Page - (000205) - in Evaluating Climate Change Action for Sustainable Development

areas,whilemeeting themin theurbansector.As in thecaseof theMDG’s, energy servesasanenabler for theachievementofothergoalsunder theSDG’s.Addition- ally, SDG7addresses the energy sector specifically by ‘ensuring access to afford- able, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all’. The linkage with climate change comes in SDG 13, which calls to ‘take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts’. My research examines the relationships between sustainable development, cli- mate change and renewable energy in rural Central America. Themain research question Ianswer is ‘Canrural renewableenergyprojects simultaneouslymeet themultiple goals of sustainable development, climate changemitigation and climate change adaptation? If so, under what conditions?’ and I use three guidingquestions: 1. How well are RE projects meeting their goals of sustainable development, climate changemitigation and climate change adaptation? 2. What are the relative roles of local historical background and physical charac- teristics, typeof communitygovernance, and funding source andproject imple- mentation process in the success of projects inmeeting adaptation, mitigation anddevelopment goals? 3. What are thechallenges in integratingdevelopment andclimate changeadapta- tion policies in rural Central America? Howmight the evolving international climate regimecontribute to this integration? Ialso lookathowtheclimatechangemitigation, climatechangeadaptationand sustainable developmentmainstreaming and integration can take place. For this research, and as defined bySperling,mainstreaming indicates that climate issues are being used for planning and budgeting decisionmakingwhile integration is usedwhen specific adaptationmeasures are added to design and implementation strategies (Sperling2003).That is,mainstreaming includes climatechangeconsid- erations, that gobeyond adaptation, from theoutset duringproject planning. 11.2 Approach I used thepolitical ecologyapproach toassess the importanceof, and relationships between, political economy, social and community structures, local historical backgrounds and the use of natural resources. The approach provides a useful framework for evaluating rural renewable energyprojects, focusingon institutions (such as common property resources), markets, local response to development interventions and to thematerial effects of development on the physical environ- ment (for example,water, soil, and carbon). Political ecology studiesofLatinAmerica aremostly related to the relationship betweenpoverty and environmental degradation: poverty and conservation efforts in protected areas, development, land degradation, wildlife and livelihoods, land use change, land use and food security, shrimp mariculture and fisheries, and 11 SustainableDevelopment,ClimateChange, andRenewableEnergy inRural. . . 189