Global Kick-start for Energy Revolution

The climate change conference in Paris generated millions of words, but most significantly brought together for the first time in history, 195 countries to agree to a global pact together. The Economist summed it up this way: “The Paris agreement drew on impressive reserves of diplomatic savoir faire and international solidarity. But if it is to live up to its promise, countries will have to make full use of the mechanisms for ratcheting up emissions cuts and accelerating adaptation for decades to come.” David Fogarty reporting daily for the Straits Times over the two weeks of the Paris summit, reflected at the end this way: “The world has just signed one of the most important agreements in history. More than just an environmental pact, the Paris climate change agreement will kick-start a global energy revolution.” Read More

Note from the Editor: Besides the mainstream media, which has been giving unprecedented front page/headline news coverage to climate change and the Paris talks and outcome, the relevant online media has been maintaining its steady educational role and spreading the word effectively. Besides our own coverage over the months and years leading up to Paris (as this newsletter is now in its eight year), others keeping us well informed as well as commentating and advocating have been a number of standout newsletters, blogs and websites. Here’s some we’re regularly hearing from and dipping into. You should check them out if you are not already: www.eco.business.com; www.reneweconomy.com.au; www.rmi.org; www.ACFonline.org.au; www.carbonwarroom.com

Kick-starting a global energy revolution

David Fogarty, Assistant Foreign Editor Straits Times (16 December 2015):

The world has just signed one of the most important agreements in history. More than just an environmental pact, the Paris climate change agreement will kick-start a global energy revolution.

Nearly 200 nations in Paris have signed on to an agreement under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) that the world has to go on a carbon diet, signalling an end to dirty fossil fuels and deforestation, and giving green energy a big boost.

Every year, we pump far more carbon dioxide into the air than the planet’s forests and oceans can absorb. Emissions from industry, cars, land clearing and agriculture are creating one giant carbon bubble which is heating up the planet, supercharging our weather and causing seas to rise.

We need to burst the carbon bubble by changing the way we produce energy to power our economies.

A coal-fired power plant in Beijing. China will have to halt building new coal-fired power plants. Coal produces the most carbon dioxide of all fossil fuels and China is the biggest coal producer and consumer, so what it does really matters. PHOTO: REUTERS

We must also become far more efficient in using that energy. This will help get nature back in balance and steadily bring carbon levels down, over decades, to less dangerous levels.

Crucially, Singapore’s industries will have to become more efficient. Aviation and shipping, collectively producing 5 per cent of mankind’s greenhouse gas emissions and growing, will also have to step up and accelerate emission cuts.

For the targets in the Paris pact to be achieved, the world will have to decarbonise by the end of this century, with emissions peaking before 2030 and then falling sharply.

Sounds scary? Not really. We’re already making progress.

But what does this mean to all of us? What changes do we need to make, and what changes will be needed, to ensure the Paris pact isn’t another toothless treaty?

For the Paris Agreement to be effective, all nations must start implementing their climate action plans now. Nearly 190 countries submitted their plans, called INDCs or Intended Nationally Determined Contributions, ahead of the Paris conference, spelling out their targets or goals to reduce emissions, some by 2025, most by 2030.

Collectively, these pledges still put the world on a path towards dangerous climate change. So, under the Paris Agreement, all parties will need to offer new and stronger INDCs at regular intervals.

For Singapore, the goal is to use less and less energy, while still growing the economy. This means, for example, getting more people on the nation’s growing public transport network and using fewer cars. For those who love their cars, the Government might introduce stronger incentives for electric vehicles.

In Paris, there are numerous streets lined with charging points. Singapore should have them, too, in Housing Board estates and office parking areas. Electric vehicles make perfect sense in Singapore.

As the building stock ages, it will be replaced with apartment and office buildings that use far less energy.

There will be more solar panels on rooftops and solar cells could eventually be embedded into the glass curtains of office buildings. Our lighting, air-conditioners and appliances will all use less power.

Crucially, Singapore’s industries will have to become more efficient. Aviation and shipping, collectively producing 5 per cent of mankind’s greenhouse gas emissions and growing, will also have to step up and accelerate emission cuts. Both sectors are already taking action and the Paris Agreement will likely accelerate separate UN agreements on aviation and shipping emissions.

Nations with much larger land areas and greater renewable energy resources, such as Australia, will have to dramatically step up investment in wind, solar and even wave energy. Australia faces a major challenge because 75 per cent of its electricity comes from coal.

China has already been investing heavily in renewable energy and aims to cap coal consumption, in part to fight severe air pollution. But it will also have to halt building new coal-fired power plants. Coal produces the most CO2 of all fossil fuels and China is the biggest coal producer and consumer, so what it does really matters.

Fortunately, green energy investment keeps growing. Last year, installed wind capacity reached 370 gigawatts globally, including 51 GW of newly installed capacity that year. China is the world’s largest producer of wind energy, installing 23 GW of new wind capacity last year. By 2019, the Global Wind Energy Council forecasts total global installed capacity to reach 666 GW, a small but growing percentage of total global power production.

A price on carbon will really help drive investment towards renewables.

So, how much will this energy revolution cost? A lot – but banks, pension funds, university endowments and insurance firms are already shifting away from carbon-intensive assets and embracing cleaner energy.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) says achieving the Paris Agreement targets will cost US$16.5 trillion (S$23 trillion) by 2030 – a bit smaller than the current size of the US economy.

The pact set the target of holding global warming to “well below 2 deg C” and urged nations to pursue efforts to limit the rise to 1.5 deg C. This year is already set to be the hottest in recorded history. We’re already at about 1 deg C warming from pre-industrial levels, so it’s time to get a move on.

Getting to the 1.5 deg C goal would cost even more, the IEA said, because it would mean an even steeper drop in carbon emissions. But that would be worth it to limit the growing impacts of climate change that are threatening food production, water resources as well as seafood supplies, with warmer and more acidic seas destroying coral reefs.

The Paris Agreement has reset the way we view our planet and our future. We already have the technology to create greener economies. But for the pact to succeed, all nations must get to work and steadily strengthen their efforts.

If we fail this time, it really will be too late.

Source: www.straitstimes.com/opinion/kick-starting-a-global-energy-revolution

Climate change

Hopelessness and determination

The Paris agreement will not stabilise the climate; but the efforts it makes possible could still achieve a lot

The Economist (19 December 2015):

“THE test of a first-rate intelligence”, F. Scott Fitzgerald, a sometime Parisian, once wrote, “is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time.” By this standard, the 195 countries that gathered outside Paris in the two weeks running up to December 12th to negotiate a new agreement on climate change have to be counted very bright indeed. It is vital, they declared, that the world’s temperature does not climb much more than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels; and yet they simultaneously celebrated a new climate agreement that got nowhere close to preventing such a rise.

The individual pledges that nations made going into the Paris talks—which they will now be expected, though not compelled, to honour—are estimated to put the world on course for something like 3°C of warming. In the non-linear universe of climate change, 3°C represents a lot more than twice as much risk and harm as 1.5°C; it could well, for instance, be the difference between the Greenland ice cap staying put and the sea-level rising, over centuries, by six metres.

For someone to propose means that fall so far short of their purported ends might seem like cynicism or stupidity. Sure enough, some of the keenest devotees to action on climate change have accused the Paris negotiators of both. In fact, the deal really did demonstrate collective intelligence.

The nations of the world know that they cannot suddenly force each other to stop emitting greenhouse gases, because fossil fuels are fundamental to the way that economies work. But many countries also want to reduce the risks posed by climate change and know that they need to find ways to work together. The Paris agreement offers a range of mechanisms to make this happen (see page 94).

Countries now have a framework to ensure that each is doing what it said it would; they have pledged more money to help the poorest and most vulnerable countries adapt to the effects of climate change; they have a task force for looking at the issues raised by those who cannot adapt and need to find new places to live; and they have the basis for new carbon-pricing deals. They have also agreed that big developing countries, which were largely spared by earlier deals, should consider making a greater contribution.

The Paris agreement provides a timetable for increasing the ambition of countries’ emissions pledges as technology improves and experience accumulates. And, outside the main negotiations, Paris saw a commitment from rich countries and individuals to undertake a lot more research into new sources of clean energy. All this has signalled to investors that both developed and developing countries intend to act. This will not in itself bring about the end of the era of fossil fuels; it is, though, a step in that direction.

This side of paradise

But there are a daunting number of further steps. Some relate to administrative capacity. In many poor countries the ability to assess action on climate change and promulgate effective adaptation is inadequate; it must be nurtured.

Others relate to the use of private capital. If investors are discouraged from bankrolling fossil fuels, they are under no obligation to redirect their money to clean energy: they may prefer not to invest in energy at all. Governments will need to structure their power markets, and plan for their growth, in ways that make sense to long-term backers. Without the lure of profits in low-carbon energy, climate action could result in hundreds of millions of people who now lack modern energy services being left in the darkness for longer.

By the same token, increased R&D on its own is a necessary condition for progress, but not a sufficient one. Backers need to ensure that it leads to innovative solutions which can be installed on a commercial scale, rather than becoming a self-perpetuating academic exercise (as with international efforts on nuclear fusion).

The worst risk is that a justified sense of accomplishment will engender a debilitating complacency. The Paris agreement drew on impressive reserves of diplomatic savoir faire and international solidarity. But if it is to live up to its promise, countries will have to make full use of the mechanisms for ratcheting up emissions cuts and accelerating adaptation for decades to come. Fitzgerald’s example of opposing ideas was the ability “to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise”. Sustained determination could be the difference between an agreement that deals with climate change and one that turns out to be another wasted opportunity.

Source: www.economist.com/news/leaders/21684153-paris-agreement-will-not-stabilise-climate-efforts-it-makes-possible-could-still