LRQA’s Technical Expertise Shines at Carbon Expo
14th June 2011 by Jo Brophy
Now that the dust has settled, the LRQA Climate Change Technical Team Round Table gathered together to reflect on their collective three days of meetings, keynote speeches, presentations and panel discussions at Carbon Expo held from 1-3 June 2011in Barcelona.
Madlen King, Global Head of Climate Change and Sustainability was joined by
• Andy Ritchie, Climate Change Services Manager (MSBS)
• Javier Vallejo Drehs, CDM Quality Manager (MSBS)
• Olga Rivas, EMS & OSHAS Technical Manager (EMEA/Spain)
• Michiaki Chiba, Climate Change Manager, (Asia & Pacific)_
• Zvezdalina Yaneva, Climate Change Manager, (EMEA/Bulgaria)
• Luis Carneiro, Climate Change Manager, (Latin America)
Here is a recap of that discussion, starting with Madlen’s thoughts:
Madlen King
The difference for me for Carbon Expo this year has been the quantity and quality of client meetings that we have been able to schedule. With a truly global LRQA team present, including representatives from EMEA, the Americas and Asia, we have strengthened our relationships with existing clients and established a sound basis on which to further develop relationships with new clients. But the highlight for me has certainly been the positive feedback that we have received for our CDM services in Asia and Latin America.
When a client reports that they have ‘nothing but praise’ for our services, it is testimony to all of our staff and their hard work and commitment. I will have great pleasure in passing on the compliments received to all those involved.
Michiaki Chiba
For me, project developers’ interests were twofold; firstly to find a solution to known business until 2012, and secondly, the prospect of unknown future business post 2012. Project Developers were quite keen to ensure verifiers capacity to meet their needs to conduct verification of the existing projects as well as validation of projects under development to be registered before the deadline of 2012.
It is clear that the number of reliable verifiers is very limited in the market.
Future prospects were often talked about relative to underdeveloped regions, e.g. Africa, underdeveloped sectors, e.g. energy efficiency, transport, forestry, etc. that were not sufficiently addressed through the current framework. Many talked about the Programme of Activities surrounding CDM (POA) to Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMA), Reducing Emissions from Deforestation (REDD) for example as the key words for the future.
LRQA undoubtedly has an established reputation in the market as a reliable verification body that can be the choice of major project developers.
Our team over the globe will have a busy time towards the later half of this year to maximize our presence and to most effectively utilize our resources in line with the business strategy and plan – to meet the growing demand from the market. Carbon Expo this year, among the other events around the world, will be a check point for our team to shift gear.
Javier Vallejo Drehs
Of particular interest to me were the conferences related to the Kyoto Protocol and the flexible mechanisms (CDM, Joint Implementation, International Emissions Trading) and also those related to forestry and REDD, that provided information and opinion about the future of the climate change market beyond 2012.
There were more people here than last year with new exhibitors particularly in the areas of consulting and trading. From a business perspective, LRQA made a lot of contacts with project developers and new clients.
Luis Carneiro
We saw increased demand for LRQA’s validation and verification services – particularly over the coming few months.
Along with improvements being made in the CDM approval process as defined by COP16, the market movement to have projects registered before 2012 is transferring a significant demand to the Designated Operational Entities (DOEs), mainly for the validation of new projects. LRQA must be prepared to absorb this demand, by utilizing our current capacity built over the years, whilst strengthening our time planning and maintaining quality control.
For LRQA in Latin America we received 8 validation requests as result of these 3 days at Carbon Expo and detailed negotiations on another 8 projects are in progress, with a strong likelihood of closing contracts in the next weeks.
Zvezdalina Yaneva
Visitors were looking for the ‘right person’ to speak to and having the main LRQA climate change contacts from around the world was very well received and left a good impression as to the commitment of our organisation and our people.
You can find out more about LRQA’s climate change activities at www.climatechange.lrqa.com.