Sustainability Research (SRI) PhD Projects
CDM projects and local sustainable development contribution
Supervisors: Professor Jouni Paavola
Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) was adopted as one of the flexibility mechanisms to ensure cost- effective mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions. CDM made it possible for developed Annex 1 countries to undertake extra-territorial mitigation actions in the developing world. The CDM projects are expected to deliver on two goals: climate change mitigation and local sustainable development.
The majority of CDM projects – nearly three quarters of them - are hosted by China, India and Brazil. Looked from another viewpoint, the majority of carbon credits have been issued to projects to do with 1) reduction of HFC and PFC emissions; 2) renewable energy; 3) CH4 reduction, cement manufacturing and mining, and; 4) supply side energy efficiency. Mitigation rationales seem to dominate CDM activities and not enough is known of the evolving contribution of CDM projects to local sustainable development in the host communities.
This project seeks to generate new evidence on the contribution of CDM projects to local sustainable development. There would be scope to tailor the broad project template by choice of region or regions to focus on, depending on language and other skills. Also, the broad topic can be tailored to a comparative analysis of different types of CDM projects to local sustainable development, or an analysis of one particular sector of projects.
Supporting documents:
If you would like to be considered for research in this area, you will need to provide a short research proposal. This should be no longer than 6 pages, plus referencing. You will need to present the proposal in sections including 1) an introduction, 2) short literature review and novelty of the proposed research 3) research problem and questions 4) study area / site, materials and methods, and 5) references. Referencing should be done in the style of a journal related to this research area.
Funding:
There is no funding specifically attached to this project, but candidates can apply to external funding (e.g. Commonwealth research studentships) or the University scholarships which include:
Home/EU: University Research Scholarship (URS) – full information at http://scholarships.leeds.ac.uk
International: Fully-funded International Research Scholarship (FIRS), and China Scholarship Council (CSC)-Leeds Partnership – full information at http://scholarships.leeds.ac.uk
Note to candidate: You will need to demonstrate that you have/are being consideredfor 3 years offunding to include tuition fees and living costs. Additionally, a bench fee may be charged, to cover exceptional consumables/fieldwork costs neededfor successful completion of the project. Please see the notes on ‘fees and scholarships’ in the main menu
Entry requirements/necessary background:
The minimum entry requirement is 2.1 UK BSc (Hons), preferably in a social science subject.