Vietnam is one of the countries worst affected by the impacts of climate change and must break its dependence on coal. The country's energy transition has begun, thanks in part to one courageous woman.
The Mekong Delta — an intricate maze of rivers, wetlands and islands, characterised by astonishing biodiversity and located in southern Vietnam — is becoming increasingly brackish as a result of climate change, threatening the survival of millions of farmers and fishermen. In 2016, Vietnam was one of the five countries in the world worst affected by the consequences of global warming, according to the ranking drawn up by the NGO Germanwatch. The Asian country has been battered by hurricanes and storms and was hit by the worst drought in a century, which brought the Mekong River to record low levels. To counter this alarming trend and strengthen the nation's resilience, an energy transition is under way in Vietnam that envisages the gradual abandonment of coal in favour of renewable energy.
In Vietnam, the massive exploitation of coal has fuelled considerable national economic growth, but at the expense of citizens' health and the environment, and by accelerating the effects of climate change. Vietnam's per capita carbon emissions quintupled in just over twenty years, between 1990 and 2013. Coal-fired power plants, according to a Harvard University study, are the cause of the highest number of premature deaths per year compared to any other country in Asia, with the exception of Indonesia, and the air in major cities is almost unbreathable, with levels of pollutants four times higher than those considered acceptable by the World Health Organization. Forty per cent of rice production — one of the country's main resources — is also at risk due to rising sea levels. The need to adopt less impactful forms of energy has therefore become increasingly clear.
To reduce its environmental impact, Vietnam has launched the National Energy Development Plan (Psen), which aims to cut CO2 emissions by 8 per cent by 2030 and to meet 5 per cent of national energy needs through renewable energy by 2020. Invaluable support has come from Khanh Nguy Thi, who has actively contributed to the energy transition under way in her country, as well as to the improved management of natural resources, by founding the NGO Green innovation and development centre (GreenID).
Read also: Il Bangladesh protegge le foreste per non finire sott'acqua
Read also: Dal degrado al parco, l'incredibile riqualificazione del fiume Emscher
Khanh Nguy Thi, winner of the Goldman environmental prize 2018 — an honour that since 1990 has recognised environmental activists from around the world — was born into a farming family in a village in northern Vietnam. Having grown up near a coal-fired power plant, she experienced the pollution caused by coal first-hand and saw many people in her community fall ill with cancer. For this reason, Nguy Thi set aside her dream of becoming a diplomat and began to take an interest in environmental issues, with the aim of reducing Vietnam's dependence on fossil fuels and coal. In 2011, as mentioned, she founded GreenID, with the primary objective of promoting the development of sustainable energy in Vietnam, as well as the proper management of water resources and green development. She also established the Vietnam sustainable energy alliance, a network of eleven Vietnamese and international environmental and social organisations that collaborate on issues related to energy efficiency.
Thanks to Nguy Thi's tireless commitment, and her growing public profile, the Vietnamese government revised the national energy plan, deciding to reduce the number of coal-fired power plants and to increase the use of renewable energy. The new energy plan was drawn up in collaboration with Nguy Thi and GreenID, and represents the first step towards energy independence for Vietnam. GreenID's objective is to promote sustainable development in Vietnam through clean energy, low-impact technologies and responsible management of the environment and natural resources. The organisation, characterised by a holistic approach, also aims to provide detailed information on the serious impact of coal on health, the environment, society and the economy, and is developing local energy planning to deliver clean and effective energy solutions to rural communities across the country. Vietnam's journey towards a renewable and resilient future has therefore begun, thanks in part to Nguy Thi's efforts which, through arguments grounded in scientific data, have shown the entire country just how dangerous dependence on coal is for health and the environment.