BAGUIO CITY

Despite the complexities of rapid population growth, environmental change, pollution, waste disposal and other problems, Baguio City continues to live up to its name as the "Summer Capital of the Philippines," and as the "Cleanest and Greenest City" nationwide.

Fears that this highly urbanized city may become just another urban nightmare began several years ago with the advent of problems associated with economic growth. With 7,897 new births adding to its population every year, the city soon started facing unprecedented problems like squatting on watersheds, denudation of forests and de-vegetation, improper gardening/kaingin, and even forest fires.

While Baguio City has a good record in garbage collection and removal of solid wastes, a lot still has to be done, like the complete phase-out of controlled dumps. With this problem resolved, leacheate produced by decomposing garbage from the controlled dumps will no longer pose a threat to the water system especially in the low-lying communities.

Recent and ongoing developments in the city have resulted in rapid loss of open space, destruction of the natural environment and scarring of the landscape. These have far-reaching effects on the city’s economy, since tourism as a basic industry depends so much on a well-managed environment for its viability.

A more breathable environment

Because Baguio City is touted as eco-cultural tourist destination and nature city committed to sustaining the growth, conservation and preservation of its natural resources and prevention of air, land and water pollution while complying with relevant environmental regulations and requirements, the city government of Baguio enacted and implemented relevant environmental legislation and regulations.

The local government appeared to have turned things around by enforcing environmental and zoning laws strictly and working closely with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) which provided much-needed technical expertise and other assistance.

Experts from the Environmental Management Bureau (EMB-DENR) reported that the city’s ambient air quality particularly within the Central Business District (CBD) has shown a tremendous improvement from year 2003 when total suspended particulates (TSP) measured at 204 ug/Ncm (microgram per normal cubic meter), translating to a 12-percent decline in air quality. In 2005 TSP concentration reached to only 176 ug/Ncm, representing a 17-percent improvement.

Air quality in the CBD is highly influenced or affected by vehicular emission representing 80 percent, traffic and road conditions, and from ambulant broiling and vending of street food by some vendors proximate to the sampling and monitoring stations designated at the Plaza Garden and lower Session Road, according to DENR Regional Executive Director Samuel R. Peñafiel.

There are 34,000 registered vehicles plying in the city, plus those vehicles that come from other parts of the country who travel by road to Baguio. Other pollutants are industrial, solid, liquid and energy wastes.

To address air pollution forcefully, the Bantay Kalinisan Task Force established by the DOTC, EMB-DENR and the city government, working with non-government organizations and private radio and communications groups, started a daily monitoring and apprehension of smoke belching vehicles.

The use of alternative fuel or cocomethyl-esther (CME) and additives by the transport sector was also implemented.

EMB-DENR also designated the Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR) airshed covering Baguio City and the municipalities of La Trinidad, Itogon, Sablan and Tuba (BLIST) to facilitate monitoring of air quality in those areas.

Peñafiel admitted that TSP concentrations sometimes went up in certain months, but he attributed this to the continuing influx of local and foreign tourists with vehicles, street rallies, torch parades and dust sources from road diggings, concreting and other repair works.

Local policies in pursuit of Clean Air were drafted and signed into effective local law such as the Ordinances on Comprehensive Transportation and Traffic Code (Ordinance 7-86), the No Smoking (Ordinance 24-89), Anti-Smoke Belching (Ordinance 55-88) and Comprehensive Land Use Plan (Ordinance 051-2001).

Moreover, Resolutions 202-93 and 061-99 were also drafted adopting the energy policy formulated by the ASEAN-EC Energy Management Training and Research Center as the energy policy of Baguio City and adopting the guidelines for a modern solid waste disposal system, respectively.

To reinforce the traffic management, the 5 E’s were created — engineering, education, enactment, enforcement and environment.

Among the proposed programs and projects were a number coding scheme similar to that which is being implemented in Metro Manila, shifting to green charcoal production which aims to reduce overall garbage and eCO2*, reforestation program, a corporate energy conservation with the objective of reducing by 10 percent the consumption of electricity and 1.04 million of petroleum and petroleum products which hopefully yields a reduction by 1,608 tons of eCO2 and the promotion of alternative fuels such as LPG which was pilot tested as an alternative fuel for around 15 taxi cabs. This was achieved through the participation and active involvement of Shell Pilipinas.

The government of Baguio had tied up with other organizations such as Petron initializing a clean fuels and a clean air campaign forum for drivers and operators coordinated by the Baguio Regreening Movement. Other matters given consideration were the redesign of existing buildings to be more energy efficient, landscaping of rooftops within the CBD to increase carbon dioxide (CO2) sequestration, and a provision for rainwater capture. It also set out to procure energy-efficient equipment and fixtures that are based on environment-friendly technologies and committed to practice certain approaches such as active participation, holistic integration and the application of the Polluters Pay Principle.

• eCO2 or equivalent carbon dioxide, also known as global warming potential weighted greenhouse gas emissions, is a unit that allows emissions of greenhouse gases of different strengths to be added together. For carbon dioxide itself, emissions in tons of CO2 and eCO2 are the same thing, whereas for methane, an example of a stronger greenhouse gas, one ton of methane emissions has the same greenhouse gas emission as 21 tons of CO2. Thus, one ton of methane emissions can be expressed as 21 tons of eCO2.