Feasibility Study on Emission Free Community Composting Programmatic CDM in Bohol, Philippines

Global Environment Centre Foundation(GEC)

Reports of CDM/JI Feasibility Studies

Title of Feasibility Study (FS)Feasibility Study on Emission Free Community Composting Programmatic CDM in Bohol, Philippines
FYFY 2007
Main Implementing EntityEX CORPORATION
FS Partner(s)KAJIMA CORPORATION, Bohol Provincial Government, APCC
Location of Project ActivityProvince of Bohol, Philippines
Summary of FS ReportSummary (PDF174KB)
Description of Project ActivityThe Ecological Solid Waste Management Act (RA9003), issued by the Philippine Government, requires all final disposal sites to be converted into sanitary landfills by 2006, and mandates municipalities to reduce their waste through re-use, recycling and composting activities, as well as other resource recovery activities. Despite such national efforts to promote sorting of waste and the reduction of waste materials, very little progress has been made at the municipality levels to achieve the requirement, mainly due to the lack of funds. Bohol Province located in the Central Visayas region in the Philippines, is an island province consists of 48 municipalities (capital city is Tagbilaran City) with a population of approximately 1.14 million. Bohol Province has been one of the forerunners in the Philippines and Southeast Asia in regards to their environmental efforts, and it was the first local government in Southeast Asia to receive ISO 14001 accreditation. After the issuance of RA9003, Bohol Province has been promoting composting activities to improve the sanitary condition of existing landfills. However, due to financial barriers only few community level composting programs have been initiated.
Therefore, the Emission Free Community Composting Programmatic CDM in Bohol, Philippines (hereafter, the “Project”) will support such efforts made by the Province of Bohol by providing financial and technical assistance through a programmatic composting CDM project. The increase of composing facility will bring about “co-benefits,” not only at the local level by solving regional waste management issues, but also at the global level by reducing greenhouse gas emissions by preventing emission of methane generated from conventional waste treatment process. In addition, the successful implementation of this project has a potential of being applied to other developing nations facing similar problems. The Project intends to establish a “Compost Fund” which will provide financial assistance for the development of CPAs under the Project.
Targeted GHGMethane (CH4)
Category of Project ActivityWaste Management
CDM/JICDM
Duration of Project Activity/ Crediting Period2009~2023/ 2009~2015
Baseline Methodology/ AdditionalitySSC AMS-III.F. “Avoidance of methane production from biomass decay through composting, (Ver.5)” was applied to the baseline methodologies in the PoA. SSC AMS-III.G. “Landfill Methane Recovery (Ver.5)” and Methodological Tool in Annex 10 of the EB 35 meeting Report: “Tool to determine methane emissions avoided from dumping waste at a solid waste disposal site for the estimation of baseline emission of organic matter undergoing anaerobic decay at the solid waste dump site (Ver.2)” were also applied as references for SSC AMS-III.F. Determination of additionality for CPAs implemented under this PoA, investment barrier, due to the low potential of income generation from compost sales, and barrier due to prevailing practice, where currently only seven small-scale composting facilities exist and 99% of waste are treated at landfills, will be applicable to all CPAs.
Estimation of GHG Emission ReductionsAssuming all the organic wastes generated in the current collection area is composted under the PoA, the expected emission reduction during the crediting period is 83,813 tCO2e (annual average 11,973tCO2e).
Monitoring MethodologyThe same methodologies for baseline methodologies were applied for monitoring methodology.
Environmental Impact AnalysisIn the Philippines, DAO 2003-30 states that, “organic fertilizer (composting) facilities with an annual production capacity exceeding 15 MT/day” and “located in environmentally critical areas (ECA)” are required to complete and submit an Initial Environmental Examination (IEE) report. Any other composting facilities are required to submit an environmental managements plan (EMP). For CPAs under the PoA, facilities is not expected to be established in ECA.
Issues and Tasks for Project Realisation(1) Development of CPA Project Plan
Development of concrete implementation plans for CPAs is crucial. If municipalities choose to implement the Project in collaboration with other municipalities, or if municipalities would like to participate in composting projects where they transport their organic waste to composting facilities operated by other municipalities, discussions with the participation of all stakeholders, as well as individual consultations with each municipalities will be held to reach to an agreement in terms of waste acceptance fees, the distribution of initial costs, etc.
(2) Improvement of Waste Collection Rate
At present, waste collection rate in Bohol Province is low. The success of the compost CDM project highly depends on the amount of organic waste that can be collected for composting. Therefore, discussions between municipalities must take place to find ways to increase their budget allocation to improve waste collection efforts. In addition, considerations to implement low-cost waste collection alternatives such as the use of bicycle trailers in Barangays will be necessary.
(3) Operation of the Compost Fund
For the establishment of the Compost Fund that will manage the budget of the CDM project, the following actions are necessary.
  • Decide and develop a method to collect operation cost from each CPAs (e.g. payment of a proportion of CER sales for fund operation)
  • Hire Compost Fund staff for general management/operation of the Fund
  • Decide and develop the terms and condition of the Compost Fund
  • Select an auditing organization (in order to monitor that the fund management operation is carried out in a just and transparent manner)