Isramart : BB Governor for profitable operation of new CDM-supported projects

Isramart news:
Governor of Bangladesh Bank (BB) Dr Atiur Rahman yesterday commended initiative in promoting use of facilities available under Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), window of Kyoto Protocol carbon trading arrangement, for renewable energy and other environment-friendly projects in Bangladesh.

" I look forward to their playing an instrumental role in familiarizing entrepreneurs and financiers with this window of opportunity in CDM, making available necessary technical support in preparing proposals seeking CDM assistance," he told a workshop organized by Climate Action Bangladesh with support from German GTZ, Evolution Markets at a local hotel here.

Dr Atiur said, it's a pity that entrepreneurs, financiers and authorities in Bangladesh have been very late in taking note of the opportunity offered by CDM in making renewable nergy and other environment friendly projects more viable in developing economy like us, substantially mitigating the financial risks for entrepreneurs and financiers.

He said, while entrepreneurs in China and India have already drawn billions of US dollars from CDM window, with long lists of many more queued up in processing, we have thus far heard of only two projects in Bangladesh accessing a few millions.

The central bank governor described renewable energy projects as typically challenging for entrepreneurs and financiers in respect of financial viability and said the newer technologies and equipment involved usually lead to higher costs of output than those of conventional successes.

Bangladesh Bank's refinance window, he said, available to banks and financial institutions against their financing of renewable energy like solar biogas, effluent treatment plants, biogas and other environment friendly projects reduce financial costs to some extent, but cannot compensate for all higher cost elements in these projects.