Climate Change

Sustain a Future’s 2017 Review

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design-2711676_19202017 was a year when sustainability, climate change and emissions reductions came to the fore on both private and public agendas. And so as we tumble towards 2018, I would like to do a run-down of the year’s developments that are helping to sustain a future.

Paris Agreement

One of the biggest developments early in 2017 was President Trump’s decision to pull out of the Paris Agreement (see blog). However, this only served to galvanise worldwide support for the agreement and as of today, 172 out of 197 countries have ratified it. The President’s actions also gave birth to the “We Are Still In” movement of over 2700 US companies, cities and states, together representing $6.2 trillion of the US economy, coming together to pledge allegiance to the Paris Agreement goals and ensure that America abides by its commitments, even when it withdraws from the agreement. The US withdrawal has also opened the door for Emmanuel Macron to become a leading voice in the fight against climate change, as evidenced at the One Planet Summit this December.

Electric vehicles

2017 also saw a reassessment of forecasts relating to electric vehicles. In a report published in July, Bloomberg New Energy Finance stated that it estimates that by 2040, 54% of new car sales and 33% of the global car fleet will be electric (see blog), a much more bullish forecast than it had issued just a year before. Added to this, a number of countries and car companies announced the ban or phase out of petrol-only vehicles. For example, Volvo announced that it would be going all-electric with every car in its range to have an electric train by 2019 and the UK and France announced a ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2040.

Renewable power generation

Records were set in renewable energy generation in 2017. In the UK, low-carbon energy sources made up 52% of the energy mix throughout the year, making 2017 the “greenest” year on record for the UK. The country also succeeded in having a full 24 hours of coal-free power generation in May 2017 (see blog). Furthermore, in October 2017, wind power provided nearly a quarter of all energy generation in Europe as a whole. These records have been assisted by the continued falling costs of solar and wind power technology and renewed investment in renewable energy infrastructure. For example, earlier this year the world’s first floating wind farm came into operation offshore Scotland, operated by Statoil.

Business initiatives 

On the business side, the RE100 group of companies committed to 100% renewable power (see blog) grew again this year to 116 members including Google, Apple, Unilever,  Walmart, ABInv Bev…to name but a few! These huge, multinational companies have each set the goal of obtaining 100% of their electricity from renewable sources within the next decade or so. Traditional oil and gas companies have also embarked on the energy transition journey. Shell now commits $1 billion annually to investments in clean energy. BP is committed to a lower-carbon future with a move towards greater investments in gas and carbon capture and storage technology. Both companies are also members of the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative (see blog), which includes the world’s biggest oil and gas companies. These companies have committed US$1 billion of funding to be invested over the next decade in innovative technologies and start-ups which propose solutions to substantially reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

Plastic pollution

2017 also witnessed the first UN Ocean Conference, which highlighted the plight of our oceans due to growing plastic pollution and climate change (see blog). The Ocean Conference raised $5.24 billion in commitments to protect the oceans and created a Call for Action which affirmed the signatories’ “strong commitment to conserve and sustainably use our oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development”.  Greater awareness of the dangers of plastic pollution have also resulted in individual action to fight plastic pollution, including the Ocean Cleanup whose plastic waste collection system aims to remove half of plastic waste in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in five years; Adidas teaming up with Parley to develop trainers out of plastic and Plastic Odyssey which has developed a boat that can be powered by plastic.

A look to the future…

So what are the predictions for 2018? I think that the key themes will be:

  • a broader conversation about peak oil, but due to falling demand rather than supply;
  • the role of gas in the future energy mix;
  • the use of blockchain to facilitate peer to peer energy transactions;
  • the rise of electric vehicle alternatives, such as the hydrogen motor; and
  • more innovative uses of existing technologies – such as the solar panelled motorway in China that intends to charge cars as they drive using wireless technology.

It’s been an eventful year and so for now, I wish you all a very happy and prosperous New Year!

COP23 Roundup

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downloadLast week, the latest UN Climate Change Conference was held in Bonn, Germany. It was the first such conference to take place since the US’s withdrawal from the Paris Agreement and with Syria becoming a signatory during the conference, the US is now the only country in the world not to be a party to the agreement.

The conference again brought the topic of climate change to the centre of the international political arena and amid the general calls for action and greater urgency, concrete commitments were made. I will discuss some of the key take-aways here.

1. Launch of Powering Past Coal Alliance 

The UK and Canada spearheaded the launch of a new initiative aimed at phasing out traditional coal power. Although there is no firm timeframe commitment, the alliance’s declaration states that traditional coal power needs to be phased out by no later than 2030 in the OECD and EU28, and no later than 2050 in the rest of the world.

The alliance was joined by more than 20 entities including Denmark, Finland, Italy, New Zealand, Ethiopia, Mexico, the Marshall Islands and the US states of Washington and Oregon. Michael Bloomberg also pledged $50m to expanding his anti-coal US campaign to Europe.

However, notable abstainees from the pledge included the US, China, India and Germany.

2. Launch of Ocean Pathway Initiative

With Fiji holding the rotating presidency at COP23, it was expected that there would be an initiative focussing on the oceans and climate change. As a Pacific Small Island Developing State (SIDS), Fiji is particularly vulnerable to the destructive effects of climate change on the oceans, through rising sea levels to overheating.

The Ocean Pathway initiative has reaffirmed the Call for Action issued at the UN Ocean Conference earlier this year and seeks funding for ocean health and maintenance of ecosystems from UN climate change funding initiatives. The initiative has also launched the Oceans Pathway Partnership to link existing ocean activities and promote cooperation.

3. Financing climate action

During the conference, a number of significant funding commitments were announced, including:

  • Adaptation Fund: This fund, established under the Kyoto Protocol, finances projects and programmes that help vulnerable communities in developing countries adapt to climate change. To date, it has committed US$462 million in 73 countries. This year, it was officially committed to serve under the Paris Agreement framework and country contributions have exceeds the 2017 target with contributions of EUR 50 million from Germany and EUR 7 million from Italy.
  • Norway and Unilever fund: US$400 million fund established for public and private investment in more resilient socioeconomic development. The fund will invest in business models that combine investments in high productivity agriculture, smallholder inclusion and forest protection.
  • Amazon rainforest fund: Germany and the UK have committed US$ 153 million to fight climate change and deforestation in the Amazon rainforest.
  • Initiative 20×20 investment: World Resources Institute announced a US$ 2.1 billion investment to restore degraded lands in Latin America and the Caribbean.

4. Launch of Below50 Initiative

The World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) launched the below50 initiative, initially in North America, South America and Australia, to create greater demand and more markets for sustainable fuels, i.e. fuels that produce at least 50% less CO2 emissions than conventional fossil fuels. The initiative aims to bring together the entire value-chain for sustainable fuels and scale up their deployment.

Finally, despite US’ withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, Michael Bloomberg’s “We’re Still In” coalition of US cities, states and companies, was out in force at COP23, showing the world that large parts of America are still fully committed to the targets set out in the Paris Agreement.

And as the conference delegates begin to reflect on the week’s achievements, the biggest hope is that the commitments are kept and promises are delivered. With record levels of funding now being directed towards tackling climate change, there really is no excuse not to act.

 

 

 

BF(O)G – big friendly oil & gas

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oil-rig-2191711_1920I have always believed that a clean energy revolution can only be achieved with support and buy-in from the big oil and gas companies. It seems that many such companies are now starting to agree.

A few years ago, 10 major oil and gas companies, between them responsible for over 20% of world oil and gas production, came together to form the Oil and Gas Climate Initiative (OGCI), an “initiative which aims to show sector leadership in the response to climate change“. The ten companies are BP, Total, Statoil, CNPC, eni, Pemex, Reliance Industries, Saudi Aramco and Shell.

The initiative’s mission is to work together to achieve notable reductions in greenhouse gas emissions from the oil and gas industry, while still meeting world energy demand. At present, the OGCI is focussing its efforts on three working groups – Low Emissions Roadmap, Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage, and Managing Methane Emissions.

It has also prepared an interesting matrix which maps actions identified by the IEA as having the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions sufficiently by 2040 to remain on track for a 2°C scenario against the oil and gas industry’s ability to influence such actions. This matrix is reproduced below (source: OGCI):

aboutus-infographic-2017-b

In November 2016, the companies behind the OGCI finally put their money where their mouth is and set up OGCI Climate Investments, a partnership with a committed US$1 billion of funding to be invested over the next decade in innovative technologies and start-ups which propose solutions to substantially reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The partnership will operate out of Imperial College London’s White City Campus, bringing it into direct contact with the Better Futures initiative recently launched by the Mayor of London (see my blog on this). OGCI Climate Investments appointed its first CEO, Dr. Pratima Rangarajan, in May 2017 which hopefully means that it will now come into full operational mode.

I hope that both the initiative and the investment partnership will actively push ahead with their stated aims and that we will begin to see the fruits of their labour in the not too distant future. I also hope that other oil and gas companies will join their cause.

 

 

“We’ll always have Paris”…continued

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IMG_2427aIn my original post about Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, I discussed Michael Bloomberg’s efforts to replace the outgoing USA with a new signatory consisting of a coalition of American states, cities and companies. Positive steps have now been taken in this direction.

The coalition has issued an open letter entitled “We are still in“, pledging allegiance to the Paris Agreement. It now boasts over 1400 signatures.

During a G-7 environment meeting in Bologna, Italy earlier this week, Patricia Espinosa, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, announced that she will work towards enabling regions, cities and other sub-national players to join the Paris Agreement officially.  It is still unclear how this would work in practice, but the political will is there to ensure that even if America withdraws, the efforts and contributions being made by its states, cities and companies are not ignored.

In a bold move on 6 June, Hawaii passed legislation affirming its dedication to the Paris Agreement. It is the first state to officially confirm its position and hopefully, this will pave the way for other states to join.

The G-7 meeting concluded with the issue of a communique signed by all ministers, other than the US (whose representative only attended one session of the two day event). This communique reaffirmed international commitment to the Paris Agreement and also addressed other sustainability issues, including ocean pollution, energy efficiency and the need for increased funding to assist with reaching the sustainability goals.

 

A Call for Action for our Oceans

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loggerhead-turtle-123402_1920On 9 June, the first UN Ocean Conference came to an end. Deemed a resounding success by President of the UN General Assembly, Peter Thomson, the conference achieved the adoption of a 14 point Call for Action.

The Call for Action signatories affirmed their “strong commitment to conserve and sustainably use our oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development”. They recognised the importance the oceans play in maintaining our ecosystem, through the supply of oxygen and the absorption of carbon dioxide, and therefore, recommitted to the Paris Agreement climate change targets. They affirmed the need to “enhance the conservation and sustainable use of oceans and their resources by implementing international law as reflected in the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea“. They committed to “accelerate actions to prevent and significantly reduce marine pollution of all kinds” and to “implement long-term and robust strategies to reduce the use of plastics and microplastics”.

Equally impressively, the conference resulted in over 1300 voluntary commitments having been registered. These are commitments on the part of governments, NGOs, and other stakeholders to uphold the aims of Sustainable Development Goal 14.

Furthermore, the delegates from China, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines declared that they would begin tackling the problem of plastic waste from their countries ending up in the oceans. According to findings from the Helmholtz Centre in Leipzig, Germany, 75% of global plastic debris delivered by rivers to the sea comes from just 10 rivers, which are predominantly in Asia and reducing the plastic loads in these rivers by 50% would reduce global plastic inputs by 37%.

According to Andrew Hudson, head of the water and ocean governance progamme at the United Nations Development Programme, “This has been the biggest demonstration of interest in protecting our oceans – the biggest commitment to action. It’s really good, everybody is doing something,”.

 

 

“How inappropriate to call this planet Earth when it is clearly Ocean.”*

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P1030434The oceans and seas of the world cover 2/3 of the surface area of our planet. They feed us, absorb carbon dioxide, emit half of the oxygen generated by plants and contain an abundance of natural resources, from hydrocarbons to minerals. However, they are being used and abused.

Over-fishing is depleting fish stocks and affecting the stability of the marine eco-system. Pollution, especially from plastic, is having a devastating effect on marine life and is economically detrimental to fisheries and tourism. With five trillion pieces of plastic currently floating in the oceans, in 2015, Globalwatch Institute estimated that the annual cost of ocean pollution from plastic equals approximately US$13 billion.* Plastic toxins are also finding their way into our food-chain, having been absorbed by fish and other sea-based foodstuff that we consume. Finally, growing CO2 emissions are raising the acidity of the oceans as increasing levels of carbon dioxide are absorbed by the oceans and converted into carbonic acid. This again affects marine life, bleaching coral reefs and dissolving the shells of crustaceans. The oceans also absorb much of the planet’s generated heat contributing to increasing ocean temperatures and rising sea-levels.

This is not sustainable. Steps need to be taken to arrest and reverse these trends.

Luckily, the international community is taking notice. In September 2016, John Kerry hosted the 2016 Our Ocean Conference in Washington, D.C., the third such conference. The conference raised US$5.24 billion in commitments to protect the oceans. The 27 May edition of the Economist ran a cover story about the health of our oceans. And this week the UN is hosting the first ever UN Ocean Conference in New York aimed at progressing Sustainable Development Goal 14 – “Life under Water”. It is expected that the conference will adopt a Call for Action to support the implementation of Sustainable Development Goal 14, to be shared on this blog once available.

However, intergovernmental commitments alone will not solve these issues. Action can and should be taken at corporate and individual level. Here are a few examples of innovations and initiatives helping our oceans:

Research Expedition Vessel: Kjell Inge Roekke, the tenth-richest man in Norway, with a net worth of over $2 billion and a background in fishing, industrial trawling and oil, recently announced his plans to contribute his great fortune to causes that will benefit society. His first initiative is a marine research vessel that will remove five tons of plastic from the ocean daily, melting it to ensure that it can do no harm. The ship will be managed by the WWF.

Global Fishing Watch: This is a joint SkyTruth, Oceana and Google platform which monitors global fishing activity by pooling together historical data from a satellite-based vessel monitoring system. It uses an algorithm to track fishing activity and is open for use by anyone with an internet connection. The aim of this initiative is to tackle over-fishing and help generate smart and effective fishing policies.

SkySails: One of a host of so-called “green shipping initiatives” aimed at reducing fuel consumption by cargo ships through innovative design. SkySails provides cargo ships with high altitude sails enabling them to capitalise on the stronger wind energy available at high altitudes and thereby, reducing their fuel use.

The Ocean Cleanup: The company has developed a plastic waste collection system which aims at removing half of plastic waste in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch in five years. Their system is a floating, rather than fixed, solution meaning it is more efficient at collecting waste and it is energy neutral. The system is currently being piloted but the creators are working at scaling up the system to deploy it worldwide by 2020.

If you know of any other great initiatives that deserve a mention, please send these in!

 

* quote from Clarke, Arthur C. 1917

“We’ll always have Paris”

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IMG_2427a…So goes the iconic phrase from the end of Casablanca. However, on 1 June 2017, President Donald Trump announced the US’ withdrawal from the widely respected Paris Agreement on climate change. What implications could this have for the agreement’s success? Unlike Ilsa and Rick from Casablanca, could it be that we will not always have Paris?

The Paris Agreement, adopted on 12 December 2015 and, as of today, ratified by 147 out of 197 signatories, is a commitment towards a sustainable, low carbon future. Its key aims are to curb global warming to 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and to equip countries to deal with the consequences of climate change.

According to President Trump, the agreement is at odds with his “America First” mantra as complying with its terms could result in an apparent loss of 2.7 million US jobs. However, President Trump’s decision, somewhat counter-intuitively, may have actually galvanised support for the Paris Agreement around the world and given it an even greater impetus.

In Europe: Immediately on the back of President Trump’s announcement, Italy, Germany and France issued a joint statement reiterating these countries’ commitment to the Paris Agreement, stating that “We deem the momentum generated in Paris in December 2015 irreversible and we firmly believe that the Paris Agreement cannot be renegotiated, since it is a vital instrument for our planet, societies and economies“.

In America: Tesla’s Elon Musk and Walt Disney’s Bob Iger have announced their intentions to resign from White House advisory councils. And even more impressively, Michael Bloomberg is now spearheading the creation of a coalition of thirty American cities, three American states, and over 100 American companies which pledges to uphold America’s obligations under the Paris Agreement and even attempt to replace it as a signatory, once America fully withdraws. The coalition is currently in negotiations with the UN to be accepted as a signatory entity. This blog will follow the developments of this coalition.

In China: China also made it clear at the recent EU-China summit in Brussels that it considered President Trump’s actions to be an error. Although the summit was expected to produce a formal statement of cooperation on climate change between the EU and China, disagreements over trade intervened. Nevertheless, China has proven that it has an appetite for renewable energy with US$102.9 billion worth of investments into renewable energy in 2015* (however, falling to US$78.3 billion in 2016*) and with its Longyangxia Dam Solar Park becoming the world’s largest solar farm earlier this year. Here’s hoping therefore, that a formal cooperation statement between the EU and China will be forthcoming in the not too distant future…let’s watch this space.

In conclusion: President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Agreement does inevitably deal a blow to its ambitions. However, signatories and stakeholders around the world do not seem phased by his actions and indeed seem to have used his stance as a uniting counter-point. So yes at this stage, I think it is fair to conclude that we will always have Paris and in the words of Emmanuel Macron, there is substantial international commitment to “make the planet great again“.