Mexico - Low-Carbon Development : Main Report
This study analyzes a range of energy efficiency options available in Mexico, including supply-side efficiency improvements in the electric power and oil and gas industries and demand-side electricity efficiency measures to limit high-growth energy-consuming activities, such as air conditioning and refrigeration. It also evaluates a range of renewable energy options that make use of the country's vast wind, solar, biomass, hydro, and geothermal resources. But low-carbon (CO2) development is not only about energy production and consumption. In Mexico one of the most important sources of greenhouse gas emissions continues to be emissions from deforestation. The rate of deforestation has fallen steadily in Mexico over the past decades. Expanded programs for forest management, wildlife conservation, and efforts to increase the stock of forests can provide needed employment in rural areas and help make Mexican forests net absorbers of CO2 in the coming years. A fundamental question often asked about low-cost mitigation options is why they are not already being undertaken. As the study shows, the availability of commercial technology and even low financial costs is often not enough to overcome barriers related to institutional and knowledge gaps, regulatory and legal constraints, or societal norms. Inability to surmount these 'transactions costs' is typically at the root of the problem of why supposedly low-cost actions are not undertaken. To partially overcome this dilemma, one of the explicit criteria used in this study for identifying low-carbon measures was that they had already been implemented on some scale in Mexico or in a similar economy outside of Mexico. In order to mainstream low-carbon development, a package of new stimuli will be needed, including public and consumer education and training, public demonstrations, standards and regulations, and financial incentives.