Cleaner Technology and Sustainable Development： Contributions of Brazilian Clean Development Mechanism （CDM） Projects

Brazil is the world’s third most successful bidder for CDM projects, only behind China and India. One of the main objectives of CDM is to promote sustainable development in the developing countries through the transfer of environmentally sound technologies. Assuming that the generation of cleaner technologies is the most effective strategy for achieving this CDM goal, this paper was built upon the following research question: Is CDM effective in promoting sustainable development and the generation of cleaner technologies in Brazil? Thus, this paper evaluates the contribution of 10 CDM projects for the generation of cleaner technologies and the promotion of sustainable development in Brazil. For this, 10 cases that represent the Brazilian CDM context were selected out of 75 PDDs (Project Design Documents) approved by September 2009: five renewable energy production projects and five other on swine/urban waste treatment and N2O destruction. A multiple-case study method was chosen and a data triangulation technique was used to collect the data from the 10 selected projects. The analysis and discussion of results was made based on a model built upon the following concepts: CDM project cycle, technology transfer, environmental technology and sustainable development. The results of this study demonstrate the prevalence of projects that: (1) use end-of-pipe technologies; (2) have a single or double bottom line profile with regard to sustainable development; and (3) show endogenous technology transfer, with the acquisition/development of most of the know-how and equipment in Brazil. In short, this paper defends Brazilian CDM projects which make only a modest contribution to cleaner technology generation and to the promotion of triple bottom line sustainable development.