in Ukraine.

The project, estimated to cut on average 906,269 tonnes of carbon dioxide (CO2) equivalent per year, has also received a letter of approval from the Netherlands.

Other projects to get letters of approval come under the Kyoto protocol’s clean development mechanism (CDM), which aims to cut emissions in developing countries.

The largest CDM project is a landfill gas scheme in Mexico, presented by Hera-Holding S.L. and Hera-Amasa S.A., with an estimated annual emissions reduction of 137,735 tonnes of CO2 equivalent.

Spain's DNA approved the SML WHRB CPP Asia-Pacific Carbon Fund project in India, where electricity generated from waste heat at iron kilns is expected to cut emissions by an estimated 101,666 tonnes per year.

Approvals were also given to two smaller projects: a BioCarbon Fund afforestation project in China and a small hydroelectric scheme in Colombia for Union Fenosa.

The five projects in total have an average annual emissions reduction capacity of 1.24 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent.

Spain’s DNA has now given letters of approval to 94 CDM and JI projects, which are estimated to cut emissions by 128.6 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent during the period 2008-2012