TransMilenio: first mass transport project adapted to the Kyoto Protocol

(Bogotá, September 14, 2006). The Bogotá Integrated Mass Transport System, TransMilenio became the first project of its type at world level to successfully integrate the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) component of the Kyoto Protocol, after intense work led by the Andean Development Corporation (CAF) and the Bogotá system.

This means that the operation of the TranMilenio system will reduce its emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs) into the atmosphere thanks to more efficient passenger transport and the partial substitution of private transport by high-quality public transport, which involves moving a percentage of users from private vehicles to the new mass transport system, a factor that gave access to the CDM.

"The path opened by TransMilenio and CAF has great merit considering the complexity of modeling a transport system and the changes that are generated in the mobility of cities added to the environmental benefit. CAF has traveled a long road on behalf of developing countries which has ended happily,” CAF environment director Maria Teresa Szauer said.

The environmental and mobility benefit was achieved after the development of a complex project by CAF and TransMilenio, aimed at implementing the CDM component in mass transport projects. The project resulted in the construction of a methodology that, thanks to the approval recently granted by the United Nations, becomes the only one applicable to this type of project.

The methodology can be applied to all mass transport systems based on rapid buses, which in the Colombian case includes MIO de Cali, Transcaribe de Cartagena, Transmetro de Barranquilla and Megabus de Pereira. It can also be used by other countries that are developing similar projects such as Transantiago in Chile, TMU Guayaquil in Ecuador, Protransporte in Lima, Peru, Panama City, Shanghai, Laos and several cities in Brazil.

Transport causes 25% of greenhouse gas emissions which generate global warming. Of the 43 existing methodologies in the area approved internationally for different types of projects, one is applicable to small-scale transport. The methodology constructed by CAF-Transmilenio is the world’s first for mass transport.

The CDM is a market mechanism established under the Kyoto Protocol to help developing countries achieve sustainable development by promoting environmentally friendly investments by governments or companies in the industrialized countries.

Through its Latin American Carbon Program (PLAC), CAF promotes projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions and contribute to sustainable development. The work ranges from identification of the opportunity to the sale of the emission reductions, all adapted to the terms of the Kyoto protocol.

The accreditation of a transport project under CDM means that its GHG emission reductions are recognized in the market, and new funds for the project can be earned from the sale of the environmental service of emission reductions.

The funds channeled through the CDM should help developing countries to achieve some of their economic, social, environmental and sustainable development objectives, such as clean water and air, improvements in land use, accompanied by social benefits including rural development, employment, poverty reduction and, in many cases, reduced dependence on imported fossil fuels.

This methodology gives rise to a new concept which emphasizes mobility and environmental protection, aspects on which CAF is permanently working.