Within the framework of the COP28 being held in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, the Dominican Republic and the Kingdom of the Netherlands, the organization based in California (USA) Calstart and the Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM), reviewed, one year after the country’s accession, the progress achieved so far in the framework of the Global Agreement to Reduce Emissions from Medium and Heavy Duty Vehicles, which is developed under the Drive to Zero program, developed by Calstart and the California Air Resources Board.
At the meeting, the executive vice president of the National Council for Climate Change and Clean Development Mechanism and co-chair of the Dominican delegation to COP28, Max Puig, presented the progress made by the country in the pursuit of the primary goals of this agreement, signed by the Dominican Republic last year 2022 at COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt and which aims to achieve that the country has, by 2030, 30% of electric vehicles.
“These objectives are not easy to achieve, but we are working on the regulatory framework, the generation of incentives and the necessary conditions to move in that direction, hand in hand with Intrant and other related institutions. In fact, the country has already initiated the implementation of a pilot plan to acquire electric buses through the Municipal Bus Service Office, OMSA, to continue on the road towards electric and sustainable mobility”, said Puig.
The representatives of this initiative, led by the senior advisor of the Netherlands Enterprise Agency, Sonja Munnix; the president and CEO of Calstart, John Boesel, and the Mobility Manager of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, Urska Skrt, offered technical support to develop and improve the country’s capacities in this area, so that the advance towards electric mobility in the transportation of people and cargo is carried out with the greatest efficiency and transparency.
Background Reports
The delegation of the Kingdom of the Netherlands took the opportunity to present the results of the study entitled Expanding Access to Finance for Zero Emission Trucks in Latin America and the Caribbean, designed to identify key actions and interventions for the financial sector and governments in the region to accelerate the adoption of more sustainable and less greenhouse gas emitting options for freight transportation.
“The report was developed by the Climate Works Foundation; it is available in both English and Spanish and focuses mainly on 5 countries in the continent, Mexico, Colombia, Chile, Uruguay and the Dominican Republic. It is a fundamental tool for us to initiate the necessary transition towards climate sustainability in a sector as important as the heavy and medium load sector, including buses, which is fundamental for the mobility of people”, said the executive vice-president of the National Council for Climate Change and Clean Development Mechanism, Max Puig.
Also presented was the study on the Blocking of commercial vehicle recharging infrastructure, carried out to learn about the operations to be carried out in the interest of advancing in the deployment and installation of the necessary infrastructure to support the process of decarbonization of the civil and commercial transportation system.
In addition, the Dominican Republic delegation was able to learn about the Global Action Plan 2023 to implement the global agreement to reduce emissions from medium and heavy duty vehicles, a multi-country study that not only presents a far-reaching plan to develop this initiative, but also makes broad and specific recommendations on the decisions that must be taken to implement this initiative.
Source: Presidencia.gob.do
