CERINA Plan is the abbreviation for “CO2 Emissions and Renewable Investment Action Plan”. It is a CO2 reduction concept developed by the German renewable energy institute IWR. The CERINA Plan proposes a technical investment approach linking a country’s CO2 emissions to its investment in renewable energy technology. Therefore, it is an alternative model to approaches like the Kyoto idea of mere cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. The model is meant to be flexible and to adapt to the special national circumstances of each country.
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Background
In 2009, all countries of the world emitted collectively 31.1 billion tons of CO2. This was 37 per cent more than in 1990, the Kyoto reference year. Whereas the Kyoto-model only considers the limitation of emissions, the CERINA concept allows countries to choose if they prefer to cut emissions or to increase renewable investment. Based on this idea of economic incentives, the CERINA plan is meant to help stabilizing global emissions.
Principle of the model
In general, the principle of the CERINA-Plan is: The more a country emits, the more it has to invest in counterbalancing renewable energy technology. Since the annual global CO2 growth rate and the investments in renewable energy generation plants concerning power, heating and fuels are known, the necessary amount which have to be spent for renewable can be calculated. According to IWR calculations, the global amount should be increased to 500 billion Euro per year from 125 billion Euro of actual investment in 2009. Together with the figure of 31.1 billion tons of CO2 emissions, this leads to a theoretical price of 16 Euro per ton [3]. With the help of this calculation, the required investment sum can be determined for each country. For example, the world’s largest emitter China would have to spend an amount of 119 billion Euro to compensate for its 7.4 billion tons of emitted CO2. The IWR has calculated the necessary investment for 65 countries.
Perspectives
Alone or combined with other methods, the CERINA concept is supposed to increase the industrial and political acceptance of climate protection goals. In the long term, it is planned by the IWR institute to establish a global renewable energy investment ranking according to the real investments in renewable energy by the countries.