President Joe Biden said the former Mastercard executive “has critical experience mobilising public-private resources to tackle the most urgent challenges of our time, including climate change”.

Banga is currently an advisor to General Atlantic’s climate-focused fund, BeyondNetZero, has sat on the boards of big corporations like Dow Chemicals and has worked with US vice-president Kamala Harris on her Central American policies.

The bank has been led by 13 men and no women. Germany’s world bank governor Svenja Schulze tweeted this week “it is definitely time for a woman to lead the World Bank”.

The World Bank needs to become the frontrunner in fighting poverty and global crises such as #climatechange, #biodiversity loss & #pandemics. And it is definitely time for a woman to lead the World Bank.

— Svenja Schulze (@SvenjaSchulze68) February 22, 2023

The US is the bank’s biggest shareholder and traditionally picks its president so it is likely that Banga will replace David Malpass when he steps down in or before June.

Malpass was a Trump appointee who resigned before the end of his term following criticism of climate sceptic comments he made last year.

The public banks lead for the E3G campaign group Sonia Dunlop welcomed the nomination. She said: “Banga will be a fresh pair of hands at the wheel of what we hope will be a greener, bigger, transformational and reformed World Bank capable of leading a global response to global challenges.”

Climate evolution

The World Bank has become a key focus of efforts to tackle global climate change.

Barbados’s prime minister Mia Mottley first called for its reform to free up spending and tackle climate change, in an initiative labelled the Bridgetown agenda.

That call has been taken up by major bank shareholders like the US, Germany and India. It was endorsed by all governments at Cop27 and has been taken on by the UAE as hosts of Cop28.

Specifically, the bank has proposed lowering the loan to equity ratio of its main lending arm from 20% to 19%, freeing up about $4 billion a year to lend.

Reformers from the governments of Barbados and Germany told Climate Home this week that this was a good start but did not go far enough.

Credit rating

Many governments, including those of Barbados and Germany, say that any loosening of lending rules should not endanger the bank’s AAA credit rating.

This rating, determined by credit rating agencies like Moody’s, allows the bank to borrow money cheap and therefore to lend it cheap.

The government of India will push at the G20 this week for the bank to give cheaper climate finance to developing countries than developed ones.

The bank will host its spring meeting in its home city of Washington DC in April.

World Bank chief to step down early after climate controversy

There it will discuss its ‘evolution roadmap’ with its shareholder governments.

This roadmap aims to broaden the bank’s mission so that it includes tackling climate change, pandemics and other global issues as well as its current twin goals of reducing poverty and boosting prosperity.

The bank proposes to give more money to middle-income countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as these emerging economies pollute far more than the world’s poorest countries.

The bank also wants to lend more money to nations which are vulnerable to climate change. Currently, a country’s needs are based just on how poor it is.

To finance this wider mission, the bank’s roadmap calls for more funding from governments.

The post US backs Ajay Banga to lead World Bank in climate fight appeared first on Climate Home News.

The study, by the New Climate Economy and World Resources Institute think-tanks in partnership with former finance ministers and World Bank executives, proposed measures including reduced deforestation, more sustainable agriculture, less-polluting energies and wider electrification of the vehicle fleet.

It estimated that a shift to greener growth could could create two million jobs and boost gross domestic product by $535 billion over the next decade compared to business as usual plans — a gain equivalent to the gross domestic product of Belgium.

Low-carbon growth would help cut the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions by 42% below 2005 levels by 2025, it estimated. That would exceed Brazil’s climate pledge under the 2015 Paris Agreement of a 37% reduction.

Bolsonaro, a right-wing populist, has scaled back protection for the Amazon rainforest where deforestation rates have risen since he was elected in 2018. In turn, that has led to strong criticism from foreign governments and investors.

Wind, solar generate 10% of world electricity, doubling share since 2015

“Brazil’s economy was in trouble before Covid-19 hit. Now, it is expected to contract between 8% and 9.1%,” the report said.

“The transition to low‐carbon energy technologies is a strong 21st century trend. It is no longer a matter of if, but of when it will happen,” it said, noting that both China and the European Union have made greener growth pillars of post Covid-19 economic plans.

Rogério Studart, an author of the study and a senior fellow at the World Resources Institute in Washington, expressed hopes that the report would stir debate in Brazil and abroad despite Bolsonaro’s reluctance to embrace tougher action on climate change.

“The crisis makes it very very hard not to think outside the box,” he told Climate Home News. “Opting for a low-carbon inclusive development has so many benefits.”

Kamala Harris might help ‘night and day’ shift for US on global climate diplomacy

“A green recovery is best for Brazil and Brazilians and can also make the country much more attractive to foreign investment,” echoed Caio Koch-Weser, former vice chairman of Deutsche Bank Group and a former German Deputy Minister of Finance.

Among recommendations, the report said that Brazil should do more to safeguard nature.

Brazil’s “advantage lies in the ample existing supply of natural infrastructure (e.g., forests, mangroves, and rivers), which has been proven to reduce overall costs of investments in infrastructure and logistics, if natural resources are used in a smart way,” it said.

More sustainable agriculture, including restoring degraded lands, could increase “crop yields between 30% and 300% and can increase incomes up to 3.5 times,” it said.

For transport, the report encouraged a shift to greater use of Brazil’s natural gas for the shipping industry, a less polluting option than bunker fuel. And it said that Brazil could build more electric buses, perhaps opening export markets.

Among examples of greener innovation, it said that a switch to burning farm and industrial waste, rather than illegal firewood, had brought wide-ranging benefits to five ceramic factories in Ceará state.

Their shift generated $4.5 million in revenues for local communities, improved working conditions, increased water availability and avoided the deforestation of 1,750 hectares in ten years, in addition to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the report said.

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Electricity generated from wind and solar was also up by 14% compared to the same period last year and this despite a 3% drop in demand globally due to restrictions to limit the spread of Covid-19.

The analysis by Ember, a UK-based climate think-tank focused on accelerating the global electricity transition, shows that electricity generated from coal fell from 37.9% in 2015 when almost 200 countries adopted the Paris climate agreement to 33% in the first six months of 2020.

The study is based on national electricity generation for 48 countries making up 83% of global electricity production.

It found that coal dropped by 8.3% in the global electricity mix in the first half of the year compared to the same period last year, led by by plunges of more than 30% in the US and the European Union. Last year, the share of coal in electricity generation fell by just 3%.

US President Donald Trump, who doubts mainstream scientific findings about climate change, is pulling the US out of the Paris Agreement and has been seeking to promote the coal industry.

Ember estimated that 30% of coal’s decline was due to increased wind and solar generation while 70% could be attributed to a sharp reduction in electricity demand during Covid-19.

Overall coal generation fell by its largest half-year decline in decades. For the first time, the world’s coal fleet ran at less than half capacity. Earlier this month, the Global Energy Monitor found the global coal fleet shrank for the first time on record with 2.9 gigawatt retired in the first half of 2020.

But China’s share of global coal generation continued to increase to 54% so far this year – up from 44% in 2015.

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Dave Jones, senior electricity analyst at Ember, said the global electricity transition was not happening fast enough to limit global temperature to 1.5C above pre-industrial times – the tougher goal of the Paris climate agreement on which the survival on vulnerable nations depend.

Citing a CarbonBrief analysis of scenarios to limit global temperature rise to 1.5C by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – a leading body of international climate scientists – Jones said unabated coal use needed to fall by about 79% between 2019 and 2030 – or 13% every year for the next ten years.

Further analysis of IPCC scenarios found coal needs to fall to just 6% of global electricity generation by 2030 – a steep decline from the 33% share in the first half of this year. In most 1.5C scenarios, the decline in the share of coal is replaced by wind and solar generation.

“The fact that, during a global pandemic, coal generation has still only fallen by 8% shows just how far off-track we still are. We have the solution, it’s working, it’s just not happening fast enough,” he said.

Some countries are experiencing a more rapid transition than others. In India, the share of wind and solar in electricity generation rose from 3% in 2015 to nearly 10% in the first half of 2020 while coal’s share fell from 77% to 68% in the same period.

Coincidentally, in China, Brazil and Japan, the share of wind and solar in electricity generation rose from 4% in 2015 to 10% so far this year while in the US it doubled from 6% to 12%.  Australia recorded a rise from 7% to 17% while Vietnam saw a rapid increase from just 0.2% in 2018 to 6.4% this year.

Across the European Union, wind and solar produced a record fifth of the European Union’s electricity during the first half of the year – overtaking coal, oil and gas for the first time.

On the other hand, the data shows wind and solar in  Canada’s electricity mix has barely changed since 2015 and remains below the global average in South Korea.

Globally, wind and solar generated almost as much electricity as nuclear power plants which represented 10.5% of global electricity so far this year – unchanged from 2019.

The post Wind, solar generate 10% of world electricity, doubling share since 2015 appeared first on Climate Home News.

Japan, the first G7 industrialised nation to submit an updated climate action plan known as a “Nationally Determined Contribution” this year, said it would “continue to aim at resolutely achieving” its goal set in 2015 of reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 26% by 2030 from 2013 levels.

Its submission to the UN also said it “will pursue further efforts both in the medium and long-term to reduce greenhouse gas emissions beyond this level”. It comes at a time when governments around the world are overwhelmed by the coronavirus pandemic.

Laurence Tubiana, who was an architect of the 2015 Paris Agreement as France’s climate ambassador, welcomed Japan’s submission but said it was “disappointing to see the government has not increased its ambition in response to the climate crisis”.

Britain is due to host a critical climate summit in Glasgow in November – providing the coronavirus crisis is over by then – to rally far more global action at the first five-year milestone of the Paris Agreement. Countries are under pressure to submit tougher climate plans to limit climate change that the UN calls an existential threat to humanity.

A UK government spokesperson told Climate Home News it had taken note of Japan’s “technical NDC submission” but expected Tokyo to come up with a more ambitious plan ahead of the summit.

“We are clear on the need for increased ambition from all countries, particularly from G7 partners. We hope to see a further submission that includes an increase in Japan’s headline target ahead of Cop26.”

Green bailouts? – Climate Weekly

Tubiana said that other nations such as European Union members, China, the UK and South Korea were moving towards a low-carbon economy and could leave Japan behind in “the high-tech race of this century”.

“At one of the most challenging times of recent memory, we need bolder, mutually reinforcing plans that protect our societies from the global risks we all face,” Tubiana, who is now CEO of the European Climate Foundation, said in a statement.

2019 was the second warmest year on record, behind 2016, with severe wildfires, bleachings of coral reefs and an accelerating thaw of ice in Greenland and Antarctica that is pushing up world sea levels. Last year, UN Secretary General António Guterres urged the world to cut emissions by 45% by 2030, and for developed nations to lead the way.

Christiana Figueres, who was head of the UN Climate Change secretariat at the time of the Paris Agreement, praised Japanese companies including business conglomerate Marubeni for moving away from fossil fuels. But she said the government’s NDC fell short.

“The new NDC limits the scope for Japan to meet the goals required by science, desired by humanity and committed to by its government in Paris. I hope this announcement does not hinder further leadership from the private sector in Japan,” she said in a statement.

Governments urged to attach green strings to long-term coronavirus recovery plans

“When the world is learning through the Covid-19 pandemic that we need to work together to tackle global threats like climate change, it’s disappointing to see Japan not learning this lesson,” Mohamed Adow, director of the Nairobi-based think tank Power Shift Africa, said in a statement.

Japan says its industries such as steel, cars or cement have historically been more efficient than major rivals, partly because of its dependence on energy imports. Tokyo says that limits its ability to make deep cuts compared to other, less efficient, economies.

It originally submitted its NDC climate action plan in July 2015. Since then, the document said that Japan had reduced its greenhouse gas emissions for four consecutive years, from 2014-2017.

The submission also added that revisions to Japan’s NDC “will be carried out consistently with the revision of the energy mix” rather than having to wait for the next five-year milestone of the Paris accord, when countries will be expected to ratchet-up their plans further.

According to figures included in the submission, coal makes up 26% of Japan’s energy mix on which its NDC is based. Renewable energy makes up 22-24%, nuclear power up to 22% and liquefied natural gas about 27%.

A report published by Oil Change International earlier this year, also found that Japan’s export credit agency provided more support to oil, gas and coal projects abroad than any other government – an estimated $7.8 billion annually.

Coronavirus: in Hawaii’s air, scientists seek signs of economic shock on CO2 levels

In 2019, Japan also submitted a long-term strategy to cut emissions by mid-century to the UN.

Monday’s document said that long-term plan aimed to achieve “a ‘decarbonised society’ as close as possible to 2050 with disruptive innovations” such as artificial photosynthesis – a process used by plants to make food while absorbing carbon dioxide – and hydrogen.

Japan’s greenhouse gas emissions totalled the equivalent of 1.23 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide in 2017, up 2.04% from the UN base year of 1990. They have declined from 1.34 billion in 2013.

Only four nations have submitted more ambitious climate plans to the UN so far – the Marshall Islands, Suriname, Norway and Moldova.

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If a downturn in air pollution observed by satellites over China in February lasts a year, premature deaths from air pollution could fall by about 50,000 to 100,000, scientists at the Center for International Climate Research in Oslo (Cicero) have said.

The coronavirus pandemic has reduced demand for coal and other fossil fuels linked to a closure of factories and less road traffic, both in China and in other parts of the world.

Kristin Aunan, a senior researcher at Cicero, said the possibility of reduced deaths from air pollution was in no way to detract from the severity of the pandemic.

“But we have to remember that air pollution kills people, especially vulnerable elderly people,” she told Climate Home News.

Putting the brakes on – Climate Weekly

So far coronavirus, known as Covid-19, has infected about 170,000 people worldwide and killed 6,500, with cases surging daily in many nations.

Aunan was the lead researcher of a 2018 study that estimated that between 1.15 million and 1.24 million people in China die from air pollution every year.

And the World Health Organisation (WHO) says air pollution kills about seven million people worldwide annually by causing heart disease, lung cancers and respiratory infections.

The Cicero researchers focused on fine particulate matter, or PM2.5, described by the WHO as the most harmful type of pollution of 2.5 micrometres or less across.

Earlier this month, Copernicus, the EU’s Earth Observation Programme, said satellite measurements showed that levels of PM2.5 pollution over China in February 2020 were down by about 20-30% compared to the average for the same month in 2017, 2018 and 2019.

Based on those observations, Aunan and her colleagues wrote that if PM2.5 concentrations “over China remains at a level 20-30% below the baseline situation for a full year, the annual avoided number of premature deaths could amount to 54,000 – 109,000”.

That would correspond to a reduction in deaths from air pollution of 5% to 10%.

She cautioned that the figures were highly uncertain and that the impact would be far less if China’s economy recovers quickly, especially if Beijing seeks to stimulate the economy by burning more fossil fuels.

Nasa has also cited evidence that the decline in air pollution over China “is at least partly related to the economic slowdown following the outbreak of coronavirus”.

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A Copernicus official said the agency would issue satellite images of Italy this week to illustrate how a nationwide lockdown has affected air pollution in the European nation hardest hit by coronavirus.

The European Public Health Alliance, a non-governmental group advocating better health for all, said in a statement that all air pollution aggravated risks in Europe from the virus.

“Covid-19 has also highlighted the need for a long-term EU strategy to address Europe’s invisible epidemic of non-communicable diseases, and measures to tackle air pollution,” it said.

It added that “patients suffering from conditions such as hypertension, diabetes, or respiratory diseases have proved to be particularly vulnerable to the outbreak”.

The European Commission says that more than 400,000 people die prematurely from air pollution every year in the EU.

Aunan told CHN she hoped efforts to combat coronavirus would also put a spotlight on wider health risks such as pollution and climate change, which is disrupting food and water supplies with heatwaves, droughts and floods.

“When we look into the future for climate change and air pollution… all these risk factors are continuously taking lives,” she said.

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The 23 ex-ministers from six continents, a group founded by former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, also urged governments to complete a UN treaty this year to safeguard life in the high seas, the area beyond the legal jurisdiction of coastal states that makes up two-thirds of the ocean.

“We endorse setting a global target of strongly protecting at least 30% of the land and 30% of the ocean by 2030,” the group, known as the Aspen Ministers Forum, said in a statement about goals for expanding parks and other protected areas for wildlife.

Signatories included Germany’s Joschka Fischer, Britain’s Malcolm Rifkind, Egypt’s Amre Moussa, Argentina’s Susana Malcorra, Israel’s Tzipi Livni and Australia’s Alexander Downer.

Governments are due to meet in Kunming, China, in October, to set new targets for 2030 to try to avert what scientists say is the worst extinction crisis since the dinosaurs were wiped out 65 million years ago. One million species are now at risk from human activities, a UN report said last year.

Locusts plague destroys livelihoods in Kenya but ‘biggest threat yet to come’

The 2030 goals are meant to build on goals set a decade ago to protect at least 17% of the land and 10% of the seas by 2020.

So far, about 15.1% of terrestrial areas and 7.9% of the seas are protected, according to an overview by the UN Environment World Conservation Monitoring Centre. But the Brazilian Amazon, for instance, is under renewed threat from economic development and many fish stocks are at risk.

On land, the loss of habitats, over-exploitation, pollution, climate change and invasive species are among threats to creatures ranging from giraffes to beetles. Over-fishing, plastic pollution and acidification of caused by carbon dioxide emissions are undermining life in the seas.

“Humanity sits on the precipice of irreversible loss of biodiversity and a climate crisis that imperils the future for our grandchildren and generations to come,” the former ministers wrote.

“The world must act boldly, and it must act now,” they wrote.

In documents released last month by the UN Convention on Biological Diversity, one proposed goal is for protected areas and other conservation measures to cover “at least [30%] of land and sea areas with at least [10%] under strict protection” by 2030.

The brackets signal that the numbers are not yet agreed.

“It’s good news that biodiversity is being recognised at a higher priority,” Alex Rogers, Science Director for REV Ocean and a visiting professor of zoology at Oxford University, told Climate Home News of the ministers’ appeal.

“The loss of biodiversity is hair-raising,” he said.

But he said government definitions of protected areas, including the 2020 UN targets, are often vague with loopholes that allow continued activities such as deforestation, road-building, hunting and fishing.

He said he hoped Tuesday’s call for “strongly protecting” the seas, for instance, would mean areas where fishing is banned or highly restricted.

Climate Home News launches front line climate justice reporting programme

Rogers said that he recently took part in a yet-to-be published scientific report for a high level panel of world leaders that recommends that 30-40% of the ocean should be protected.

It also said that fisheries policies, such as setting catch quotas, should try to assess the wider risks on biodiversity. Catching too much herring, for instance, can undermine the amount of food available for predators such as seabirds or tuna which also feed on the fish.

(Corrected on 18 February to update Alex Rogers’ affiliation and to show that the high level scientific panel is of world leaders, not limited to the UK)

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At a meeting in Birmingham on 8 February, 110 sometimes sceptical citizens were consulted about ways to decarbonise the UK economy as part of preparations by Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s government for the Cop26 summit in Glasgow in November. 

France launched a similar democratic experiment in October to seek voters’ ideas for cutting emissions. Last year, the UK was the first G7 economy to legislate a goal of net zero emissions by 2050 but it did not spell out exactly how.

Buy less new stuff, rent everything from toys to cars, and repair damaged possessions were among topics debated at the Birmingham meeting. 

“The more we consume, the quicker we run out of natural resources,” Nicole Koenig-Lewis, a reader in sustainable consumption at Cardiff University, told the room.

UK climate diplomacy ‘already happening’ for Cop26 despite leadership vacuum

“Thinking about resources like fossil fuels or minerals: it always leads to an increase pollution of our water and the air and also too much waste. Thinking about the fashion industry, 300,000 tonnes of clothing are sent to landfill every year,” she said.

Many in the audience said they got the message although others doubted the government would heed their ideas.

“It’s a big issue for my generation,” Leia, a currently unemployed 20-year old engineer from Darlington, told Climate Home News of a throwaway society. Reporters were asked only to use participants’ first names.

“We’ve never been taught to mend or make clothes. I have but I know I’m the exception, so we need to educate young generations how to do these things rather than just live a consumerist lifestyle,” she said.

Participants in the Birmingham citizens’ assembly, the second of four weekends devoted to consulting the public, were recruited through a civic lottery, under which the government sent 30,000 invitations and randomly picked 110 people out of those willing to take part.

The attendees reflect the UK population in terms of age, gender, education, ethnicity, geography and attitudes to climate change, according to Resolve, a charity specialising in participative democracy overseeing the climate assembly. 

The outcome of the discussions will be presented to the six parliamentary committees which called for the assembly in April. The government will not be bound by the recommendations, prompting Extinction Rebellion UK to call out the assembly as “toothless”.

By contrast in France, President Emmanuel Macron has said he plans to present citizens’ proposals “unfiltered” either to a referendum, to a vote in parliament or to direct regulatory application.

One million solar panels! If only we knew where they were…

In Birmingham, one audience member won a round of applause by asking Rachel Reeves, the chair of parliament’s Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee: “How can we be reassured that the government will follow on our recommendations?” 

Reeves, of the opposition Labour Party, insisted that the assemblies were genuine.

“We can have a degree of reassurance that the government are going to listen and take on board the views of the citizens’ assembly,” she said, pointing to cross-party support. “We’re going to use what you come up with to inform our future work programme.”

Participants broke out into several groups in an afternoon session, each tackling ways to decarbonise an area of the UK economy, including energy in the home, transport and consumption. 

In the workshop on consumption, lectures challenged the notion that greater energy efficiency in the future would allow British people to get away with present-rate consumption. 

A net-zero economy would also have to encourage less waste, higher-quality and more durable products than those produced at present in a shift from a throwaway consumer culture.

“Is the new iPhone, which has a new form of selfie, adding enormous amount of value to our life?,” asked John Barrett, a professor in energy and climate policy at the university of Leeds. 

“It isn’t about personal blame. This is about a system that we work in,” he said, sending several heads to nod in agreement. Some economists object that a shift to buying less will undermine growth and jobs.

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Koenig-Lewis advocated a shift away from ownership and towards renting or sharing. Ride-sharing for commuters by car, clothes-sharing or product rental, such as the Lego subscription box, could allow British people to cut resource use in the long-term. 

The participants, who were spread across five tables of six to seven people including a mediator, then had ten minutes to exchange views with experts in a session closed to the media. 

Barrett reported upon the audience’s “annoyance” towards products’ lower standards and limited lifespan.

The idea of forcing companies to indicate their products’ carbon footprint was particularly popular, the experts said. Carbon footprint labelling is currently not compulsory in the UK, despite support from household names like Kit-Kat chocolates, Cheerios cereals and Nescafe coffee.

So was a graph linking emissions to income that showed the 5% richest section of the population have by far the greatest impact. “The reaction was a sense that they want to make sure that the polluter pays,” Barrett said. 

On the sharing economy, Koenig-Lewis said participants wanted to discuss “how to  make a rented car feel more personal”. 

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There was also vivid interest in repairing initiatives, such as the rise of ‘repair cafes’, free meeting places where people can bring broken products such as clothes, bicycles, furniture, electrical appliances and, if necessary, learn how to fix them.

Notwithstanding the odd disagreement over subjects such as whether to restrict consumption of meat in favour of plant-based diets, participants provided overwhelmingly positive feedback on the experience in surveys. 

Chris, a 32-year old mechanical engineer from Oxfordshire, admitted to being initially “very sceptical about the climate assembly”. 

“I heard a lot of people say: we want a group of people, to represent the people, to make a decision for the people. And I thought: and is that not what Parliament supposed to be?”

But he said the diversity of the assembly and willingness of participants to find compromise on issues had left him “pleasantly surprised”.

The assembly embraced the full spectrum of British society, he said, from “people who are in denial to people who say we need to fix it tomorrow and everything in between along that line”.

“I feel proud of what has been achieved,” Adrian, a 52-year old lawyer from Belfast, told CHN.

“Everyone that’s involved in this is going towards a same goal,” he said, “And that makes me a lot more secure about the outcome of this than I was when going into it.”

The post Don’t shop till you drop: advice to UK citizens on net zero climate goals appeared first on Climate Home News.

Together the three countries account for about 0.1% of world emissions.

Details of updated climate action plans, known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs):

• Marshall Islands

The Marshall Islands, which says its 53,000 citizens account for a fractional 0.00001 percent of global emissions, says it will work to curb the Pacific islands’ vulnerability to storms and sea level rise while developing solar power to break dependence on diesel fuel.

Lacking land for solar power, it said it may place floating panels on lagoons and install panels in novel places such as on schools, basketball courts, hospitals, and at airports.

It was the first to submit a new NDC, in 2018, when it set a new goal of cutting emissions by 58% by 2035 and reaffirmed an aspiration for net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

• Suriname

Suriname says it will step up climate action especially in electricity, road transport, agriculture and forests – sectors that account for 70% of the country’s emissions. Overall, it says that it is already a “carbon-negative country” because its tropical forests soak up carbon dioxide as they grow.

Among measures, the NDC will expand protected areas for forests and wetlands to cover 17% of the South American country by 2030, up from 14%.

The NDC stops short of setting economy-wide targets for emissions but outlines “a cost-effective pathway to decarbonisation of sustainable economic development, maintaining the integrity of natural forest acting as a carbon sink, and strengthening resilience.”

• Norway

Western Europe’s top oil and gas producer plans to cut emissions by 50-55% by 2030 below 1990 levels, in line with a European Green Deal outlined by the European Commission. Norway is not an EU member, but usually matches EU goals, which are currently for a cut of at least 40% by 2030.

It became the first developed nation to submit a new NDC, on 7 February, saying “the deadline is February 9.”

Norway’s emissions were 1.1% above 1990 levels in 2018 and Norway has failed to meet previous targets with domestic action. In 2010, for instance, the government pledged to cut emissions by 30-40% by 2020. It will only meet the goal by buying emissions quotas abroad.

• Other nations

Separately, a total of 107 governments representing 15% of emissions have promised to enhance NDC ambition sometime this year, according to the World Resources Institute think-tank.

There are 197 parties to the 2015 Paris Agreement. NDCs are the building blocks of global action, typically outlining policy goals for the next decade.

Documents implementing the 2015 Paris Agreement say countries are meant to bolster their NDCs every five years and submit the plans at least nine months before the relevant UN conferences, or Cop. This year’s Cop26 will be in Glasgow from 9-19 November, making 9 February a theoretical date for submissions.

But documents dating back to 2011 say the Paris Agreement was originally due to enter into force only in 2020, meaning that formal reviews will only start in 2025, 2030, 2035 and so on, legal scholars say. Governments may be able merely to re-submit existing plans in 2020.

But many governments, climate activists, the UN, cities and companies want urgent upgrades this year to tackle the worsening impacts of warming.

The post Marshall Islands, Suriname, Norway upgrade climate plans before Cop26 appeared first on Climate Home News.

On a video call hosted by Swedish teenage activist Greta Thunberg and her “Fridays for Future” youth movement, they said African nations have a role to play even though global warming has been caused overwhelmingly by major industrialised nations.

Deforestation in Africa and local energy policies promoting fossil fuels were all adding to the crisis, said Makenna Muigai of Kenya.

“I urge African leaders and world leaders to take into consideration that all of us at the end of the day will be affected by climate change,” she said.

UN relocates biodiversity talks to Italy from China after coronavirus emergency

Ndoni Mcunu, an environmental scientist at Witwatersrand University in South Africa, said that African nations should make their economies more efficient to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

“Africa only contributes 5% of the greenhouse gases yet we are the most impacted,” she said. China, the United States and the European Union are the top emitters.

Among policy advice, Vanessa Nakate, 23, of Uganda urged a halt to construction of a pipeline to export Ugandan oil via Tanzania to the Indian Ocean port of Tanga.

“We need to keep the oil in the ground,” she said. She said that activists in Africa often felt ignored, both at home and abroad.

“The biggest threat to action in my country and in Africa is the fact that those who are trying as hard as possible to speak up are … not able to tell their stories,” she said, adding that some feared arrest if they took part in local protests about climate change.

Nakate won unwanted attention last week after she was cropped from a news agency photograph at a meeting of political and business leaders in Davos, Switzerland. Her absence meant the image showed only white activists, including 17-year-old Thunberg.

Nakate said that the controversy about the photograph – subsequently reissued to include her – might end up helping. “I’m actually very optimistic about this. I believe it is going to change the stories of different climate activists in Africa,” she said.

Coronavirus side effect – Climate Weekly

Teenage activist Ayakha Melithafa of South Africa said it was difficult to galvanise local action on climate change when many people in Africa suffered crises, of poverty and unemployment.

“It’s hard to convince people in Africa to care about the climate crisis because they are facing so many socio-economic crises at the same time,” she said.

She called for better public education to show that climate change would exacerbate strains on water and food supplies.

Thunberg, named Time Magazine’s person of the year for 2019, said she wanted to focus on Africa by organising the call.

She said that everyone in power around the world needs “to start treating this crisis as a crisis.”

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Chile’s president Sebastian Piñera announced the country would not host the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) meeting or the Cop25 climate talks on the steps of La Moneda, the presidential palace, on Wednesday morning.

Accompanied by environment minister and Cop25 president Carolina Schmidt and minister of foreign affairs Teodoro Ribera, president Piñera said: “We deeply regret the problems and inconveniences that this decision will mean for both Apec and Cop. But as the president of all Chileans, I always have to put the problems and interests of Chileans, their needs, their desires and their hopes first in line.”

Schmidt wrote to UN Climate Change on Wednesday notifying them that the summit, scheduled to begin in Santiago on 2 December, would not be going ahead.

In an internal email to UN Climate Change staff, executive secretary Patricia Espinosa said: “A few minutes ago we were informed by minister Schmidt that they have had to take the very difficult decision to not host the COP in Chile and to cancel the Apec summit.”

Massive protests and disruption in Chile ahead of trade and UN climate summits

“This information has already been made public by the president of Chile himself. We are discussing next steps and will share additional information with you once it is available.”

UN Climate Change said they were “currently exploring alternative hosting options”. In a statement, the Chilean government said it would continue to preside over the Cop25 negotiations until it passes on the baton to the UK ahead of next year’s meeting.

A state of emergency was declared in Chile this month after the country was seized by the worst wave of social unrest since the end of the Pinochet dictatorship in 1990. Protesters denouncing social inequality and the privatisation of social services were met with violent repression by Chilean police and armed forces. Last week, CHN reported that 18 people had been killed in the violence.

The army has been deployed to the streets of the capital Santiago, where subway stations have been burnt and a curfew imposed. The metro system has been severely damaged, particularly across the city centre.

UN high commissioner for human rights and former Chilean president Michelle Bachelet said she would investigate allegations of human rights violations.

The climate talks, which are due to finalise critical aspects of the Paris Agreement, had already been moved once after Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro withdrew Brazil as host.

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Costa Rica hosted the smaller ‘pre-Cop’ gathering in October and had originally competed with Chile to host the main summit. However UN talks are huge events with tens of thousands of participants, making a short notice conference logistically extremely difficult.

A spokesman for Costa Rica’s ministry of the environment said “the organisation of a conference of this level has a long logistic process that takes months to prepare”.

Costa Rica’s environment minister Carlos Manuel Rodríguez said he was in discussion with the Chilean presidency about next steps. “We are going to support the decisions that are taken in order to find a successful alternative so that Cop25 can take place soon,” he said.

In the past, when countries presiding over UN climate talks have not been able to host the negotiations because of logistical and capacity issues, the talks were held in Bonn, Germany, where UN Climate Change is based. This happened in 2017 when Fiji presided over the talks.

Jochen Flasbarth, Germany’s state environment secretary said in a tweet: “We are in contact with the UN Climate Change secretariat and the Polish Cop24 presidency to discuss the situation.”

According to UN Climate Change procedures, the climate talks “meet in Bonn, the seat of the secretariat, unless a Party offers to host the session”.

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Her action, which took place on Tuesday, was part of a rolling set of protests taking place across London and the world under the Extinction Rebellion banner. She later joined a growing tally of activists to be arrested.

Yamin is a legal expert who has advised various developing countries in climate negotiations and is an associate fellow at Chatham House. On Tuesday, she told Climate Home News that the Paris Agreement, which she helped negotiate in 2015, was “not delivering”.

“I thought that was my story,” she said. “I thought that the law and science and speaking truth to power worked. That we would be able to act with kindness and in time and on the basis of the precautionary principle and all these lovely ideas that we enshrined in law in the early 80s and 90s.

Extinction Rebellion eyes global climate campaign of non-violence

“And we haven’t done that and that’s because these guys [Shell] knew and have stopped it. It’s not some random delay, this delay has been planned in the system, it’s been financed, it’s been lobbied for. So that’s why today, I feel totally comfortable and I wish I’d done it sooner, had woken up to the power dynamics and not been so naive.”

Police had cordoned off access to Shell’s London office after two other protesters had climbed onto the entrance on Monday, spray painting slogans above the door.

https://twitter.com/KarlMathiesen/status/1118170081702424578

As the pair surrendered themselves to police on Tuesday, Yamin used the distraction to duck through a line of officers and throw herself to the ground. Yamin’s husband Michael Yule, a former criminal defence solicitor turned teacher, and son Rafi, who has been involved in the school strikes movement, watched as police tried first to prize her from the pavement before she yelled: “I’m glued to the floor, I’m glued to the floor.”

She was later removed from the pavement and led away by police in handcuffs. Yamin said she was ready to join in police custody dozens of protesters who were being simultaneously arrested on Waterloo Bridge. Overnight, more than 120 people were detained as police attempted to break a blockade on the bridge that began on Monday morning.

By Tuesday evening 209 people had been arrested, according to the Metropolitan Police, and 500,000 commuters had been impacted by the closure of bus routes.

https://twitter.com/KarlMathiesen/status/1118170086139932673

According to Extinction Rebellion, there will be protests and actions in 80 cities across 33 countries in the coming days. In London, the group plans to escalate its actions beyond the current traffic chaos to include the city’s underground on Wednesday.

“Economic disruption is key in forcing the government to come to the table and negotiate our demands,” said the group in a statement. “We sincerely apologise to all those who may suffer as a consequence of this disruption. In any other circumstances we would never dream of disrupting the tube but this is an emergency.”

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan issued a statement that said he was “extremely concerned”.

“It is absolutely crucial to get more people using public transport, as well as walking and cycling, if we are to tackle this climate emergency – and millions of Londoners depend on the underground network to get about their daily lives in our city. Targeting public transport in this way would only damage the cause of all of us who want to tackle climate change, as well as risking Londoners’ safety, and I’d implore anyone considering doing so to think again,” he said.

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The movement is calling on the UK government to “tell the truth” about the extent of the crisis, slash greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2025 and establish a citizens’ assembly to oversee climate policy.

Yamin said Extinction Rebellion in London aimed to establish permanent disruptive vigils around the city, in the same manner as anti-apartheid protesters picketed South Africa’s embassy in the late 1980s.

“My legal journey has been very much about making new laws,” said the lawyer, who was also a chief architect of Europe’s emissions trading legislation. “Making new laws is really important. But breaking the law has become more important because of the gravity and the nature of the political crisis that is stopping these laws being good enough in the first place.”

Yamin had come prepared with a copy of the book Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist to read in the cells.

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The problems vary, but, locals say, they boil down to a single root cause: climate change.

“Climate change is linked with literally everything we do,” Agnes Leina, founder and head of a Kenyan non-profit that supports pastoralist women and girls, said at a conference in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia this month.

“These girls getting married early is 100% because drought kills cows. Eighty percent of girls drop out of school because of drought; they don’t want their father to be laughed at,” she said.

These are the types of knock-on climate change effects that have crept to the present after decades of scientific warnings. While in rich countries the focus remains on reining in greenhouse gas emissions, for large parts of the world’s population the most pressing challenge is coping with their impact.

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Climate change is linked to water shortages in hydropower-reliant Ethiopia and Zambia; to the rising heat inside India’s tin-roofed homes; and to the growing trend of young child marriage in Kenya, Bangladesh and elsewhere. This variation and unpredictability makes an organised response very difficult.

There’s a set number of ways to reduce emissions around the world. They include the phase-out of fossil fuels for energy and transport and hydrofluorocarbons emitted from fridges and air conditioners, and the planting of trees to absorb carbon dioxide.

How to adapt, instead, depends on how changes are affecting local industries – from farming to fishing to tourism – and how those impacts trickle through cultural nuances, such as the role of women in growing food or collecting water. Forget talking on a global scale, even national governments struggle to respond to the real impacts felt by communities.

“Mitigation is very clear. For adaptation there are still confusions,” said Madan Pariyar, from the non-profit International Development Enterprises in Nepal. “We must talk of local action, rather than country-wide action, because the priorities differ from place to place.”

In Kenya, changes in climate are further destabilising the pastoralist tradition of roaming the drylands and taking care of cows, camels and land – without ownership. Modern property laws have already limited where they can go, while the increasingly erratic seasons make it harder to find water, grow food or feed livestock.

“I used to walk 15 minutes to get water from a stream. Then the stream dried up and we walked one hour, then two hours,” said Leina, who created the Ill’laramatak Community Concerns group in 2011. “That’s four hours of your day. Then you’ve not done the firewood, the washing, the cooking. How can a girl study too?”

Agnes Leina says the problems facing Kenya’s pastoralist women and girls all stem from the effects of climate change (Photo: Ill’laramatak Community Concerns)

Leina and her group, named after the Maasai word for “caregiver”, visit pastoralist families and urge them to send their daughters to boarding school. One school now has 720 girls, around 150 of whom were saved from female genital mutilation as early as nine years old and marriage soon after, she said.

Ill’laramatak also helps women build “alternative livelihoods”. It encourages them to make their traditional beaded jewellery to sell on its website, bought sewing machines for them to make school uniforms and teaches them to make cleaner biomass briquettes for cooking fuel.

This is one characteristic that community-focused programmes worldwide tend to share: they aim boost local development while also adapting to a changed climate.

In India’s heat-stressed Gujarat state, the non-profit Mahila Housing Sewa Trust is working to cool tin-roofed urban houses, where it can get 2-3C hotter than outside. It helped bring down the cost of replacements made from compressed plant fibres – to around 70% of the average monthly income – and worked with bankers to create affordable loans. The new roof allows people to work from their homes during the day.

“Why are people investing? Because their home is their livelihood,” said Siraz Hirani, from Mahila Housing Sewa Trust. “It’s not that the poor does not want to adopt technologies, it’s that the poor cannot afford the technology.”

Similarly, organisations for farmers in India’s Maharashtra state, Kenya and Uganda are helping farmers identify more durable seeds, for instance requiring less water, to feed themselves and to sell.

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But while local groups are finding ways to adapt and develop simultaneously, international aid is still hard to secure, especially to go beyond one-off, time-limited projects.

Developing countries said in their commitments to the Paris climate agreement that they will need $50bn a year for adaptation between 2020 and 2030, according to a UN Environment Programme report published in December.

The sums flowing so far are much smaller. Of the $17.4bn in approved public funding for climate change as of 2016, less than 10% – $1.5bn – was earmarked for locally focused projects, according to the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), which organised the Addis Ababa conference. Out of those local projects, more than half appeared to be focused on adaptation and less than a quarter on mitigation, it said.

The world’s 47 least developed countries are now calling for an overhaul in the way adaptation aid is handed out.

The bloc, which negotiates together in UN climate talks, wants efforts on the ground to be linked more closely with public and private donors and is urging all governments to set out clearer adaptation plans when they submit their 2050 commitments to the Paris Agreement. The commitments are due by the end of 2020, but the bloc intends to exert pressure at the UN Secretary-General’s Summit this September.

“[The 2050 plans are] an opportunity for our countries, because we will be able to move from short-term planning to long-term,” said Gebru Jember Endalew, Ethiopia’s lead climate negotiator and former chair of the least developed group.

The call comes amid growing awareness of the extreme weather that is linked to climate change – such as this year’s deadly floods in Iran and Cyclone Idai in southern Africa, and the -50C chills across the US.

The concern in the developing world, however, is that new money will be driven by destruction in rich countries and directed towards emergency responses, rather than prevention.

“When things happen, like [Idai] in Mozambique, they come very quickly because they want to save lives,” said Constance Okollet, head of the Osukuru United Women Network, an umbrella for 1,200 small community groups. “But it is the small-scale farmer in the community down there who feeds the whole world. If they could see and help, these people would develop quickly. We try, but we can’t reach it because we do not see the money.”

Climate Home News’ reporting from Addis Ababa was supported by the Climate Justice Resilience Fund. Please read our editorial guidelines for more details.

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The recommendations, agreed late on Thursday by a cross-party group of parliamentarians, would set legally-binding limits every five years and hike the carbon tax, while providing strong support for green jobs and agriculture.

The government will decide which, if any of the recommendations to put the policies into place. Irish climate action and environment minister Richard Bruton has said he intends to set climate targets across all government departments.

Setting a net-zero target would mark a significant step change for Ireland – a self-professed climate “laggard”, which is on track to miss its EU-mandated goals for 2020.

After six months of debate, the majority of the committee backed a set of policies that aim to strike a balance between pressure on Ireland to speed up its emissions reductions and political fear of public protests like the gilet jaunes movement in France.

Modelled on the UK’s climate change act, the committee’s report would create a new, independent Climate Action Council to monitor the government’s progress in reducing emissions.

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With this higher goal, Dublin should “proactively” support a rise in the European Union’s emissions reduction target for 2030, the parliamentarians said. This would add Ireland to a group of countries including France, the Netherlands, Sweden, Luxembourg and Denmark who are calling to hike the goal in line with limiting global warming to 1.5C, rather than 2C.

The committee also recommends gradually raising the Irish carbon tax on fossil fuels to at least €80 per tonne of CO2 by 2030, from €20 at present. The revenue should be ring-fenced until a public consultation on whether it should be dispersed equally to the public – as a carbon dividend – or put towards addressing fuel poverty and supporting climate measures.

And it calls to boost the share of renewable electricity in the mix to 70% by 2030, from around one-third in 2018.

Ireland is a testing ground for whether direct democracy can help governments bring in ambitious climate policy. Last year an assembly of 99 randomly selected citizens made recommendations that the committee then built on.

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Overall, the recommendations represent a “milestone” in Irish climate policy, said Sadhbh O’Neill, an expert adviser to the parliamentary committee and a PhD candidate on environmental policy at University College Dublin.

“The imposition of carbon budgets to meet a target of net zero emissions in 2050 will necessarily have a profound effect on policies and planned investments in transport, buildings and energy, especially given that Ireland’s emissions are increasing,” she said.

There will be disappointment that the committee did not propose specific measures to tackle emissions from Ireland’s large agriculture and land use sectors, such as a cap on the rising herd numbers.

However, the committee does call for a drastic change in the direction of  policies in favour of diversification, peatland restoration and sustainable afforestation, O’Neill added.

The recommendations focus on encouraging farmers to mitigate their greenhouse gases, including with incentives from the European Union’s common agricultural policy, and say the parliament should continue to study the potential for a new emissions tax.

“The committee was mindful, given the importance of agriculture to the rural economy, to propose recommendations which support on-farm measures to reduce emissions and improve the sustainability of farming in Ireland, including agricultural diversification,” the report states.

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However, both countries face significant domestic uncertainties that year, with the strong possibility of early general elections and economic and political problems.

In the UK, it’s not yet clear if the country will have left the European Union by then, be in the middle of a transition or even still locked in negotiations over leaving the bloc.

In Italy, current public opinion polls predict a full-out win for the right-wing League party, which now shares power with the populist 5 Star Movement.

“New elections before the Cop26 are important because they can change a government’s priorities,” said Luca Bergamaschi, an energy and climate change expert at the think-tanks E3G and Italian Institute for International Affairs. “Having a Cop26 potentially guided by the League raises strong doubts about whether Italy could guide a meeting which is very, very important.”

Germany ready to join global coal phase-out alliance: environment minister

While the UK government may still be consumed by Brexit or its fallout, Britain has “the diplomatic network to pull off the significant outreach that will be required of the Cop26 presidency”, said Jennifer Tollmann, a policy advisor also at E3G. “It has consistently driven the climate agenda within Europe and there are numerous cities that could host it.”

The government has also made an effort to show leadership in recent years. It partnered with Canada in 2017 to form an anti-coal alliance, started the process of strengthening its 2050 climate goals last year, and is now co-chairing talks on climate resilience for a special UN summit in September.

The annual Cop summits rotate between five regional groups. Britain and Italy sit with other Western European countries, the US, Australia, Canada, Iceland, New Zealand, Norway and Switzerland.

Chile warns of 3-hour commutes, split venue at December climate talks

Both countries confirmed their bids during the Cop24 summit in Poland in December. The UK also wrote a letter to the regional group in February.

The group is now under pressure to choose a host at a June UN meeting in Bonn, ahead of the secretary-general’s September summit.

That New York meeting is meant to begin pushing countries to strengthen their commitments for tackling climate change up to 2030 and come out with plans for 2050, as the Paris Agreement calls on them to do by 2020. Cop26 will be the final stage for those changes – requiring heavy diplomatic muscle from its presidency.

“Cop26 in 2020 will be a pivotal moment to encourage and take stock of global ambition and prepare the ground for further action,” UK energy and clean growth minister Claire Perry said in a statement to the UN’s climate change secretariat in January. “It is for that reason that the UK expressed interest in hosting Cop26, continuing to show our global leadership in climate action. However, we note the interest of other countries and will engage with them on this matter.”

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Italy first floated the idea of hosting under the previous Democratic Party-led government early last year.

The country’s environment ministry is now run by the 5 Star Movement, which tends to advocate for stronger environmental and climate change measures.

The League has largely stayed out of environmental policy since the coalition government took over a year ago, except in supporting a controversial gas pipeline and other infrastructure projects. However, its European Parliament members – including now-party leader and interior minister Matteo Salvini – voted against ratifying the Paris accord in 2016.

A fight is also brewing over where the summit would be held in Italy.

The northern region of Lombardy, which includes Milan, wrote a letter to the government asking to be considered, even though environment minister Sergio Costa has mentioned his home city of Naples, the newspaper Il Denaro reported in February. Milan hosted the Cop9 in 2003, and was the Democratic Party’s preferred location.

The regional group is expected to decide on the winner later this year, either at talks in Bonn or at the Cop25 summit in Chile.

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UK environment policy is devolved to the Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish governments. The UK government’s draft Environment Bill is therefore limited to England – and risks leading to diverging rules and regulatory gaps once Britain leaves the European Union.

To avoid protection gaps, Northern Ireland has asked to be part of the bill, and is now talking to the UK government about how to apply it, according to a letter published by the House of Commons’ Environmental Audit Committee on Friday.

The decision was based on concerns that Northern Ireland’s environmental protections would otherwise be weakened after Brexit, Northern Ireland’s permanent secretary for the environment Denis McMahon wrote. It would not be possible for Northern Ireland to fill those regulatory gaps with its own legislation because it has not had a sitting assembly since 2017, he added.

However, applying the environment law to Northern Ireland presents new complications: how to regulate free flowing air and water pollutants across a land border with the EU, and how to manage protected sites now shared between Northern Ireland and Ireland, the letter noted.

Belfast and London are looking at how these issues would affect the remit of the new watchdog, known as the Office for Environmental Protection.

The answer, according to Labour MP Mary Creagh, is a softer Brexit.

Adding Northern Ireland to the environment regime may require the rest of the UK to keep regulatory alignment with the EU under the Irish backstop arrangement – “effectively requiring the whole of the UK to stay within a customs union and single market”, said Creagh, chair of the Environmental Audit Committee.

However, there are still concerns that environmental protections in Scotland and Wales will diverge if London presses ahead with its Environment Bill rather than building a system with the devolved governments. Scotland opened a consultation on how to maintain environmental governance after Brexit in February, which closes in May, and Wales is expected to start one later this month.

 “It creates an anomaly for Scotland in terms of animal and plant protection and highlights the importance of our recommendations that the Office for Environmental Protection must be co-designed and co-owned by all the nations of the UK in order to be more resilient, independent and effective,” Creagh said.

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As a prominent advocate for leaving the European Union, Gove has long argued that Brexit will allow the UK to strengthen its environmental protections and set policies more effectively.

But when it comes to the commission’s role in making sure governments fulfil policies, the “easily understandable process” in Brussels sets a good example for Britain’s Environment Bill, he told the House of Commons’ Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee.

“There are lots of other things where we wish to do things differently,” Gove said. “But given that we will have had a degree of confidence in the process – whereby the commission can give an opinion and then if necessary go with infraction proceedings – people have a high degree of confidence that – whatever else are the defects of the EU – that is a good working model. And therefore we’ve sought to replicate it.”

The same goes for the government’s plan to establish environmental principles to guide policymaking.

The treaty that created the EU includes commitments to, for example, ensure that a polluter always pays. Legal experts told MPs last week that the UK’s draft would create loopholes for lawmakers to avoid following them.

Environmental advocates, MPs, the National Audit Office and others have expressed concerns that the draft Environment Bill fails to give the watchdog enough independence and power to hold the government to account for its shortfalls.

In response to criticism, Gove said repeatedly on Wednesday that his department is still “open to suggestions” and “open-minded” as it prepares to release the final version this year.

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Plan B and 11 Brits lodged the case in December 2017, seeking to compel business, energy and industrial strategy secretary Greg Clark to raise the country’s target for cutting emissions by mid-century.

The plaintiffs were appealing the High Court’s decision in July not to hold a full hearing of the case. The Court of Appeals, however, sided with the High Court, saying there was “no compelling reason” why it should hear it.

Previously: UK judge postpones decision on landmark climate case 

While Plan B said it was disappointed with the ruling, it claimed in a statement on Tuesday that the legal action played a role in pushing the UK government to revisit its 2050 climate goal. Last year, the government asked the independent Committee on Climate Change to review the 2050 goal in light of the Paris Agreement’s second aim to limit the global temperature rise to 1.5C.

“That review is now well underway, and what matters is that the committee recommends a bold and ambitious target on the basis of the science and the precautionary principle,” said Tim Crosland, director Plan B.

Sadly, the Court of Appeal has refused our appeal for a full hearing for our 2050 Target case:https://t.co/0rI3YfxjZS

What matters now is that the @theCCCuk recommends to Government the urgent and radical programme of emissions reduction mandated by the IPCC.#RebelForLife

— Plan B Earth (@PlanB_earth) January 29, 2019

In its appeal, Plan B and the plaintiffs argued that the High Court judge had “misunderstood” the Paris Agreement and was wrong to accept the government’s argument that it embodies two goals, “when in truth there is only one target.” The 2015 accord aims to limit the temperature rise to well below 2C and “pursue efforts” for 1.5C.

They also said the judge should not have refused permission to bring proceedings when the issues at stake are “of the widest public importance”.

The appeal court decided these arguments had no prospect of success.

This is one of a growing number of cases in which civil society and individuals are challenging government policies on climate change. The Irish High Court heard arguments last week on an NGO’s case over the country’s plan for limiting emissions, while the European General Court has said it will hear a case over the EU’s 2030 targets.

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The question of how the rules underpinning the Paris climate agreement will apply to developed and developing countries remains one of the biggest sticking points after nearly two weeks of negotiations in Katowice, Poland.

The European Union – along with the US and other rich nations – has been lobbying China to back a flexible system that gives poorer countries time to comply with a set of rules that will govern how countries cut carbon.

Xie Zhenhua, China’s special representative on climate change, suggested on Thursday that the country was on board – as long as the developed side helps out.

“Developing countries also have varied levels of capabilities,” Xie told reporters. “Some might need greater flexibilities, while others could voluntarily do more and accept uniform standards. With more support given to them and enhanced capabilities for these developing countries, they will be able to meet their requirements earlier and faster.”

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The EU is willing to make it voluntary, so countries can choose when to join, as long as there is a clear deadline by which everyone must comply, a developed country negotiator following the talks said. “But we would expect China to start from the beginning.”

The EU and China are hastily drafting new proposals on parts of the “rulebook” under negotiation, at the request of UN secretary general António Guterres on Wednesday, according to the negotiator. As well as the system for ensuring transparency in climate action, they’re discussing rules on financial aid and the scope of national pledges. They plan to deliver the proposals to the Cop24 summit’s Polish presidency so it can incorporate them into a draft of the entire text, which is due Friday.

Guterres flew to Katowice on Wednesday, amid concerns that the Polish presidency was dragging its feet and political leadership was lacking. He met representatives from Poland, China, the European Commission, India, Canada, Brazil, South Africa and the bloc of developing countries known as the G77 plus China. The secretary general is expected to return on Friday, when the conference is due to end.

After agreeing to work with China, the EU also held a series of meetings on Wednesday and Thursday to shore up support for its flexible system of applying the rules. Those included Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the US, Mexico, Japan, Switzerland, Norway and some African, Caribbean and Pacific countries, the developed country negotiator said.

The aim: “To have a critical mass of developed and developing countries, to support one system of transparency when we go to the plenary on Friday.”

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The way the rules are applied to countries could determine how effective they are in making sure countries fulfil their pledges under the Paris climate agreement. Loose requirements for tracking and reporting greenhouse gas emissions, for example, will make it difficult to assess progress or pick out the laggards.

Xie’s comments on Thursday broke away from China’s traditional allies: Brazil, South Africa and India. This group – known as the Basic group of emerging economies – had to date been the loudest in demanding a clearer division of labour, or bifurcation.

“There has to be some degree of flexibility – a reassertion of the differentiated approach, if you like – and the allowance made for developing countries,” South African tourism minister Tokozile Xasa said in a press conference on Wednesday. The push for “equal treatment” from some countries would represent a backslide on the Paris Agreement, which recognises the differences in capabilities, Xasa added.

A US state department spokesperson declined to comment on the kind of system it would support.

A burst of shuttle diplomacy on Thursday came amid deepening concern about the progress of negotiations. Many expect the summit to run over into the weekend. Poland’s Cop24 president, Michał Kurtyka, made a plea to ministers on Thursday afternoon, after hearing a stocktake of their progress on specific pieces of the text.

“I ask you to move forward as soon as possible… so we can achieve a meaningful outcome tonight,” he said. “We do not have the comfort of time, but we have the will and we have the power to achieve an outcome here in Katowice.”  

The main concern for negotiators was that Poland had yet to deliver a full draft of the rules – making it hard for ministers to decide where they were willing to make trade-offs. Plus, many of the open questions were still extremely complex. “There are risks around ministers dealing with technical issues; that things could be weakened if they haven’t been fully briefed,” a British source said. “So we’re not there yet.”

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By holding this year’s UN climate negotiations in Katowice, a city in the coal mining region of Upper Silesia, the Polish government put the spotlight on its call for a “just transition” for industrial workers who risk losing their jobs with the shift to cleaner energy and operations.

“‘Solidarity’ and ‘just transition’ – the language is key to making acceptable [climate policy],” Polish president Andrzej Duda said in a speech to the plenary on Monday.

“One of the challenges we have to face and continue to face is how to reconcile economic growth with taking care of the environment,” he added later. “The choice we are making is not between jobs and the natural environment but whether we are going to keep both or none of them.”

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The Polish government also launched a European Union-backed declaration on Monday calling to support regions and cities like Katowice that will be affected by the shift away from fossil fuels. International union groups welcomed the message.

The new summit presidency’s comments stood in sharp contrast to speeches from the small island countries, whose leaders stressed that their people are already suffering – not from climate action, but inaction.

“We should not only have a just transition for those workers, regions and economies affected by the move from dirty energy to clean energy, we must have a just transition for all – and especially the most climate vulnerable,” said Fijian prime minister Frank Bainimarama, who presided over last year’s Cop23 summit in Bonn, Germany.

The leaders’ speeches kicked off two weeks of intensive negotiations over rules to make sure countries meet their pledges under the 2015 Paris climate agreement. The strength of the rules will largely determine how the political goals set in Paris are actually implemented – making Katowice the perfect setting to highlight the challenge of maintaining economic growth while shifting away from old, polluting industries.

CopCast: Episode one – What are we doing in Katowice?

Throughout the next two weeks, we’ll be starting the morning with the news that is driving the day and guests to explain what is happening inside the room and out of it.

Sara Stefanini and Karl Mathiesen caught up on Sunday evening for our very first episode. Follow us on Soundcloud and please share, share, share!

Katowice was home to as many as 14 coal mines in the 1980s, and two now. The Cop24 conference centre sits next door to one of the shuttered mines, which has been converted into a museum.

But Katowice is also “one of the greenest cities in Poland”, with forests covering more than 40% of its area, Duda said. The modernisation of plants is leading to “environmental improvements”, without disrupting energy security.

The city’s remaining coal workers “need reassurance they are along for the transition”, said Michał Kurtyka, Poland’s Cop24 president. “They need rules – transparent, implementable – and a system of support for the role they are asked to take.”

While the rulebook will be crucial to monitoring progress towards the Paris goals, some countries want the Cop24 to also set the scene for all parties to raise their commitments by 2020. Current pledges would only limit global warming by 3-4C by 2100; the Paris accord calls for well below 2C, and ideally 1.5C.

Duda made little mention of the discussions due to be held in Katowice, although Polish environment minister Henryk Kowalczyk said the summit will “take stock of all the wealth of views, expectations and proposals for action”.

But it was the small island countries that put the strongest emphasis on increasing efforts.

“It is essential that the contributions presented in 2020 significantly raise the bar of ambition,” said Baron Divavesi Waqa, president of Nauru, in Micronesia. “After a quarter century of negotiations we are further away from our goal of stabilising greenhouse gas emissions than we have ever been. I will resist the temptation to brand our efforts a dramatic failure.”

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The draft withdrawal agreement, agreed by the EU and backed by the Theresa May’s cabinet on Wednesday night, ensures the UK’s environmental laws, regulations and practices do not fall below continental standards at the end of the Brexit transition period in 2021. It also says the UK will create a “transparent system” with an independent body in charge of monitoring, reporting, oversight and enforcement of the environmental standards.

Those includes measures to tackle climate change, limit air and industrial emissions, conserve nature and biodiversity, manage waste and dispose of chemical substances.

But the deal would not guarantee the standards remain in sync after the divorce – meaning the UK could fall behind future EU policies after it leaves, Labour’s Brexit shadow secretary Keir Starmer told BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme on Thursday.

“It’s a non-regression clause – in other words you can’t take away what you’ve got now. It certainly isn’t a clause that keeps us up-to-date with standards as they evolve in Europe,” Starmer said.

Under the draft withdrawal agreement, the UK is only required to adopt the EU’s existing package of clean energy and climate change policies, which extend to 2030, said Chaitanya Kumar, a senior policy advisor at the Green Alliance think-tank.

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The government plans to create an environment watchdog, replacing the EU’s role in making sure member countries meet their commitments. But proposals for the agency earlier this year drew criticism for excluding oversight of climate change policies.

Britain’s greenhouse gas emissions targets are already locked in national law, and set higher than the EU’s reduction goals. Yet around 55% of the rules designed to make sure the goals are met, such as targets for adding renewable energy and improving efficiency, are covered by EU law, rather than national, according to the UK’s independent advisory Committee on Climate Change.

“The pre-emptive measure is to make sure the watchdog has oversight of UK climate law,” Kumar said.

That said, the fact that the draft mentions climate change in its list of environmental protections suggests the government will have to include it in the new watchdog’s role, said Liberal Democrat Lord Robin Teverson.

“This, to me, requires it,” Teverson told Climate Home News on Wednesday. “Although it’s not perfect … hopefully that would at least put some pressure on the government to make a system that has rather more teeth than it would perhaps want it to have.”

The draft deal would also make sure the UK has a carbon pricing scheme that is “of at least the same effectiveness and scope” as the EU’s emissions trading system, without making clear whether the country would leave the bloc-wide market.

In an outline of a political declaration on the future EU-UK relationship, Britain said it would consider the potential for linking a national emissions trading market to the EU’s. The UK government has been weighing different options for pricing carbon emissions after Brexit, including creating a national market and possibly linking it to the EU’s, or setting a domestic carbon tax.

Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro is the environmental story of 2018.

No-one is better positioned than CHN’s Fabiano Maisonnave to cover the impact of his presidency on the world’s most important forest. We are the only international news site with a correspondent living in the heart of the Amazon. You can read some of the great reporting Fabiano has already done for us here.

We know we need to keep on this story, but after a huge 2018 and with the biggest UNFCCC talks in years approaching, our resources are really stretched. Please help us to keep Fabiano writing by making a small donation through our Patreon account.

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Clean growth and energy minister Claire Perry appeared before a House of Lords committee last month to talk about the impact of an abrupt exit on the UK’s energy supplies, carbon pricing and research for energy innovation.

But her answers were incomplete, Liberal Democrat Lord Robin Teverson, chair of the sub-committee on EU energy and environment, said in a letter to Perry published on Wednesday.

The UK government has made clear that a no-deal departure would pull the country out of the European Union’s internal energy market, with which it shares electricity and gas interconnectors. Asked how this would affect consumer energy prices, however, Perry failed to answer, Teverson wrote.

“We are disappointed that you were not able to respond on this issue, and we are concerned that the government may be making decisions without having fully considered their potential impact on consumers,” he said. “We therefore restate the question.”

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Similarly, Perry failed to provide “concrete information” on the progress in talks between London, Dublin and the European Commission to ensure that the single electricity market on the island of Ireland remains intact even without a withdrawal agreement, the letter stated.

Instead, she said only that there is “a growing sense of confidence that that market will be maintained”.

The government’s intention to maintain the Irish single market, however, could be complicated by its separate plan to impose a national carbon emissions tax on Northern Ireland, the letter noted.

Northern Ireland is currently exempt from the UK’s floor price of CO2 emitted from power plants, because it would otherwise distort prices on a market shared with the Republic of Ireland. But if the UK leaves the EU’s emissions trading system (ETS), the government plans to immediately replace the carbon market price with a tax.

“You yourself acknowledged that ‘there is an argument that carbon pricing would hinder, in the short to medium term, the effective functioning of that market,'” Teverson said. Perry’s comment, that the issue will need to be considered, is not satisfactory, he said, asking for clarification.

Brexit: What it means for UK-EU energy trade

The House of Lords committee also wants more answers on how an abrupt departure from the EU ETS would affect carbon pricing in the country and on the continent.

The government said in its 2018 budget late last month that it would immediately impose a domestic tax of £16 per tonne on CO2 emitted from all stationary installations that currently trade on the EU market. “On what basis was that value selected?” Teverson asked. “And is there any intention for it to be adjusted over time to mirror the EU ETS carbon price?”

He also expressed concerns about a letter the Scottish and Welsh governments wrote to London in October, saying they would object to replacing a carbon market with a tax and asking for ministerial talks.

“This disregard strikes us as extremely concerning,” Teverson said, and asked if further discussions with Cardiff, Edinburgh and Belfast have taken place and whether there is progress on reaching a deal. Jonathan Holyoak, Perry’s director of EU energy and climate change, told the committee during the hearing that business, energy and industrial strategy department had discussed the issue with the devolved governments.

Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro is the environmental story of 2018.

No-one is better positioned than CHN’s Fabiano Maisonnave to cover the impact of his presidency on the world’s most important forest. We are the only international news site with a correspondent living in the heart of the Amazon. You can read some of the great reporting Fabiano has already done for us here.

We know we need to keep on this story, but after a huge 2018 and with the biggest UNFCCC talks in years approaching, our resources are really stretched. Please help us to keep Fabiano writing by making a small donation through our Patreon account.

The department is currently working on 73 exit issues, of which one of the trickiest is preparations for leaving the EU’s internal energy market, Perry said during the hearing. While British regulators and operators can prepare new UK access rules to make sure trading continues despite a no-deal exit, it is up to other countries to set rules on their side, she said.

Prime minister Theresa May is meeting with cabinet ministers on Wednesday evening to discuss a Brexit withdrawal agreement reached on Tuesday. However, it still faces strong opposition from both the leave and remain sides of the parliament.

Climate Home News’ reporting on Brexit is supported by a grant from the European Climate Foundation. Please read our editorial guidelines for more details.

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The new national strategy to combat imported deforestation, released by the environment ministry on Wednesday, will use trade to help decouple economic development from tree-cutting and unsustainable agriculture in poorer countries.

France also plans to help companies meet their own goals for combatting the import of products linked to deforestation, and encourage financiers to take environmental and social issues into account for investment decisions.

Europe’s imports of agricultural products – ranging from beef and soybeans from Latin America, to palm oil from southeast Asia, to cocoa from Africa – are responsible for more than a third of deforestation, according to the French strategy.

“The EU, a major global economic player, bears an important responsibility to set an example,” it stated. The European Union, as well as France, therefore should “rapidly” adopt measures to reduce the impact of their consumption on deforestation.

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The European Commission is under growing pressure from some EU capitals, European Parliament members and civil society to address the bloc’s contribution to deforestation in other countries.

“The EU and others need to follow suit, because France can’t tackle deforestation alone,” Nicole Polsterer, campaigner at the Brussels-based environmental NGO Fern, said on Wednesday. “Only the European Commission can ensure that all member states’ trade is free from violations of land tenure rights and deforestation.”

France, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, the UK, Denmark and Norway sent a letter to EU commissioners earlier this month asking them to come up with a bloc-wide action plan to combat deforestation, based on a feasibility study the commission published in March.

The French strategy also comes amid growing concern about rising deforestation in the world’s largest tropical rainforest – the Amazon – following Brazil’s election of Jair Bolsonaro. Deforestation in the Amazon jumped by nearly 50% during the three-month presidential election season, according to preliminary figures. The incoming president has talked about putting a highway through the forest and weakening environmental laws in favour of farmers and loggers.

Polsterer argued in Climate Home News during Brazil’s election campaign that the best way for the EU to resist Bolsonaro’s impact would be through trade. The EU is the largest foreign investor in Brazil and its second-largest trading partner, with a share of 18.3%, she said.

Forests shelter more than 75% of the world’s biodiversity, absorb climate-warming carbon dioxide emissions and help protect soil and freshwater, said the French strategy. Global forest cover shrunk by 129 million hectares, or twice the size of France, between 1990 and 2015, it said, citing the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation.

Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro is the environmental story of 2018.

No-one is better positioned than CHN’s Fabiano Maisonnave to cover the impact of his presidency on the world’s most important forest. We are the only international news site with a correspondent living in the heart of the Amazon. You can read some of the great reporting Fabiano has already done for us here.

We know we need to keep on this story, but after a huge 2018 and with the biggest UNFCCC talks in years approaching, our resources are really stretched. Please help us to keep Fabiano writing by making a small donation through our Patreon account.

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If Britain leaves without a withdrawal deal on 29 March, imports and exports of power and gas will cease to be governed by EU trading rules. While energy is highly unlikely to stop flowing, it could make trade slower and more expensive.

Britain shares power links with France, the Netherlands, Ireland and Northern Ireland, with more in planning stages. British regulators are working with electricity interconnector operators to make sure that new UK access rules for trading are approved by the time Britain leaves the EU, added Jonathan Holyoak, director of EU energy and climate change at the business, energy and industrial strategy department (Beis).

It is up to the EU to prepare rules on their side, but it’s in their interest to make sure trade can be as efficient as possible if there is no divorce deal, he and Perry told a House of Lords’ subcommittee.

“The French like it because they are exporting their nuclear power to us, and they don’t have anywhere else to send it – they send it to Germany, but no one’s allowed to know that,” Perry said. “There is a strong commercial reason to keep these flows.”

Brexit: What it means for UK-EU energy trade

Perry told the subcommittee that Beis was handling 73 EU exit issues. The minster said three of those were currently “off-track” – including issues relating to the single energy market the European Union’s global satellite navigation system Galileo.

“The thing that’s tricky is the single energy market, and partly I think because of the dependence on other countries,” she said. Still, she stressed that the energy supply taps will not be shut off.

Brexit is particularly concerning for the two Irish countries, which share a single power market. The republic also relies on the UK for gas supplies and emergency oil stocks.

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Perry was more confident about no-deal preparations for leaving the EU’s emissions trading system (ETS), even though it would lead to an immediate break with the market.

The UK government said earlier this month that it would immediately replace the European carbon price with a tax, and will provide more details in the 2018 budget announcement on Monday.

Backlash to a tax from Scotland and Wales, which have devolved powers over environmental policy, was not “quite fair,” Perry said. “Ultimately, we’re trying to maintain a very strong price signal for carbon reduction, and we’re trying to do something that replaces an EU ETS market that we have been told we would have to leave in the event of a no deal.”

Climate Home News’ reporting on Brexit is supported by a grant from the European Climate Foundation. Please read our editorial guidelines for more details.

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Last month, Simon Blevins, Richard Roberts and Rich Loizou were handed 15-16 month sentences for their role in a July 2017 blockade on a drilling site in Lancashire.

According to the Guardian, the lord chief justice Ian Burnett said: “We have concluded that an immediate custodial sentence in the case of these defendants was manifestly excessive.

“In our judgment the appropriate sentence was a community order with a significant requirement of unpaid work. But these appellants have been in custody now for two weeks, the equivalent of a six-week prison sentence. As a result, and only for that reason, we’ve concluded that the only appropriate sentence is a conditional discharge.”

Emma Norton, head of legal casework at Liberty, which made written submissions to the appeal, said: “When people break the law, they rightly expect to face fair consequences, but the disproportionate punishment of peaceful protesters betrays our values as an open society where we can stand up to power, and risks deterring people from exercising their right to dissent.”

UK anti-fracking protestors jailed over blockade

Onshore gas company Cuadrilla started operations at the same site on Monday, in the face of fresh protests.

In a statement from Preston prison, the three appellants said: “The fracking industry threatens to industrialise our beautiful countryside. It will force famine, flooding and many other disasters on the world’s most vulnerable communities by exacerbating climate change. Fracking is beginning right now. So there has never been a more critical moment to take action. Your planet needs you.”

Cuadrilla declined to comment for this story. On Monday, CEO Francis Egan announced the company was moving into the final stage of assessing the reserves beneath the Lancashire site: “If commercially recoverable this will displace costly imported gas, with lower emissions, significant economic benefit and better security of energy supply for the UK.”

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn welcomed the ruling. “We stand in solidarity with the activists and thank them for standing up to the further destruction of our environment by this Tory government. When Labour gets into government we will ban fracking,” he said.

On Monday, energy minister Claire Perry told Climate Home News: ““I strongly believe that gas is absolutely part of our future.” She added that fracking the country’s domestic resources was preferable to imports.

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Speaking at a town hall event in Bali, Jim Yong Kim was asked by civil society representatives from Kosovo whether the bank was still considering guaranteeing loans to the plant.

“On the Balkans, yes, we have made a very firm decision not to go forward with the coal power plant,” he said.

Climate Home News reported in June that World Bank officials had met minister of economic development Valdrin Lluka, amid rumours that a bank review had rejected the project on the grounds that there were cheaper options to solve Kosovo’s energy crisis.

On Wednesday, Kim said: “We are required by our by-laws to go with the lowest cost option and renewables have now come below the cost of coal. So without question, we are not going to [support the plant].”

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In 2015, the Kosovo government announced that it had signed an agreement with the World Bank and US company ContourGlobal to build the new station.

It is unclear what the withdrawal of the bank’s guarantee means for the financing of the project, which has long been a centrepiece infrastructure project for the Kosovo government.

In a statement last month, Kosovo prime minister Ramush Haradinaj said construction was likely to begin early next year. Lluka and ContourGlobal did not immediately return requests for comment.

Dajana Berisha, founding member of the Kosovo Civil Society Consortium for Sustainable Development (Kosid) said: “We’re happy that our efforts, work has been proven to be right. But now another battle will probably begin, because we don’t know whether the government will continue searching for other investors to come and support the project.”

In 2013 World Bank revised its lending policies to rule out new coal projects, except in “exceptional circumstances”. Kosovo e Re has been the only coal project for which the bank has been considering support.

Years of war and slow reconstruction have left Kosovo with a power sector based entirely on the tiny country’s abundant lignite resource. Two Tito-era power stations, just outside the capital Prishtina, are notorious for breakdowns, black outs and air pollution.

In September, Joseph Brandt, founder and CEO of ContourGlobal, announced several bids for contracts to build and operate the plant. He said it was “crucial to the future of Kosovo’s energy supply”.

The World Bank’s involvement in the coal sector in Kosovo has been controversial. In 2016, CHN reported on leaked internal documents that found the bank had breached its own rules when villagers were forced from their homes to make way for a coal mine expansion.

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“I agree with our energy commissioner’s analysis of the CO2 emissions cut for 2030,” Juncker said in his final State of the EU address at the European Parliament in Strasbourg. “They’re scientifically right and politically necessary.”

However he did not mention the proposed numbers, or give any preview of the European Commission’s forthcoming draft climate strategy for 2050.

Miguel Arias Cañete, the climate action and energy commissioner, said in June that the European Union would begin the process of upping the bloc’s existing goal to reduce emissions by at least 40% compared to 1990 levels.

“We as Europeans want to leave a cleaner planet for future generations,” Juncker said. “The terrible events of this summer have brought home — not just to farmers — the importance of our efforts to safeguard the future of our coming generations.”

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The EU’s 40% target was agreed in 2014, a year before the Paris Agreement, and was intended to align with a 2C global warming limit. As the world’s third-largest emitter, Europe is under international pressure to hike its targets for 2030 and 2050, to match the Paris deal’s stretch goal of holding the temperature rise to 1.5C.

Arias Cañete argued that the bloc’s newly agreed measures for boosting clean energy and efficiency between 2021 and 2030 allow for a higher emissions reduction target.

But there is still resistance from some member countries. Poland, which presides over this year’s Cop24 summit, has said that the EU should focus on meeting the existing measures first. German chancellor Angela Merkel also expressed displeasure on ARD public television in August.

“At the moment I am not very happy regarding these new proposals since many member states are already today failing to comply with what they promised — and people are not going to accept that,” she said, as reported by Politico.

Juncker hinted at the opposition: “Some may choose to ignore the climate challenge and look the other way,” he said. “We in the commission and you in parliament must look to the future.”

He also argued that the EU needs to take firm action to ban single-use plastics, rather than simply showing “good intention,” in order to win public trust ahead of the European elections next year.

Environmental advocates were hoping Juncker would give an update on the commission’s 2050 strategy proposal and express support for a goal that fits with a temperature limit of 1.5C.

“Juncker rightly recognised the damage that climate change is already inflicting on European citizens,” tweeted Jonathan Gaventa, director at the environmental think-tank E3G. “But while climate was a theme in the speech, it is notably absent from the deluge of @EU_Commission press releases with new announcements.”

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“We have to get out of the religious war [against nuclear power],” de Rugy said in an interview with Le Monde published on Monday. “The important thing is to know what the economic data is in the nuclear sector and in the field of renewable energies. And to know what the safety data is. Nuclear risk is not a small risk that can be brushed away.”

France’s previous government set a goal in 2015 to reduce the share of nuclear in the country’s electricity mix from 75% to 50% by 2025, while raising the portion of renewable energy to 50%. However, president Emmanuel Macron’s government decided to drop the target last year. Then-environment minister Nicolas Hulot said it was not realistic, while prime minister Edouard Phillipe suggested it could be delayed to 2035.

Asked if a 2035 target is achievable, de Rugy backed away from setting a clear date. “The multi-annual energy programme to be presented at the end of October must find the way to achieve this balance between 50% nuclear and 50% renewable energy in the best possible timeframe,” he told the French newspaper.

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Contrasting sharply with Hulot, De Rugy sought to present himself as a pragmatic player who sees the potential for spearheading a green transition within the current economic model — and economic restraints.

“I don’t want the idea to be spread that ecology is always about more spending,” de Rugy said. “I have read calls from economists explaining that hundreds of billions of dollars must be mobilised. If that is the case, we will not succeed, because we know the budgetary equations.”

Ecology can also work hand-in-hand with economics and save money, he added.

Hulot, by contrast, slammed “the pursuit of growth at all costs” when he unexpectedly quit on live radio last month. “We strive to maintain if not to revive a market economic model that is the cause of all our disorders,” Hulot told national radio station France Inter.

Hulot’s resignation was prompted by the presence of hunting lobbyist Thierry Coste at a ministerial meeting.

De Rugy attempted to de-dramatise the role of lobbies in policymaking. “I prefer lobbies to act with their faces uncovered,” he said. “Their constraints can be taken into account, but without deviating from the objective of change.”

In his new role, De Rugy said he wants to concentrate on enabling “the renovation of existing buildings” and investment in “everyday transport rather than new infrastructure”.

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Analysis of Department for International Development (Dfid) data by Climate Home News found 77% of that went to just five large British or Dutch firms – Adam Smith International (ASI), KPMG, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), IMC Worldwide and Crown Agents.

A large part of the UK’s international climate finance programme between April 2011 and June 2018 was administered by Dfid. The department spent £8.4 billion on 251 projects in that time.

In response to questions, Dfid told CHN that £3.9bn was spent specifically on efforts to address climate change, with £472m, 12% of the total, spent through consulting firms.

The stated purpose of the programme is to support international poverty reduction by helping developing countries adapt to climate change. Most is disbursed by aid and non-governmental organisations, such as the UN, Oxfam and the World Health Organization.

CHN drew its data from transactions listed on Dfid’s development tracker webpage, the UK’s aid spend on climate was previously mapped by Carbon Brief.

Experts said the reliance on consultants had grown due to Conservative government public spending cuts and raised concerns about “recycling” aid money back into rich countries and undermining the development of expertise in poor countries.

Dfid does not publish how much UK aid money the companies retain as fees for their services. Neither the department, nor any consultancies, would share this information with CHN.

An ex-Deloitte consultant told CHN a consultant typically charges between £500 and £1,500 a day. “They wouldn’t do it if there wasn’t a profit to be made,” they said. Deloitte has received £236,633 from Dfid since April 2011. The figure for the day rate was backed up by another industry source.

In 2012 evidence to the select committee on international development, ASI said the day rates it charged Dfid were “generally in the £400 to £850 range, with only a few outliers”.

View: All of CHN’s data from the Dfid development tracker website

Dfid uses aid contractors because they “play an important role in development work when they deliver well. They provide specialist expertise, flexibility and deliver UK aid’s life-changing work in some of the most fragile and dangerous places in the world,” a department spokesperson said.

But when money is spent on western consultants, it keeps it out of the country in need, said Saleemul Huq, a senior climate change fellow at the International Institute for Environment and Development.

“A significant amount comes through the provision of the consultants, who are very expensive, so the money remains in the developed country,” Huq said. “Consultancies themselves are not bad, it’s about how they are used and what they are used for.”

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Joe Thwaites, at the World Resources Institute’s Sustainable Finance Center, said on-the-ground ownership led to better results. “A lot of the literature on aid effectiveness recognizes that development projects are more likely to be successful if there is local ownership, and this includes hiring local staff,” he told CHN.

“Direct access can help build up the capacity of local institutions to design and implement their own projects, drawing on local knowledge and expertise to tailor solutions to the specific needs of the community in question,” Thwaites added.

Frank Rijsberman, director general of the Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI) said that globally there was a strong trend away from using western consultants. Experts working for their own governments were “much more credible”, he said.

The role of consultants in UK climate aid reflects a wider trend of austerity-driven public spending, according to Rijsberman.

“Under David Cameron, there was growth of the development budget, but stoppage on the number of staff. Meaning Dfid is lean and mean, but the work still has to be done and it tends to be done by others,” said Rijsberman.

All donor countries used consultants to deliver projects, he said, but because of the UK government’s push to cut public sector jobs, Dfid had “very few in-house technical experts”, leading it to rely on consultants “somewhat more than other aid agencies”. Dfid disputed this, saying the number of full time equivalent staff had grown since 2011.

KPMG, IMC Worldwide, McKinsey and Deloitte all declined to comment on this story.

Analysis: 8 takeaways from the Green Climate Fund meltdown

ASI, received the most Dfid climate cash, more than £226 million. Alex Ephinstone, who directed the Climate Smart in Africa programme for ASI, said: “We do present a good value for money”, adding that the figure quoted by CHN “looked high”.

A PwC spokesperson said the £118m it received included all the funds the company disbursed on behalf on Dfid: “Our work for Dfid involves designing services and organising third parties to provide services. We disburse the funds for technical assistance work, or grants to NGOs and research institutions.”

Climate Home News has previously received Dfid funding for reporting projects in Africa and Asia. Those projects were administered by PwC consultants.

A spokesperson for Crown Agents, which received £93.5m, said that the company had performed a banking service for Dfid.

“If that figure is correct the vast majority of this money was for disbursement through Crown Agents Bank to other agencies. It would therefore not be accurate to compare this sum with sums of money spent on programmatic activities by other suppliers,” the said.

In terms of actual project funding, they said, “I would say it is comfortably under £10 million”, adding “we are a not-for-profit organisation”.

A former senior partner at McKinsey, a consultancy that received £108,135 from Dfid, told CHN climate change was a “top three urgent challenge to restructure the international economy” on which “the government should look to get the best possible advice”.

In 2016, the Times of London accused Dfid of lacking the systems to properly assess the performance of consultants. Rijsberman’s GGGI receives Dfid funding to support a programme of in-country advisors who sit within government.

He said: “I don’t know another aid agency that as carefully and as quantitatively goes through all the agreements and scores the performance of contractors.” He said the outcome of these checks was clearly linked to future funding.

Dfid said: “We expect our suppliers to be transparent in their costs, adhere to the highest standards to achieve the best results for the world’s poorest and value for money for the British taxpayer. Dfid has made progress on improving value from contractors and controls the costs associated with contracts.”

A spokesperson for Oxford Policy Management, which was contracted to deliver climate projects in South Asia, said Dfid had created a market with 200 service suppliers vying for contracts.

“This competition drives costs down, and increases innovation and value for money,” they said.

But developing country governments question the way value for money is assessed. Gebru Jember Endalew, an Ethiopian government official and chair of the Least Developed Countries (LDC) group, said recipient countries should be the ones to identify their needs and priorities.

“[Using consultants] is not only a way of recycling finance; it also undermines the capacity development in poor countries,” said Chukwumerije Okereke, geography and environmental science professor at Reading University.

Dfid and consultancies argue that some governments lack the expertise to deliver complex projects. Okereke said that claim had some grounds. But at the same time, he said, it “shows that decades of so-called concerted effort in capacity building has not worked”.

Okereke said: “If truly they need the work done to a certain level of standard that can only be achieved by western consultants, why is there not training, mentoring build into such projects so that local capacity can be developed?”

The International Development Committee launched an inquiry into the effectiveness of UK aid in combating climate change in July, which is accepting evidence submissions until September. Findings are expected early next year.

In October 2017, Carbon Brief mapped where UK foreign aid for climate change is spent after obtaining a list of 284 climate finance projects across Dfid (251), Defra (6), and Beis (27). Climate Home News only analysed data from the 251 Dfid projects. A full list of the 79 consultancies and the amount they have received since 2011 can be viewed on a read-only spreadsheet here.

Note: This article was amended to reflect the fact that ASI were found not to have falsified testimony by a parliamentary committee, despite media reports the company called a “fabrication”. The piece also originally said ASI had profited from leaked internal documents, this has been removed.

The article was also amended after Dfid returned to our requests with specific data on the proportion of funding specifically spent on addressing climate change, rather than projects with some element of climate change finance within their budget. We also added a line from Dfid refuting a characterisation of their staffing numbers as depleted.


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In a report, published on Wednesday, the agency suggested climate risks could derail development gains, such as the decrease in infant mortality and the achievement of near universal primary education.

Mourad Wahba, director of UNDP’s regional bureau for Arab States said that the over the past decade cycles of drought, “the frequency and severity of which are beyond anything seen for hundreds of years in the region”, had contributed to “famine and food insecurity, loss of livelihoods and life, and the displacement of millions”.

The report found this could disrupt efforts to bring peace to the region. “Climate change with its direct impact on decreasing water and food security is feeding armed conflict,” the UNDP paper concluded.

The Arab region has 14 of the world’s 20 most water-stressed countries and 90% of the region lies in arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid zones.

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From 2006 to 2011, Somalia suffered a prolonged drought that may have been made more likely by climate change, which led to the displacement of four million people.

Similarly, a drought in Syria from 2006 to 2010, which has been attributed in part to human interference in the climate system, led to a mass migration of 200,000-300,000 people from farmlands to urban centres, according to the UNDP.

Rising levels of conflict across the Middle East and North Africa (Mena) has resulted in it housing the world’s largest population of refugees and displaced people. 

“Security and resources go hand in hand in the Mena region. The uprisings and political instability were mainly to demand equal resources, that includes energy, basically in the form of electricity and water,” Safa Al’ Jayoussi, a climate change expert and environmentalist based in Jordan, told Climate Home News.

“Political leaders in the countries are diving into fossil fuels with all the uncertainty around it and removing subsidies without giving the people any other alternative,” she added.

“In Jordan, especially with the current wave of protests where we went out to the streets calling for solutions to the price hikes, [the government] is still struggling to see the shining future of climate change solutions,” Al’ Jayoussi said.

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The joint statement, adopted at a summit in Beijing, committed the world’s largest and third largest carbon polluters to driving progress in UN climate talks.

They said they would push for agreement on the rulebook of the Paris climate deal, negotiations over which stalled this year, with continuing disagreements between Chinese and European diplomats.

The statement, signed by European Council president Donald Tusk, European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker and Chinese premier Li Keqiang, also included:

• An agreement to release long-term strategies for their low carbon development by 2020
• Agreement to step up their efforts before 2020
• “Triangular” cooperation with developing countries to increase their capacity to combat climate change and build clean energy
• A commitment to exchange knowledge on clean energy and explore the development of interconnecting networks

The statement also called on “all parties” to uphold the Paris deal. That includes Donald Trump’s US, which remains a signatory until 2020.

In the face of US efforts to undermine international cooperation, leaders said the Paris Agreement was “proof that with shared political will and mutual trust, multilateralism can succeed in building fair and effective solutions to the most critical global problems of our time”.

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The climate statement, as the only annex to a memorandum on a wide range of bilateral issues, places global warming at the centre of the complex, often fraught EU-China relationship.

The move, which encouraged climate campaigners around the world, could fill a vacuum left by Trump, said Léa Pilsner, a researcher for E3G based in Brussels.

The statement “enshrines climate change at the heart of the EU-China relationship and shows an intention to jointly drive the global climate governance process forward. At a time when climate leadership is very much needed”, said Pilsner.

German MEP Jo Leinen, who chairs the parliament’s China delegation said the commitment was “a vital message ahead of this year’s climate summit in Poland”. But he said the political deal needed to translate into instructions to climate negotiators to strike a deal.

The statement is almost identical to one drafted, leaked then withdrawn at the meeting between the two powers in June last year.

At that time, a disagreement over trade – reportedly the EU’s unwillingness to recognise China as a market economy – was behind the collapse.

Comment: Fragile China-EU climate pact must be backed by action

“Yes! Finally!” tweeted Isaac Valero, an advisor to the EU’s climate commissioner, calling it “historic” and a “major boost” to the Paris Agreement.

Li Shuo, a Greenpeace East Asia campaigner, told Climate Home News that the 2017 failure had bound trade and climate talks together at the highest level: “No progress on trade, no climate statement.”

One year on, global politics in the form of Trump’s US have brought the two uncomfortable bedfellows closer.

“In light of the trade war from Trump,” said Li. “The EU and China are inclined to project a joint front. Climate is a natural issue for collaboration.”

But Li said the statement shouldn’t just be window dressing and that the countries needed to follow it by updating their pledges to the Paris deal.

Pilsner agreed: “The challenge will be to turn this commitment into actions that get delivered regardless of possible disagreements on other fronts.”

The EU has signalled it may be ready to increase its emissions reduction pledge to the Paris deal. An influential government think tank in China has recommended the country consider a similar move.

Only a few changes were made from the 2017 statement, mostly to respond to subsequent events.

Note: This article was amended to remove a reference to the dropping of the Talanoa dialogue. That phrase appears in the statement.

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The proposal is backed by seven political parties, who between them hold 113 of 150 seats in the Dutch parliament. There will be opportunities for lawmakers to amend the text before it is finalised, likely in 2019.

It would set a 49% greenhouse gas emission reduction target by 2030 compared to 1990 levels and a 95% cut by 2050, with a carbon neutral electricity system.

“The Dutch climate law is groundbreaking for the Netherlands,” said Jesse Klaver, leader of the Green Party. “Today seven parties, with a wide range of political ideologies, agreed on a Dutch climate law, currently the most ambitious climate law in the world.”

Other features include the establishment of an annual “climate day”, when the ministry of energy and climate will give a progress update on achieving the climate targets. From 2019, successive future Dutch governments will be obliged to present updated climate plans every five years.

The targets are based on a 2017 report by the country’s national environment agency. The report warned current and proposed policies in the EU and the Netherlands “will not lead to reductions consistent with the Paris Agreement’s climate objectives”.

Report: Half of member states back stronger EU climate action

Climate change has not always been the country’s top political priority. In 2015, campaign group Urgenda and almost 900 citizens successfully sued the government in the Hague district court for a stronger national 2020 emissions target, subject to an ongoing appeal.

Following an election in 2017, however, the governing coalition parties VVD, CDA, D66 and ChristenUnie agreed to phase out coal and lobby for stronger EU action. Opposition parties SP, GroenLinks, and PvdA also support tighter climate targets.

Urgenda’s legal counsel Dennis van Berkel said the proposal was a “largely symbolic act” that “only ensures that a yearly climate debate is organised which reports on the route towards the 2050 target, but which gives very little assurance that real action is taken”.

“Measures such as the establishment of short and medium-term carbon budgets and the legally binding target for 2030, were all deleted from the initial draft,” he added.

For comparison, other countries with legally mandated 2050 emissions cuts include the UK (80%), France (75%), Mexico (50%) and Finland (80%). Sweden and Norway are set to go carbon neutral by 2045 and 2050 respectively, with some of the obligation to be met by international carbon credits.

The Netherlands is among 14 member states calling for the EU to increase its climate pledge in line with efforts to limit global warming to 1.5C. There will be a political moment for countries to signal their commitment to ambition at the Cop24 summit in Katowice, Poland, this December.

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The EU’s current pledge to the Paris deal is for a cut of “at least 40%”. But after a series of new measures were approved this fortnight, the EU will now cut its emissions by more than 45% below 1990 levels by 2030.

The package of clean energy targets means the EU was able to raise its level of overall ambition, Miguel Arias Cañete, EU commissioner for climate action and energy, told a meeting of climate ministers in Brussels.

That also meant the EU would change its formal pledge to the Paris climate deal, known as a ‘nationally determined contribution’ or NDC, pending approval from the EU council of member states.

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“Both new targets would de facto mean that the European Union would be in a position to raise the level of ambition of the NDC and increase its emissions reduction target from the current 40% to slightly over 45% by 2030,” said Cañete.

A European Commission spokesperson told Climate Home News the NDC would need to be formally changed by the European Council. The commission will ask the council to consider the change after the summer holidays.

The EU, China and Canada are holding ministerial talks, which opened on Wednesday afternoon.

With a stronger RES target (32%) and efficiency target (32.5%) now agreed, the EU is now set to go well beyond 40% GHG cuts by 2030.

The new targets alone should get us to nearly 45%. Factor in accelerated coal phaseout in many EU countries, and the number could be even higher. pic.twitter.com/Hdawg15vT3

— Jonathan Gaventa (@jonathangaventa) June 20, 2018

Cañete noted the EU counted for less than 10% of global carbon emissions and called on all other nations to do more.

He said the change in ambition, spurred as it was by the development of stronger policies on renewable energy and energy efficiency, showed that raising “headline targets” was not always the first step in increasing political will.

“Ambition can emerge from the bottom up: if we strengthen our policies, renewables and energy efficiency in this case, we should be able to achieve deeper cuts in our overall emissions,” he said.

Under the Paris Agreement, all countries submitted voluntary pledges that detailed the efforts they would make to fight climate change.

That process delivered promises to cut carbon that collectively fell far short of the amount needed to keep global warming below 2C, which is the upper limit of the Paris deal.

There is a process for raising ambition, known as ‘ratcheting up’. But countries are not formally required to increase their NDCs until 2025.

The EU move to increase its pledge now may help to build goodwill for the Katowice climate talks this December in Poland. Negotiators are due to finalise the rulebook to govern the Paris deal and take stock of action so far.

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The government of president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, which faces elections this month, plans to massively expand coal power. But just 17% of respondents thought coal power should be used as long as Turkey had coal reserves as opposed to renewable energy sources.

Conducted by climate information hub İklim Haber and research company Konda, the survey suggested a majority of citizens were worried about climate change and don’t have much faith in their government to tackle it.

75% of the 2,595 participants were worried about climate change, while just 8% believed the Turkish government was “strongly likely” to take action against climate change.

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Among supporters of the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP), 16% thought the government was “strongly likely” to take enough climate action.

“In a deeply polarized society, climate change is a thing Turks can agree on,” said Bariş Doğru, chief editor of İklim Haber.

More than 70% of Turkey’s electricity comes from fossil fuels and the government has named coal as its preferred fuel for future plans to meet growing electricity demand.

Erdogan has set about a large expansion of Turkey’s coal sector. Only China, India and Vietnam have more coal power plants in planning than Turkey. The country has also begun construction of its first generation of nuclear power plants.

However, 53.1% of Turks oppose coal power being built near them, while 68.2% oppose nearby nuclear power plants.

Akif Pamuk of the Earth Association, a Turkish NGO, said the social opposition to coal was based on first-hand experience.

“Coal power plants have direct physical and visual impacts on your daily life,” said Pamuk. “These plants have been major polluters in the regions where they were installed since the 1960 and we are running out of time to fix problems they have already caused.”

The survey found that 86% of respondents thought climate change was happening. A higher proportion of Turkish people were “very worried” or “extremely worried” about climate change than the European average.

Both the first round of the presidential race and elections for the general assembly are scheduled in the country for 24 June.

According to Doğru, reports show that meteorological disasters, such as floods and heat waves, are increasing in Turkey. But climate change has not been a priority topic during the election campaign.

“The political agenda is very occupied in Turkey and climate change is not one of the priorities,” Doğru told Climate Home News.

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The state also signed a bill mandating sea level rise be factored into review processes for building projects, and a bill to restore the states’ forests for carbon offsets.

Hawaii already has some of the most rigorous climate policies in the US, including a mandate to achieve 100% renewable energy by 2045 and a law to uphold the Paris Agreement.

Before the bill signing, Hawaii governor David Ige posted on his Facebook page: “We are well on our way to meeting our [renewable energy] target and we are currently meeting our share of the US emissions goal under the Paris Agreement.

“This bill to go carbon neutral by 2045 will tie together these efforts – clean energy and emissions reductions – into one that focuses on decarbonising our economy and restoring our native habitat through carbon offsets to do reforestation and carbon farming.”

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Following president Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement just over a year ago, Hawaii became the first state to bring in laws to align with the accord’s goals.

Other states, such as Rhode Island which pledged to cut emissions by 85% of 1990 levels by 2050, have voiced their commitment to continue climate action.

According to the US Energy Information Administration, Hawaii has the ninth smallest carbon emissions of all US states.

The bill to make the archipelago in the Central Pacific carbon neutral by 2045 notes sea level rise could cause $19 billion worth of damage in Hawaii.

Mayors from each county “have pledged to end the State’s dependence on fossil fuels by eliminating fossil fuels from ground transportation by 2045”, the bill said.

Hawaii joins countries such as Sweden in signing into law a commitment to becoming carbon neutral.

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Sergio Marchionne, in his last major presentation before his retirement, told a shareholder conference that the company would make its last diesel car in 2021. The company will continue to make pick-ups and vans with diesel engines.

In 2017, the carmaker was caught up in the diesel emissions rigging scandal that swept through the auto industry. US investigators launched a civil suit against the company for doctoring test results, revelations from which have damaged share prices.

Fiat, Renault, VW scams will hasten rise of electric car

Diesel used to be promoted as a lower-carbon alternative to petrol. But vehicles burning diesel produce higher levels of other pollutants, which have been shown to damage health.

Morten Thaysen, clean air campaigner at Greenpeace UK, said: “Fiat Chrysler is the latest car company to realise consumers don’t want diesel and bite the bullet. It’s time VW, the biggest diesel producer in Europe, woke up to the harm diesel has on our health and the climate and committed to end diesel sales too.”

In the UK last year, diesel sales dropped 20%, while the low-carbon car market grew by 34.8%.

Thaysen said diesel was a “bad bet”. Many car executives agree, with more than half surveyed last year agreed that diesel was “dead” and it was only a matter of time before they all took the decision announced by Marchionne on Friday.

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The Desert to Power collaboration between the African Development Bank (ADB), the Green Climate Fund (GCF) and the Africa50 investment fund aims to build 10,000 MW of solar projects across the dry, sunny region.

That would be enough to bring solar-generated electricity to 250 million people, including 90 million through off-grid solutions, which the organisations claim will enable the development of agriculture. Just 42% of people have access to electricity in sub-Saharan Africa.

Green Climate Fund executive director Howard Bamsey said the needs expressed by countries in the region were driving the initiative.

“Sahel countries have identified the potential of solar power to bring green energy to people across the region,” said Bamsey. “Renewable energy investment is a priority in their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement.”

The organisations agreed to share ideas and resources to make solar power available throughout the Sahel region, with the aim of transforming African deserts into new sources of renewable energy.

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The GCF is a $10 billion fund for climate initiatives. “At this stage, GCF has indicated that we will work together with ADB and Africa50 to discuss how to develop a project proposal that would be submitted to the GCF Board for approval,” said Simon Wilson, a GCF spokesperson. “The GCF Board would have to take a decision to commit funds to the project.”

Alain Ebobissé, CEO of Casablanca-based investment group Africa50, said the agreement with the UN climate fund and the multilateral ADB would give them greater leverage when raising finance for projects “that will provide millions of people and businesses on the continent with clean and affordable energy”.

Helena Wright, senior policy advisor at E3G welcomed the initiative, and said the investment sent “a strong signal to the private sector about the huge regional opportunities for renewable energy”.

Tunisia: Giant desert solar project aims to power EU

Development banks have committed to aligning with the Paris climate goals and initiatives like this are “definitely a step in the right direction,” said Wright. “There is a huge potential to transform deserts into sources of energy and avoid dependence on fossil fuels”.

“However, at the same time there have been reports that the ADB is considering funding a coal plant in Kenya despite the major concerns from local groups,” Wright told Climate Home News.

Solar power has a growing presence in the region. Burkina Faso launched a solar plant in the Sahel in November 2017, funded by France and the European Union, which provided renewable energy to tens of thousands of homes. The country produces only about 60% of the electricity it consumes; 20% of the population has access to the grid.

The Sahel region is a transition zone between the Sahara and the savannah that stretches across Africa from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea. The countries that are part of the new initiative include Burkina Faso, as well as Ethiopia, Nigeria, Mali, Eritrea, Niger, Chad, Mauritania, Senegal, Djibouti, and Sudan.

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Also nominated were comparably massive sites like Pink News, BBC East of England, the Belfast Telegraph and the Trinity Mirror. But a heavyweight panel of judges rewarded CHN’s keen global reportage and mission to spread it around the world.

“Quality journalism is needed now more than ever online and the winners tonight are some of the best internationally,” said editor of the year Steven McCaffery from The Detail, which was also nominated in our category.

There are a lot of people to thank for Climate Home News’ success. Our deputy editor Megan (who is definitely one of them) has done that here. I second every one of the people she mentions.

But I wanted to single out you, our readers, for a special mention. Climate change is an issue that affects and interests everyone. But there is a special, diverse community out there who care enough to follow it closely.

We are here to serve you and we are looking for better ways to do that. It’s tacky (and irresistible) to use an award as a platform to call for financial help. But we hope our new Patreon account will be much more than that. The link is here.

Members who sign up – for a small fee – will gain access to a forum we want to use to help us find new ways to respond to the needs of this community and help those who care about climate change to connect with each other.

It’s fantastic to have the work of the past years recognised. We think there is a lot more we can do and we’d like your guidance.

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