Canada's Erie Shores Wind Farm includes 66 turbines with a total capacity of 99 MW. Credit: Denise Morazé/IPS

By Kitty Stapp
NEW YORK, Jul 7 2015 (IPS)

Up to 96 percent of the emissions reductions needed by 2030 to keep global warming below a critical threshold of two degrees C could be achieved through a series of 10 steps, says a new report released by the Global Commission on the Economy and the Climate.

“The low carbon economy is already emerging,” said former President of Mexico Felipe Calderón, Chair of the Commission."Africa can ‘leapfrog’ the fossil-fuel based growth strategies of developed countries and become a leader in low-carbon development." -- Former Finance Minister Trevor Manuel

“But governments, cities, businesses and investors need to work much more closely together and take advantage of recent developments if the opportunities are to be seized. We cannot let these opportunities slip through our fingers.”

Scheduled for Nov. 30 to Dec. 11, the upcoming Paris Climate Conference (known as COP21) will, for the first time in over 20 years of U.N. negotiations, aim to achieve a legally binding and universal agreement on climate, with the goal of keeping global warming below two degrees C.

It is expected to attract close to 50,000 participants, including 25,000 official delegates from government, intergovernmental organisations, U.N. agencies, NGOs and civil society.

Ahead of the meeting, governments have been submitting their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) to the U.N. which lay out how they plan to cut emissions and transition to a greener economy.

Last week, China – both the world’s largest emitter and biggest investor in clean energy – vowed to peak its emissions around the year 2030, reduce carbon intensity 60 to 65 percent from 2005 levels, and increase the share of non-fossil fuels in its energy mix by about 20 percent by 2030.

But other industrialised countries and/or major emitters are lagging behind in their pledges.

“We know that the current INDC pledges are not likely to get us to the two degree C world we need. But this report shows there is significant room for stronger action that is in countries’ economic self-interest,” said Michael Jacobs, Report Director, New Climate Economy.

Jacobs told IPS that the best case scenario at COP21 would be “an agreement with universal participation – all countries- which includes a long-term goal to reduce GHG [greenhouse gas] emissions to zero or near-zero in the second half of the century.”

He also hoped to see “a regular five-yearly cycle of commitments in which countries strengthen their mitigation and adaptation targets, with this year’s INDCs being seen as ‘floors not ceilings’ to national ambition, able to be raised later.”

In addition, a successful agreement would include a strong package of financial and technology support for developing countries, for both adaptation and mitigation, a requirement on all countries to produce national adaptation plans, and a robust system of measurement, reporting and verification (MRV).

“A worst-case scenario?” Jacobs said. “No agreement. This could still happen.”

​The commission urges that at least 1.0 trillion dollars goal be invested in renewable energy by 2030.

This could be achieved if governments put in place strong policy and regulatory frameworks to incentivise clean energy (such as feed-in tariffs and robust power purchase agreements), and eliminate fossil fuel subsidies and introduce carbon pricing.

It says that international and national development banks should work closely with governments and the private sector to reduce the cost of capital through risk mitigation instruments and to develop pipelines of bankable projects, and institutional investors, international banks and sovereign wealth funds should commit to increasing financing of renewables and to reduce coal financing.

“The findings of this report, combined with those of the recent Africa Progress Report, prove that there are immense opportunities in the emerging low-carbon economy,” said Trevor Manuel, Former Minister and Chairperson of the South African Planning Commission.

“Africa can ‘leapfrog’ the fossil-fuel based growth strategies of developed countries and become a leader in low-carbon development, exploiting its abundant – and currently under-utilised – renewable energy resources.”

The Commission’s recommendations include:

Scaling up partnerships between cities, like the Compact of Mayors, to drive low-carbon urban development. Key aspects are investment in public transport, building efficiency, and better waste management. It says such measures could save around 17 trillion dollars globally by 2050.

Enhancing partnerships such as the deforestation programme REDD+, the 20×20 Initiative in Latin America, and the Africa Climate-Smart Agriculture Alliance to bring together forest countries, developed economies and the private sector to halt deforestation by 2030 and restore degraded farmland. The report says this would boost agricultural productivity and resilience, strengthen food security, and improve livelihoods for agrarian and forest communities.

The G20 should raise energy efficiency standards in the world’s leading economies for goods such as appliances, lighting, and vehicles. Investment in energy efficiency could boost cumulative economic output globally by 18 trillion dollars by 2035.

Cutting emissions from aviation and shipping and from hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) under the Montreal Protocol to protect the ozone could cut emissions by as much as 2.6 gigatonnes in 2030. In shipping alone, higher efficiency standards could save an average of 200 billion dollars in annual fuel costs by 2030.

“2015 is a moment of opportunity to accelerate growth-enhancing climate action. Landmark conferences on development financing, the SDGs [Sustainable Development Goals], and climate change have the potential to usher in a new era of international cooperation,” said Kristin Skogen Lund, Director-General, Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise.

The New Climate Economy is the flagship project of the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate. It was established by seven countries: Colombia, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Norway, South Korea, Sweden and the United Kingdom, as an independent initiative to examine how countries can achieve economic growth while dealing with the risks posed by climate change.

Chaired by former Mexican President Felipe Calderón, and co-chaired by renowned economist Lord Nicholas Stern, the Commission has 28 leaders from 20 countries, including former heads of government and finance ministers, leading business people, investors, city mayors and economists.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

A framework for this transformation includes a price on carbon, green investment funds, and strong policies to decarbonise energy and land use. Credit: Bigstock

By Stephen Leahy
UXBRIDGE, Canada, Sep 22 2014 (IPS)

Acting on climate change will not hurt domestic economic growth, and in fact is more likely to boost growth, most analyses now show.

The latest to confirm the dictum that swift action is eminently affordable is the recent report by the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, released on the eve of the Sep. 23 U.N. Climate Summit in New York.“We’ve been hiding what’s going on from ourselves: A high-carbon future is being locked in by the world’s capital investments.” -- Princeton University’s Robert Socolow

“There is no reason to fear that more ambitious action to reduce carbon emissions will have a high economic cost,”said economist Robert Repetto, an International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) fellow and former professor at Yale University.

“Those claiming the costs of climate action will be high represent the economic sectors that will be adversely affected,”Repetto told IPS.

These include the fossil fuel industries and others that profit from burning carbon including railroads, pipeline and other industries.

Repetto was not involved in the Global Commission’s report by the U.N., the OECD group of rich countries, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, and co-authored by leading climate economist Lord Nicholas Stern.

Repetto agrees with their findings that the costs of acting on climate now will not hurt economies but delaying action will be extraordinarily costly.

“The costs of burning fossil fuel are enormous even without factoring in climate impacts,”he said

Air pollution costs China 10 per cent of its annual GDP due to increase health costs from particulate pollution and smog damage to crops and buildings. In India, pollution costs are up to six per cent of GDP. Germany also loses six percent of its GDP to pollution because it and neighbouring countries like Poland continue to rely on coal, Repetto told IPS.

“Those costs alone are way more than additional costs of installing renewable energy,” he said.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon notes that, “Domestic economic growth and acting on climate change are two sides of the same coin.”

Too many governments and leaders don’t understand this reality and that must change, Ban said at the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate press conference.

However, the U.S. government, among others, continue to rely on a high-profile but deeply-flawed economic model called DICE. Developed by well-known Yale economist William Nordhaus, the DICE model claims that action on climate will cost more than the damages from climate change.

Repetto and Robert Easton, professor emeritus of applied mathematics at the University of Colorado, have just completed a “sensitivity analysis”of the DICE model. They found that DICE has many questionable assumptions, including that damages from climate impacts will increase at a modest level no matter how high the global temperature rises.

It also assumes improvements in renewable energy will be far slower than they actually have been over the last decade.

When these and other dubious assumptions are corrected, the DICE model shows that “much more aggressive policies to reduce emissions are warranted”because economic growth would continue to be robust. The actual costs of keeping global temperatures below 2C are far less than previously estimated, they conclude.

Staying below 2C means that by 2018, no new electrical power plant, factory, school, home or car can be built anywhere in the world unless they are replacing old ones or are carbon-neutral.

That’s the shocking implication of a recent study looking both CO2 emissions and CO2 commitments. Build a new coal or gas power plant and it will emit CO2 every year for the 40- to 60-year lifespan of the plant. That’s a CO2 commitment.

The study “Commitment accounting of CO2 emissions,”is the first to total these commitments.

Last year, the most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report established a global carbon budget in order to stay below 2C. Adding up current CO2 emissions and commitments, in less than five years that global carbon budget will be fully allocated with business as usual.

Carbon commitments should be a fundamental part of any decision to build most things. Instead, hundreds of billions of dollars are invested in new infrastructure that will make climate change worse.

“We’ve been hiding what’s going on from ourselves: A high-carbon future is being locked in by the world’s capital investments,” said Princeton University’s Robert Socolow, a co-author of the commitment study.

Any plan or strategy to cut CO2 emissions has to give far greater prominence to those investments. Right now the data shows “we’re embracing fossil fuels more than ever,” Socolow previously told IPS.

The time has long passed where “we can burn our way to prosperity,” said Ban Ki-moon. “A structural transformation is needed.”

A framework for this transformation includes a price on carbon, green investment funds, and strong policies to decarbonise energy and land use.

Time is not on our side; the urgency grows with each passing day.

“We’ve already waited too long…significant climate impacts are now unavoidable,”Repetto said.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The cost of solar energy has fallen by 90 percent in the last half dozen years. Credit: UN Photo/Pasqual Gorriz

By Joel Jaeger
UNITED NATIONS, Sep 17 2014 (IPS)

A widespread perception exists that developing countries must make a choice between tackling climate change and fighting poverty. This assumption is incorrect, according to the authors of a new report on green growth.

The New Climate Economy (NCE) report was launched on Tuesday at the United Nations by the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, which is chaired by former Mexican President Felipe Calderón."Reforms will entail costs and trade-offs, and will often require governments to deal with difficult problems of political economy, distribution and governance.” -- Milan Brahmbhatt of WRI

“The report sends a clear message to government and private sector leaders: we can improve the economy and tackle climate change at the same time,” said Calderón.

“Future economic growth does not have to copy the high carbon path that has been observed so far,” he added.

Focusing on the global aggregate rather than individual countries, the NCE report charts the path that the world economy must take over the next 15 years. To improve the lives of the poor and lower carbon emissions to a safe level, a vast transformation must be made. But here is the surprise: it will cost much less than expected.

In a business-as-usual scenario, the world will invest about 89 trillion dollars in urban, agricultural and energy infrastructure over the next 15 years, the report predicts.

On the other hand, a low-carbon path would require 94 trillion dollars over the next 15 years, and its benefits in reducing resource scarcity and improving basic liveability would more than make up for the difference.

The window of opportunity will not stay open for long, however.

“If we don’t take action in the coming years it will be every day more expensive and more difficult to shift towards the low carbon economy at the global level,” Calderón said.

Jeremy Oppenheim, global programme director for the NCE report, explained the details.

The commission’s work focuses on three systems: cities, land use and energy. In each case, the implementation of greener policies can also lead to greater development.

In terms of urban systems, “our main focus has been how to drive to higher productivity in cities through improved transport systems,” Oppenheim said. Economic gains can be achieved “through improved urban form by having cities that are denser and that are essentially better places to live.”

Urban sprawl is the enemy when it comes to environmentally-friendly city design. For example, Barcelona and Atlanta both have about five million people, but Barcelona fits into 162 square kilometres, while Atlanta is spread across 4,280 square kilometres. As a result, Atlanta emits more than 10 times more CO2 per person than Barcelona.

Efficient cities generally deliver improved economic and environmental performance.

Low-income countries must “get the infrastructure right the first time so they urbanise in a high productivity way,” Oppenheim told IPS.

Moving on to agriculture, Oppenheim said that “we think that it is possible to increase yields by more than one percent a year.”

The NCE report states that “restoring just 12% of the world’s degraded agricultural land could feed 200 million people by 2030, while also strengthening climate resilience and reducing emissions.”

Reducing deforestation also has wide benefits to the economic system and to agricultural productivity, as well as the obvious climate benefits.

The report recommends that world leaders halt deforestation of natural forests by 2030 and restore at least 500 million hectares of degraded forests and agricultural lands.

As for the third system to be reformed, energy, the biggest economic and environmental opportunity will come from a shift away from the widespread use of coal. Coal is not as economically efficient as once thought, especially since the health problems caused by coal pollution reduce national incomes by an average of four percent per year.

The report’s authors recommend a halt to the creation of new coal plants immediately in the developed world and by 2025 in middle-income countries. Natural gas may serve as a stopgap for a short period of time, but it too must eventually give way to low-carbon energy sources.

Transforming so much energy infrastructure may be more economical than expected.

“We are stunned by the progress that has been made in renewable energy,” Oppenheim said. “The cost of solar has come down by 90 percent in the last half dozen years.”

If the price of solar energy continues its downward tumble, it will soon be cheaper than fossil fuels, leading to a natural shift in investment even without government intervention.

Governments will have to make a number of significant decisions to facilitate the change, however.

Currently, the market for energy is distorted by government subsidies. According to the report, governments around the world subsidise fossil fuels for an estimated 600 billion dollars, but only subsidise clean energy for 100 billion.

Lord Nicholas Stern, co-chair of the Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, says that “those subsidies have to go.”

“They’re giving the wrong signals. They’re encouraging the use of polluting fossils fuels. They’re subsidising damage.”

Governments need to set up “strong, predictable and rising carbon prices,” according to Stern.

With clarity on carbon prices, incentives to pollute would decrease and investors would put their money towards low-carbon options.

Although the NCE report may be the most optimistic document on climate change to come out of the U.N. in years, the authors do realise that their recommendations may be difficult to follow.

Milan Brahmbhatt, a senior fellow at the World Resources Institute and one of the authors of the NCE report, told IPS that “there is no simple reform formula or agenda that will work for all countries.”

“The report focuses specifically on ‘win-win’ reforms to strengthen growth, poverty reduction and improvements in well-being, which also help tackle climate risk,” Brahmbhatt said. “‘Win-wins’ are not necessarily ‘easy wins’ though. Reforms will entail costs and trade-offs, and will often require governments to deal with difficult problems of political economy, distribution and governance.”

The report’s launch was strategically timed one week before the secretary-general’s climate summit, which will convene an unprecedented number of world leaders to make public pledges on national climate change mitigation efforts. Ban Ki-moon hopes the summit will generate the necessary political will for a binding climate change agreement to be negotiated in Paris next year.

A binding agreement in Paris would give countries the confidence to pursue strong national climate policies, knowing that they are not the only ones doing so, and could give assistance to developing countries that are more vulnerable to climate change but less responsible for it, according to Stern.

While the NCE report only covers the next 15 years, 2030 will not signal the end of efforts to tackle climate change. “Beyond 2030 net global emissions will need to fall further towards near zero or below in the second half of the century,” the report says.

It may not cover everything, but the NCE report reassures worried leaders of the enormous potential for green growth. The Global Commission on the Economy and Climate, an independent initiative created by Colombia, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Norway, South Korea, Sweden and the United Kingdom, plans to directly share its report with world leaders in an upcoming consultation period.

Felipe Calderón believes that the report’s optimistic and practical message will help it make a big splash.

“With this report we now have a set of tools that global leaders can use to foster the growth that we all need while reducing the climate risks that we all face,” he said.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The writer can be contacted at joelmjaeger@gmail.com