Latest news with #greenhousegasemissions
ABC News
2 days ago
- Business
- ABC News
Climate stability will require carbon removal on a large scale — are the existing methods up to the task? - ABC Religion & Ethics
If countries are to meet the Paris Agreement goal of holding 'the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels' and pursing efforts 'to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels', we're now told that reducing greenhouse gas emissions alone will be insufficient. Given our energy needs and the time it will take to transition to fully renewable sources of energy, Carbon Dioxide Removal (CDR) will also be needed, on a large scale. But there is considerable scepticism about CDR. In May, power company EnergyAustralia apologised to its customers after settling a Federal Court case launched by advocacy group Parents for Climate. In a statement published as part of the settlement, the company said: 'Burning fossil fuels creates greenhouse gas emissions that are not prevented or undone by carbon offsets.' There are several reasons why that might be true. One that critics frequently cite comes from the fact that the removals certified by carbon offsets can't be guaranteed to last as long as the emissions they are supposed to offset. Is this a good reason for dismissing CDR? CO₂ removal methods and the risk of reversal Broadly speaking, there are two types of CDR methods. 'Nature-based methods' use natural processes — like photosynthesis — to trap CO₂ in ecosystems such as forests, wetlands and farmlands. 'Engineered' methods, on the other hand, typically use advanced technology to capture CO₂ directly from the atmosphere or industrial sites. Both of these methods have drawn criticism. Some argue against investing in new carbon capture methods due to their high costs and technological uncertainties. Others argue that the benefits of nature-based solutions are profoundly limited, not least because of the short time horizon over which forests and other natural sinks can store carbon. The critics of nature-based methods are on to something. If the core idea of net zero emissions is balancing greenhouse gas additions and removals, we need the removals to last as long as the additions. However, the CO₂ we release today can persist in the atmosphere for centuries or even millennia. In contrast, many nature-based methods, like planting trees, might only store carbon for a few decades. This criticism highlights a genuine concern: merely planting a tree cannot be considered a valid offset if it eventually releases its absorbed CO₂ back into the atmosphere when it dies. This carries a 'reversal risk' — a risk that CO₂, once stored, will be re-released. However, while reversal risk is undoubtedly important, this doesn't mean that nature-based methods should be dismissed — instead, it means that they need to be managed well. Individual trees die, but provided a forest is properly maintained and managed over the long term, it can still act as a carbon sink. It's the continuous, deliberate maintenance of forests that ensures carbon is consistently captured, even if individual trees within the ecosystem die and are replaced. Additionally, reversal risk is not exclusive to nature-based methods. Engineered carbon removal methods and novel storage technologies also carry their own reversal risks. Storage facilities could fail, or novel technologies might prove less effective or reliable than initially expected. Investing all our resources in engineered CDR is problematic for another reason. Keeping within the 2°C carbon budget requires increasing the use of CDR now — and these technologies are not, even on an optimistic picture, going to be available at the scale required soon enough. Rather than being taken as grounds for dismissing these different CDR methods, we think these criticisms support a different conclusion. Each method on its own faces a serious problem — but they can complement each other, when used together. We must combine them strategically, using the strengths of each to offset the weaknesses of the other. Nature-based methods, if employed sensibly, offer the rapid, large-scale deployment that is needed now to help reduce peak global temperatures and slow warming trends. Engineered solutions, coming on stream later, have the potential for more secure long-term removals. These technologies, once fully developed, offer the prospect of more stable CO₂ storage options, significantly reducing the risk of reversal. What climate mitigation requires A number of companies recently announced they are leaving the Australian government's Climate Active carbon credit scheme amid concerns about its integrity. Some critics of carbon credit markets suggest that they operate simply as a way of allowing companies to buy the illusion of climate action, while continuing with business as usual. However, if the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is right, we will need emission reductions to be accompanied by CDR into the foreseeable future, and we will need well-functioning carbon markets to deliver it. Stabilising the consequences of human activity on the climate will require reducing emissions — but alongside this, it will also require both nature-based and engineered methods of CDR, situated within a well-governed carbon credit market. Christian Barry is Director of the Research School of Social Sciences at the Australian National University. Garrett Cullity is Professor of Philosophy and Director of the Centre for Moral, Social and Political Theory at the Australian National University Together with a team of international climate scientists and policymakers, they are authors of a new paper discussing these themes at greater length, 'Considering Durability in Carbon Dioxide Removal Strategies for Climate Change Mitigation', forthcoming in Climate Policy.
RNZ News
6 days ago
- Climate
- RNZ News
Report on South West Pacific climate prompts plea to public, governments
South West Pacific region includes New Zealand. Photo: AFP PHOTO/Torsten BLACKWOOD A new report into the climate of the South West Pacific - including New Zealand - shows "shocking" changes, World Meteorological Organisation's director for the region says. Last year was the hottest year on record for the South West Pacific region. Average temperatures in the region were about half a degree Celsius above even the comparatively recent 1991-2020 average, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) said. The WMO earlier said that 2024 was the hottest for the planet as a whole across all of its different datasets. Dunedin's floods in October received a mention among the year's extreme weather. WMO's director for the region Ben Churchill said the organisation's 2024 report into the state of the climate in the South-West Pacific showed "alarming" changes. He said the reports "unprecedented" findings were shocking and should be used to pressure governments to cut greenhouse gas emissions. "We keep talking about things that we've never seen before, and this [report] just continues that trend," Churchill said. "Really what we want to see is that this report is spread far and wide by this community, by the media, but picked up by decision makers and policy makers and understood by sectors that are particularly vulnerable to climate, but even just the general community, so they understand what is at stake what is happening in their part of the world at a regional perhaps they could use it to encourage their governments to take stronger climate action. "Lives are being lost and still the economic impact continues to go up." Both ends of New Zealand were singled out for their unusual rainfall patterns - the north being unusually dry and the south unusually wet. The report said the Philippines was hammered by an unprecedented 12 storms during the September-November tropical cyclone season - more than double the average. In the space of less than four weeks, five tropical cyclones made landfall in the Philippines, killing 150 people. Nearly 40 million km2 of ocean was affected by marine heatwaves - more than 10 percent of the global ocean surface area, or almost the size of the Asian continent, the report said. WMO earlier said every one of the years from 2015 to 2024 were one of the 10 warmest on record globally. A slip in Dunedin on 7 October after massive downpours caused floods, landslides and road closures. Photo: RNZ / Charlotte Cook Dunedin's floods in October were on the list of extreme events, along with heatwaves in Australia and Malaysia and other events. During the storms, Dunedin residents said the flooding was like nothing they'd seen . The Philippines was hammered by storms. "In the space of less than four weeks there were five tropical cyclones that made landfall in the Philippines and a sixth that didn't quite make landfall but still was close enough to have significant impacts on land, and that's a sequence that hasn't been seen before in that region," one of the report's lead authors, Australian climate scientist Blair Trewin said. "There were 150 deaths in total in the Philippines from this sequence of cyclones and very extensive economic losses to agriculture and elsewhere." Trewin said while said 150 deaths were tragic and shocking, early warnings had saved more lives from being lost and he urged countries to get behind implementing early warning systems. WMO lead author Thea Turkington said 2024's record year for heating in the South West Pacific region was reflected across every indicator the WMO measures - including ice, rainfall, oceans, overall temperatures and extreme events. Malaysia, Indonesia, the northern Philippines, northern Australia, eastern Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands were also extra wet, while the southern coast of Australia, the Cook Islands, the Marshall Islands and Hawaii were extra dry. "For every one degree of warming in the atmosphere the atmosphere can hold an extra 7 percent of moisture, so we are seeing these extreme situations both in terms of rainfall but also on the other end of the scale we are seeing extreme drought," Churchill said. "The global warming is actually changing the water cycle quite significantly so every fraction of a degree has an impact and it really highlights the importance of more ambitious climate action." Churchill added that when storms were hitting the Philippines with such frequency "no one can really prepare for that," despite what he called "commendable" use of early warning systems. He said it would be harder for the Pacific Islands to recover economically from the impacts of climate change, because of their vulnerability. The report also provided an update on one of the world's last remaining tropical glaciers in West Papua, which Turkington said could be gone as soon as 2026. "In Indonesia, glacier ice loss continued rapidly in 2024, with the total ice area in the western part of New Guinea declining by 30-50 percent since 2022," the report said. Atmospheric concentrations of the three major greenhouse gases reached new record observed highs in 2023, the latest year for which global figures are available. Sea level rise and ocean warming had accelerated in the region, the report said. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
BBC News
7 days ago
- Business
- BBC News
North Kesteven bin lorries powered by recycled cooking oil
Nearly all the dustbin lorries in North Kesteven are running on recycled fuel, the council has but two of the fleet of 31 vehicles now use hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) in place of council said it reduces overall greenhouse gas emission in its waste collection operation by 90%, cutting around 800 tonnes of CO2 a is produced by recycling used cooking oils and similar products. Travelling around 400,000 miles (643,737 km) a year, the refuse fleet empties 55,000 bins a leader Richard Wright said waste collection was responsible for 41% of the council's carbon footprint."Our vehicles travel along every road in the district, servicing every home, clearing fly tipping and undertaking other vital environmental tasks right across the area," he said."Now as they do so, there will be greatly reduced atmospheric impact as climate damaging emissions direct from the exhausts will be 98% lower from vehicles using HVO over regular diesel."The council is also investing in electric-powered vehicles and fitting solar panels and air-heat pumps to its to highlights from Lincolnshire on BBC Sounds, watch the latest episode of Look North or tell us about a story you think we should be covering here.
Irish Times
30-05-2025
- Business
- Irish Times
Why does Ryan Tubridy's €150,000 payment seem like a bigger deal than looming climate fines?
Another week, another warning that Ireland is not going to achieve the cuts in greenhouse gas emissions agreed with the EU and as a result, will face 'billions' in fines. This time it took the form of an Environmental Protection Agency forecast that we will achieve reductions of 23 per cent by 2030 , compared to our target of 51 per cent. It follows last week's warning from the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council (IFAC) and Climate Change Advisory Council (CCAC) that we face a 'staggering' bill of between €8 billion and €26 billion if we don't cut emissions. The bill takes the forms of an obligation to buy credits from other member states that exceed their targets. Funnily enough, national panic has not ensued and the opposition parties have devoted their energy to beating up the management of the national broadcaster live on Oireachtas TV. Whether or not Ryan Tubridy repays €150,000 to RTÉ would seem rather beside the point if the State is really facing a €26 billion bill in five years' time. Surely at least one member of the Oireachtas is wondering where we'll get the money. READ MORE Only a fool or a US president would deny global warming and its potential consequences at this stage. Persuading people to accept big changes to their lives in order to cut emissions is arguably the most difficult and most important challenge facing this Government and any government that comes after it. We don't even seem to be trying. The EU's efforts to make the impact of the climate crisis more immediate and tangible – in the form of fiscal penalties – should have pushed the Government into action. But they clearly don't take the threat of such enormous fines seriously. And they are probably on safe ground. Despite this week's upbeat assessment that the EU expects to come very close to its target of reducing emissions by 55 per cent compared to 1990 levels, the picture at the level of individual countries is much less even. Ireland may well be bottom of the class. The EU expects us to only achieve 60 per cent of targeted reductions, but we are in good company. The three largest EU members, Germany, France and Italy – which account for about 60 per cent of EU economic output – don't look like they are going to make it either. France will come close as the EU expects it will achieve 98 per cent of targeted emissions. However, its rate of reduction is slowing. Achieving reductions in areas including transport is proving difficult and forestry is absorbing less carbon than predicted. Ireland has experienced difficulties in the same areas. Italy will fall significantly short at 93 per cent of targeted emissions. Its plans around the adoption of electric vehicles and other measures are deemed unrealistic by Brussels. The desire of the country's right-leaning prime minister Giorgia Meloni to make Italy a 'gas hub' in the Mediterranean doesn't chime either. Germany – the largest EU economy – will miss its target by a lot. It is expected to achieve only 82 per cent of its target. Reversing the slowdown in Germany's manufacturing-driven economy is the top priority of the incoming coalition, which is less wedded to climate protection than its predecessor. The most likely scenario seems to be that we will arrive in a situation in five years' time where the three biggest EU economies – and three biggest contributors to the EU budget – undershoot their emission reduction targets. [ Smoking ban has important lessons for Ireland's approach to climate issues Opens in new window ] [ Sorry, kids. We blew your climate budget - but we really love our SUVs Opens in new window ] The idea that they will spend billions buying credits off EU member states that they already provide significant indirect support to seems far-fetched. It would be an act of economic self-harm on the level of Brexit or Donald Trump's tariffs. Ireland will be able to hide under their coat-tails, but if that is the strategy – as it appears to be – it's a pretty pathetic one. It says nothing good about our politics or our society that we duck these issues. It does say a lot about an endemic lack of seriousness that characterises a lot of public life. Leaving aside the moral failure that it represents, there is a danger that our already dwindling stock of goodwill with our European partners will shrink even further. Giving the two fingers to the EU's flagship climate action plan is not going to endear us to Brussels and the other member states.
The Guardian
29-05-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Nato rearmament could increase emissions by 200m tonnes a year, study finds
A global military buildup poses an existential threat to climate goals, according to researchers who say the rearmament planned by Nato alone could increase greenhouse gas emissions by almost 200m tonnes a year. With the world embroiled in the highest number of armed conflicts since the second world war, countries have embarked on military spending sprees, collectively totalling a record $2.46tn in 2023. For every dollar invested in new hardware, there is not only a corresponding carbon cost but also an opportunity cost to potential climate action, critics say. This is on top of the huge death toll resulting from armed conflicts. 'There is a real concern around the way that we are prioritising short-term security and sacrificing long-term security,' said Ellie Kinney, a researcher with the Conflict and Environment Observatory and a co-author of the study, shared exclusively with the Guardian. 'Because of this kind of lack-of-informed approach that we're taking, you're investing in hard military security now, increasing global emissions for that reason, and worsening the climate crisis further down the line.' That in turn is only likely to lead to further violence, with climate change itself now increasingly seen as a driver of conflict, albeit indirectly. In Sudan's Darfur region, conflict was linked to competition over scarce resources after prolonged droughts and desertification. In the Arctic, receding sea ice is leading to tensions over who should control newly accessible oil, gas and critical mineral resources. Few militaries are transparent about the scale of their fossil fuel use, but researchers have estimated that collectively they are already responsible for 5.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions. That figure is expected to rise as tensions escalate in a number of regions and as the US, for decades the world's biggest military spender, indicates that it expects its Nato allies to devote significantly more resources to their armed forces. According to the Global Peace Index, militarisation increased in 108 countries in 2023. With 92 countries involved in armed conflict, in places ranging from Ukraine and Gaza to South Sudan and DRC, with tensions seething between China and the US over Taiwan, and with the frozen conflict between India and Pakistan flaring, governments fearful of war are investing heavily in their militaries. In Europe, the increase has been particularly dramatic: between 2021 and 2024, EU states' weapons spending rose by more than 30%, according to the International Institute for Economics and Peace. In March, the EU, disconcerted by Donald Trump's cutting of military aid and diplomatic support for Ukraine, indicated this would go further, with proposals for a further €800bn spend across the bloc outlined in a plan called 'ReArm Europe'. In analysis for the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs, Kinney and colleagues looked at the potential impact of increased militarisation on meeting climate goals. What they found was sobering: the likely increase in emissions from Nato's remilitarisation alone would be the equivalent of adding the cost of a country as large and populous as Pakistan to the world's remaining carbon budget. 'Our analysis specifically looks at the impact on sustainable development goal 13, which is climate action – to take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts,' Kinney said. 'And what our analysis finds, looking at the various sub-targets of that … [is] that there is a real threat to global climate action caused by global increase in military spending.' Of all functions of states, militaries are almost uniquely carbon-intensive. 'First of all, with the equipment that they purchase, which is mainly a lot of steel and aluminium, which is very carbon-intensive to produce,' said Lennard de Klerk, of the Initiative on the GHG Accounting of War, another co-author of the study. 'Secondly is during operations, armies are very mobile. And in order to move around they use fossil fuels – that's diesel for ground operations and kerosene for air operations. Or for maritime operations it's mainly diesel as well, if they're not nuclear-driven.' Given the secrecy that usually surrounds militaries and their operations, it is difficult to know just how much greenhouse gases they are emitting. Only Nato countries report enough of their emissions for scientists to attempt an estimate. Sign up to Down to Earth The planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essential after newsletter promotion 'We took Nato because they are the most transparent in terms of spending. So it's not that we particularly want to focus on Nato, but simply because they have more data available,' De Klerk said. The researchers calculated by how much greenhouse gas emissions would increase if Nato countries excluding the US – since it already spends far more than the others – made a two percentage point increase in the share of GDP they devoted to their militaries. Such an increase is already under way, with many countries in Europe significantly increasing military spending in response to the crisis in Ukraine. Although Nato countries have publicly committed to increasing spending to 2% of GDP, the researchers say the ReArm Europe plan could lead to an eventual rise to 3.5%, from about 1.5% in 2020. The researchers assumed a similar eventual increase in Nato members that are not members of the EU, such as the UK. Borrowing methodology from a recent paper that argued each percentage point increase in the share of GDP devoted to military spending would lead to an increase in national emissions of between 0.9% and 2%, they estimated that a two percentage point spending shock would lead to an increase across the bloc of between 87 and 194 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) a year. The researchers say that not only would such a huge increase in emissions supercharge climate breakdown but the increase in global temperatures would hurt the economy. Recent estimates of the social cost of carbon – a monetary indicator of the damage of CO2 emitted – put it at $1,347/tCO2e, suggesting the annual cost of Nato's military buildup could be as much as $264bn a year. And that is only a fraction of the true carbon cost of militarisation, Kinney points out. 'The calculation in the paper, it's 31 countries – that only represents 9% of total world emissions. If you consider … the impact of that, there's a lot of the world that we haven't taken into consideration of this specific calculation.' The analysis notes that spending more money on militaries also reduces resources available for policies aimed at mitigating climate change. This already seems to be the case, with the UK, for example, funding its increase in spending by reducing its overseas aid budget – a move mirrored in Belgium, France and the Netherlands. 'This increase in military spending is impacting the kind of core trust that is necessary for multilateralism,' Kinney said. 'At Cop29, global south countries like Cuba in particular pointed out the hypocrisy in the room of states being willing to spend increasing amounts on their military spending, but offering … completely, unacceptably low climate finance commitments.' The Guardian has contacted Nato for comment.
