Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
inthisenergydebate.Certainly,ifdeedsandnotwordscountedtowardvolume,Nasheed
would be the most-heard leader in the international negotiations.
The Republic of Maldives is an amazing country of fewer than a half million citizens.
It's set in the middle of the Indian Ocean and comprises about 100 populated islands and
many hundreds more that are unpopulated, some of which have become resorts. Most
islands are less than 1 meter above sea level, which means they're highly vulnerable to
sea-level rise caused by climate change. This and other factors, such as extreme weather
and changing ocean currents—which in turn have affected the country's fisheries—are
causing Maldivians to worry about their future.
An Encouraging Example of Leadership
Nasheed, who served as the fourth president of the Maldives from 2008 to 2012, was
the first democratically elected president of this small Muslim nation in several decades.
(He was forced to resign in February 2012,in a coup d'état.) His predecessor was a ruth-
less dictator who had had Nasheed tortured and placed in solitary confinement for be-
ing an activist and a dissident journalist. When Nasheed became what he calls the “acci-
dental president” following a political campaign that was given great momentum by the
2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, he set about facing the biggest threat to his country: climate
change.
Nasheed famously brought attention to the cause by holding an underwater cabinet
meeting near a coral reef (probably one of the most photographed government events in
thecountry),inwhichheandhisministerialcolleaguesworeSCUBAgearwhilesigning
documents with waterproof ink against the backdrop of a coral reef. He championed cli-
mateprotectionattheinternationalconferencesonthesubjectduringhispresidency.Not
a lot came of his efforts to broker a deal at the UN Copenhagen Summit in late 2009, ex-
cept for a documentary film on the subject titled
The Island President
and some money
to build sea walls in the Maldives against the rising tide. So perhaps his greatest effort to
respond to the climate crisis was to make the Maldives the first carbon-neutral country
on Earth.
Toward this end Nasheed jumped at the offer we at Sungevity made, in conjunction
with our friends at 350.org, to put a solar electric solution on the presidential palace, a
beautifulcolonialbuildingbuiltbytheBritishindowntownMalé,thecapital oftheMal-
dives and home to about one-third of its population. Most of these people probably pass
the palace every day on their way to work or school or the beach; it's on a small island
of 150,000 people, and the Muliaage, as it's known in the local language, is right in the
middle of the city. As such it was the ideal place for the president to kick off his efforts
to take his country solar.
