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Photo: ‘Changing’ by the artist Alisa Singer “As we witness our planet transforming around us we watch, listen, measure … respond.”

11 August 2021 | The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had a simple message for the world this week: “Climate change is widespread, rapid, and intensifying,” is how it unveiled the first installment of its 6^th major assessment report.

Specifically, we’ve pushed carbon dioxide to levels not seen in 2 million years, and we’ve driven temperatures to levels not seen in more than 125,000 years – and, yes, it’s clearly we who are doing it and not sunspots or other natural phenomena. The science is “unequivocal” – another term the IPCC used for the first time.

Beyond the doom and gloom, however, there’s a bright spot: temperatures will stabilize somewhere between 1.5 and 2 degrees Celsius over pre-industrial levels if we get to net zero emissions within the next few decades, and they can fall back if we scale up both natural and technological systems for removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere – from carbon sequestering trees to industrial carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology.

It might be too late to prevent the seas from rising, but it’s not too late to save civilization.

If we do nothing, however, the planet’s living ecosystems will lose their ability to mop up greenhouse gasses, and our agricultural economy could collapse.

None of these findings are new, and they’re even a reason groups like the Net Zero Asset Managers initiative are pushing corporate pledges to achieve “net zero” emissions by 2050. At net zero, companies have decarbonized to the extent possible and are offsetting residual emissions through removal mechanisms like tree planting and CCS.

The danger, of course, is that companies will fixate on 2050 with the aim of starting to reduce in 2040 instead of now. That’s why those pushing for pledges are also calling for interim reduction targets.

These groups, however, are also giving short shrift to the concept of “carbon neutrality”, which is a critical tool for accelerating reductions to net zero.

Carbon neutral is where companies can be now, while they’re still in the process of decarbonizing on their way to net zero.

While net zero means eliminating fossil fuels and then only using offsets that remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere, carbon neutral means companies are offsetting while they transition to new technologies, but they’re not limited in the types of offsets they can use. Instead of only using offsets that remove greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere, they can also use those that reduce emissions elsewhere – by, say, protecting endangered forests or funding low-emission technologies.

The two approaches are, in other words, not mutually exclusive and can run in parallel. Ideally, a company that is on a net zero aligned pathway to reduce its own emissions to the extent possible by mid-century will purchase offsets along the way to be carbon neutral in the near term.

This is critical, because it’s easier and cheaper to prevent these gasses from getting into the atmosphere now than it is to suck them out later. Natural climate solutions are still key, because human management of forests, farms and fields generates nearly a quarter of all man-made greenhouse gas emissions.

Those who ignore – or, in some cases, actively oppose – the use of carbon credits to become carbon neutral in the near-term often do so because they feel it’s a distraction from the ultimate goal of achieving net zero emissions.

It’s not.

It’s a way of getting there sooner.

This story first appeared on the WRI blog.

26 February 2021 | A new UN report finds that countries’ emissions-reduction commitments under the Paris Agreement are falling far short of what’s needed to prevent the most dangerous impacts of climate change.

It is imperative that countries that have not yet submitted their plans deliver much greater ambition this year and that countries that already put forward weak offers in 2020 revise their commitments upward.

In the 2015 Agreement, countries adopted a process in which they would submit more ambitious climate commitments (known as nationally determined contributions, or NDCs) every five years. Recognizing that the pledges they brought forward five years ago were insufficient to meet the Paris Agreement’s long-term goals, this process was meant, over time, to nudge the world onto a pathway to limit global temperature rise to 1.5°C (2.7 degrees F). The first of these “ambition cycles” is now underway, with the expectation that countries submit new NDCs ahead of the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow in November 2021.

The UN report examines the 48 NDCs from 75 Parties submitted through the end of 2020. It finds that these commitments will only cut emissions by about 2.8% relative to the pledges those countries submitted five years ago. Globally, to limit temperature change to 1.5°C, new or updated NDCs need to cut 2030 emissions by around 55% below the initial pledges.

While the UN report paints a grim picture, it’s not the whole picture. What the remaining countries do collectively over the next nine months will be decisive. Countries that have not yet submitted updated or new NDCs — plus several that have indicated they will resubmit with stronger targets — represent 75% of total global emissions. And there are reasons to believe these countries will go beyond what’s been done so far.

For one thing, 58 countries representing over half of global emissions have now committed to net-zero emission targets by mid-century. Many of them — including China and the United States — have not yet submitted updated NDCs, but their net-zero commitments suggest that their NDCs will need to be ambitious. Japan, South Korea and New Zealand — which initially submitted NDCs that did not strengthen ambition, but then committed to net-zero emission targets by 2050 — now say they will strengthen their NDCs before COP26.

Taken together, these net-zero goals would limit warming to 2.1 degrees C if they are achieved, down from the projected 3 degrees C of warming the world was on track for. But delivering on this promise will require countries to take near-term action, which is where the NDCs are essential. The spotlight is now on those countries that have yet to come forward with enhanced NDCs for 2030 — especially the major emitters.

Below, we assess the emissions-reduction commitments in the national climate plans submitted thus far, and what needs to happen ahead of COP26:

Which countries increased ambition in their new NDCs?

More than 40 countries (including the 27 EU member states) submitted plans that will deliver deeper emissions cuts than their initial NDCs.

The EU27 strengthened its 2030 target from an “at least 40%” reduction from 1990 levels to an “at least 55%” reduction. The UK, submitting its first NDC after leaving the EU, committed to 68%, beyond what would have been its contribution to the initial EU28 NDC.

In Latin America, Argentina committed to cut 2030 emissions 26% lower than its initial target; Colombia adopted an emissions cap nearly 37% lower than its previous target; and Chile, Costa Rica and Peru also strengthened their commitments.

Finally, a number of island states and other vulnerable developing countries such as Fiji, Jamaica, Kenya and Senegal also adopted more ambitious commitments.

For more than a dozen additional countries, it’s not possible to quantify the effect of their new plans on their GHG emissions, often due to a lack of data in the initial NDC. But most of these countries have also adopted more robust commitments.

Brunei, Rwanda and the United Arab Emirates, for example, established economy-wide emissions-reduction targets for the first time in their new NDCs. Other countries, including Nepal and Nicaragua, strengthened or added sector-specific targets. Countries such as Rwanda and Bangladesh added or strengthened policies on highly potent short-lived climate pollutants, including HFCs, methane and black carbon.

Which countries didn’t strengthen their NDCs?

Several countries — including Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, Australia and Singapore — submitted NDCs with GHG reduction targets identical to the submissions they put forward five years ago. Nevertheless, there is some cause for hope: Japan, South Korea and New Zealand have now indicated an intent to update their targets in the lead-up to COP26, following on their pledges to achieve net-zero GHG emissions by 2050. Australia and Singapore, on the other hand, have not signaled any intention to strengthen their targets.

Which countries submitted weaker NDCs?

Even worse, Brazil and Mexico weakened their emissions-reduction targets compared to what they committed to in 2015. At face value, both countries’ 2030 targets look the same as in their initial plans — a 43% cut from 2005 emissions and a 22% cut relative to business-as-usual emissions, respectively. But the updated NDCs contain other revisions that reduce the impact of their targets on 2030 emissions: Brazil increased its estimate of 2005 emissions by 38%, while Mexico increased its business-as-usual projection by 1.8%. As a result, 2030 emissions permitted under the pledges will be higher than they would have been under countries’ initial NDCs.

Which countries haven’t unveiled their national climate plans yet? And which are likely to enhance ambition?

Upwards of 80 additional countries have committed to submit enhanced NDCs. This includes major economies like China, the United States, Canada and South Africa. The United States and Canada have said they will complete their NDCs ahead of the Leaders’ Climate Summit on April 22, 2021, and President Biden has made it clear that climate action will be a top priority for his presidency.

To put the 1.5-degree target in reach, these remaining countries will need to take a far more aggressive approach than we’ve seen to date. To start, the United States should commit to cut emissions by 50% from 2005 levels by 2030, and China can peak CO₂ emissions by 2026 and commit to ambitious targets for non-CO₂ gases. Other major economies like India and Indonesia, which have not yet committed to enhancing their NDCs, will also need to step up their efforts as well if we are going to get the climate crisis under control.

How will we know if new national climate plans collectively put us on a path to limiting dangerous levels of warming?

Globally, 2030 greenhouse gas emissions need to be 55% lower than in the initial round of NDCs in order to limit warming to 1.5 degrees C and prevent the worst impacts of climate change. If the countries that submitted NDCs to date continue to fall so far short of that benchmark, the countries that haven’t yet submitted NDCs would have to make even deeper cuts in order to make up lost ground.

Instead, all countries, and especially major economies, must summon all the ambition they can muster — whether they have already submitted an NDC, have committed to do so, or are still holding out. The climate crisis can’t wait.

3 February 2021 | The Trustees of the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Foundation met on Monday to review responses to a consultation paper published last year — specifically, the board addressed responses focused on whether there was enough demand for global sustainability standards for the IFRS Foundation should play a role, and, if so, what the requirements for success in doing so. The responses indicate growing and urgent demand to improve the global consistency and comparability in sustainability reporting, as well as strong recognition that urgent steps need to be taken and broad demand for the IFRS Foundation to play a role in this.

IFRS Standards are required in more than 140 jurisdictions, but not in the United States, which follows the Financial Accounting Standards Board’s (FASB’s) Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP). The two bodies have tended to align over the years, and a move to mandatory sustainability standards could accelerate demand for renewable energy and carbon credits. The announcement comes just days after the Taskforce on Scaling Voluntary Carbon Markets unveiled a “blueprint” for ensuring that voluntary carbon markets can scale to meet growing demand without sacrificing quality.

Although voluntary reporting of sustainability criteria has soared in the past decade with 90 percent of companies in the S&P 500 index issuing some sort of sustainability report in 2020, there are no mandatory reporting requirements and no standards to ensure reporting is comparable and complete.

The IFRS Foundation began exploring the issue in response to a request from the International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) as well as indications from regulators in the United Kingdom and Europe that mandatory reporting would soon be required.

Given this demand, the Trustees have agreed to undertake a further detailed analysis of feedback on the requirements for success and other conditions to be satisfied prior to consideration of whether to establish a new board. The Trustees agreed on the formation of a Trustee Steering Committee to oversee the next phases of work and added an additional key requirement for success—being the need for urgency to deliver global standards, most notably on climate.

Throughout the three-month consultation period, the Trustees led comprehensive outreach programs within their respective jurisdictions to inform their decision-making and to encourage broad participation across all geographies and stakeholder groups. This included more than 400 engagements across 33 jurisdictions, participation in more than 20 public events hosted by third parties and the hosting of webinars that attracted more than 3,000 registered users. Following that outreach, the IFRS Foundation received 576 comment letters from a diverse set of organizations and individuals from around the world. All responses to the consultation paper are publicly available.

The Trustees will be meeting next on 2-4 March 2021. Given the growing and urgent demand, the intention would be for the Trustees to produce a definitive proposal (including a road map with timeline) by the end of September 2021, and possibly leading to an announcement on the establishment of a sustainability standards board at the meeting of the United Nations Climate Change Conference COP26 in November 2021.

27 January 2021 | President Joe Biden is sending early signals that action on climate change will be front and center to his administration’s agenda, and that his climate policy will be intertwined with his economic plan.

“Biden’s economic agenda is his climate agenda; his climate agenda is his economic agenda,” Sam Ricketts, co-founder of the climate policy group Evergreen and a senior fellow at the progressive Center for American Progress think tank, told Vox.

Though many of Biden’s early actions are centered on speeding up Covid-19 vaccinations and more immediate economic relief for Americans, the White House is positioning its next big policy push on creating jobs through infrastructure. And Biden’s goal is to make his economic recovery green, based on conversations with those familiar with the president’s thinking.

“When I think about climate change, the word I think of is ‘jobs,’” Biden said in a July campaign speech announcing his $2 trillion climate plan.

On Wednesday, Biden signed a set of executive actions meant to begin making this plan a reality. In them, he directed his administration to take a “whole-of-government approach” to combat climate change, which includes — among other initiatives — ordering federal agencies to purchase electricity that is pollution-free, as well as zero emission vehicles, and directing the US Department of Interior to pause entering into new oil and natural gas leases on public lands or offshore.

These new orders come on top of Biden’s day one executive actions to rejoin the Paris climate agreement and directing his agencies to reverse a number of former President Trump’s actions slashing environmental regulations and emissions standards.

But Biden’s real stamp on climate will come from intertwining ambitious climate goals like getting to 100 percent clean electricity by 2035 with a bold economic recovery bill — set to be released next month. It will take action by Biden’s White House and Congress to make this plan a reality.

The president’s climate team is headed by two climate czars: White House National Climate Adviser Gina McCarthy, who will oversee the nation’s domestic climate policy, and Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry, who will represent the US on the world stage when it comes to climate. President Barack Obama’s administration had one climate czar, and experts told Vox that Biden doubling that number and placing several other climate experts in key Cabinet posts signals it’s a pressing priority for the president.

“The era of us having to do climate as this niche set of actions is over,” Josh Freed, the founder of the Climate and Energy Program at the center-left think tank Third Way, told Vox. “I think the thing that is really transformative potentially about this administration is it’s much bigger than a climate bill or a handful of bills.”

Of course, Biden’s aggressive goals to get the US to completely clean electricity by 2035 and to net-zero emissions economy-wide by 2050 is easier said than done. Not only will Biden have to contend with congressional Republicans, he’ll also have to balance the wants of environmental groups that want him to go big on renewable energy with unions, some of whom are more wary of what it could mean for organized labor — in part because there are fewer union jobs in the renewable energy sector.

Biden has a long way to go, but multiple experts say his ambitious plans coupled with his initial personnel picks are an encouraging start.

“I’ve done this work for a really long time and it was awesome to be a part of the Obama administration, but they’ve put this on steroids,” Carol Browner, who served as Obama’s climate czar and EPA administrator throughout Bill Clinton’s presidency, told Vox. “It’s ambitious, it’s proactive, it’s durable action on climate change.”

Biden is hiring a lot of people with a background in climate change

McCarthy and Kerry will work in tandem from the White House. After four years of a Trump administration that treated Obama’s environmental and emissions regulations with a slash-and-burn mentality, they will have to start by undoing a lot of Trump’s actions.

McCarthy, who served as Obama’s EPA administrator from 2013 and 2017, is well-regarded by many environmental groups. “We know rejoining [Paris] won’t be enough,” McCarthy told reporters recently, outlining executive actions by Biden for his agencies to review and renege Trump’s actions on lowering emissions standards, including revoking Trump’s presidential permit for the Keystone XL pipeline.

“There is enormous opportunity with a whole-of-government approach that this administration is going to take to make meaningful progress,” she added.

Kerry, who served as Obama’s secretary of state and as a close Biden adviser on climate, is a natural fit to represent the US in international climate talks. Climate change is a global issue, and under Trump, the United States took itself out of the international effort to reduce emissions under the Paris agreement. A big part of Kerry’s job will be working to rebuild goodwill with countries wary that the US pulled out of the agreement to begin with. To do that job effectively, he’ll need regular updates from McCarthy on what the federal government is doing at home to drastically lower US emissions.

“The two pieces have to coexist, both the domestic and international,” said Heather Zichal, a former Obama White House staffer who was integral in creating Obama’s Clean Power Plan. “We need to be prepared to say what we’re prepared to do as a country. The international work is once we know what we’re capable of, we’re better able to work with the international community.”

There’s also the potential that two climate czars who both report to the president could disagree over the direction of US climate policy. Kerry’s ability to do his job well will be entirely dependent on the ability of McCarthy and other domestic officials to make progress on climate at home.

In addition to McCarthy and Kerry, Biden selected former Rep. Deb Haaland of New Mexico as a historic pick to lead the US Department of the Interior (Haaland is the first Native American to do so). His pick for the Environmental Protection Agency is Michael Regan, the secretary of North Carolina’s Department of Environmental Quality, and Biden selected former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm as US secretary of energy. To round out the list, McCarthy’s deputy in the White House is Ali Zaidi, the former New York chair of climate policy and finance.

Ricketts, the co-founder of Evergreen Action, told Vox that this team is “also one that’s demonstrated experience at the state level, and comes from places that are actually making progress. There’s a lot the federal government needs to learn from states.”

The president’s climate-focused picks also go beyond environmental agencies. Brian Deese is Biden’s top economic adviser and director of the National Economic Council, and was a key figure in negotiating the Paris agreement in Obama’s administration.

Biden’s Wednesday executive order charges Deese and McCarthy with leading a new Interagency Working Group on Coal and Power Plant Communities and Economic Revitalization, to try to prevent further environmental damage in communities impacted by coal mining, oil drilling and fracking — and see if some of these areas can be converted into hubs for renewable energy.

Some progressive climate groups, including the Sunrise Movement, were wary about Deese because of his time as the global head of sustainable investing at BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager. But Sunrise political director Evan Weber also told Vox that the fact Deese’s appointment to the National Economic Council was being framed around climate, as well as economic growth, was encouraging.

“We do hope there’s central coordination and direction. We see Gina and Ali hopefully as the conductors of the federal government climate symphony,” Weber told Vox recently. “I think that these are very encouraging signs, but personnel is the first step of the puzzle and the proof is going to be in the pudding. How urgent are they going to be in their action, how much more ambitious than Obama?”

Biden could put the full force of the federal government toward fighting climate change

Multiple former Obama administration staffers told Vox that even with all of these appointments, the person who really matters in all of this is Biden himself. Presidents have to be invested in an issue for them to throw the full weight of their administration behind it.

Biden becoming a potential agent of change on climate may be surprising for some; it wasn’t a top issue for the president throughout his decades in the Senate. But climate groups also saw some opportunity: Biden did plenty of work around renewable energy as vice president, especially during his tenure overseeing Obama’s 2009 stimulus plan. And like Kerry and McCarthy, Biden is a grandparent who is concerned about what a warming planet will mean for his grandchildren’s future.

Biden’s bullishness on climate also comes in large part from the fact that he sees renewable energy options like wind and solar as having the potential to drive the green economy through power generation. Still, Biden could have his work cut out for him to convince some major unions that endorsed him that an economy completely powered by renewable energy is the way of the future.

AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka recently told Vox his union has told Biden’s team “what we think strikes the right balance between doing what we need to do to go green and at the same time not upending or putting a lot of people out of work in the process.”

It also comes from seeing the dire impacts of climate change in historic wildfires, hurricanes, and droughts. Science has never been more clear on our short 10-year window to bring down the earth’s warming or face catastrophic consequences — and many of those impacts can be seen each year.

“Leadership starts from the top,” Zichal told Vox. “The fact Biden has made it clear this is a top priority, we need to leave no stone unturned and move aggressively — that really, really matters.”

Past administrations have typically relegated climate change and environmental issues to a handful of agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy, and the Department of Interior.

Using all of the federal government to combat climate change also empowers agencies like the Department of Housing and Urban Development to implement new sustainability standards for newly constructed or upgraded affordable housing. It means that the Department of Transportation could be charged with setting up more charging stations for electric vehicles, or spend more money on public transportation. And it means that the Department of Agriculture tries to work with the nation’s farmers to reduce the emissions coming from livestock and soils — about 10 percent of total US greenhouse gas emissions in 2018.

The White House and the federal government have a lot of tools they can use to combat climate change, even beyond pushing a green infrastructure package through Congress. In addition to using government regulations to change emissions standards for vehicles and appliances, Biden’s administration also plans to leverage its own buying power through federal procurement. This way, the federal government can spur change in the private sector.

“The government has many different tools; the good news about Biden is he’s looking to use all of them,” Browner said.

The US government is one of the world’s largest consumers, and Biden’s administration is already urging its agencies to buy American. It could also incentivize them to buy sustainably by being an outsize competitor in the free market.

“It’s a market signal of where large purchasers are headed, and it gives companies an early opportunity to move,” Freed, who works at Third Way, said.

The US economy is already trending toward renewable energy; renewables power about 11 percent of US energy consumption (the same amount as coal) but still pale in comparison to oil and natural gas. Biden’s administration could rapidly accelerate that trend. Biden has already staked out aggressive decarbonization targets, but his administration needs to move quickly to achieve them.

“The private sector and the economy shifted far more dramatically toward clean energy; it’s just happening,” Freed said. “The politics have changed, and the urgency has changed, and it makes the landscape look a lot different than it did in 2017 or even 2013.”