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Climate Adam discusses climate capture and storage. The video is over a year old and Adam refers to COP28 while COP29 was the most recent. Does he mention that there are huge fossil fuel subsidies from governments to the fossil fuel industry for CCS i.e. yet more profit on top of huge profits for destroying the climate and planet?

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In Wake of UN Climate Summit, Azerbaijan Targets Independent Journalists

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Original article by Eloise Goldsmith republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

The logo of the COP29 climate conference appears on the facade of a building under renovation in the Azerbaijani capital of Baku on September 11, 2024. 
(Photo by TOFIK BABAYEV/AFP via Getty Images)

“Azerbaijan’s international partners should take note and urge the authorities to end the crackdown,” said a major human rights group.

Mere weeks after thousands of delegates descended on Baku, Azerbaijan for the COP29 climate summit in Baku, Azerbaijan, authorities in the country arrested multiple independent journalists on charges that one prominent human rights group called “bogus.”

On December 6, police arrested six employees with the independent media organization Meydan TV: Ramin Deko (Jabrailzade), Aynur Elgunesh (Ganbarova), Aysel Umudova, Aytaj Tapdig (Ahmadova), Khayala Agayeva, and Natig Javadli on suspicion of smuggling, according to a statement from Meydan TV. Another media worker, Ulvi Tahirov, was also arrested that day. All seven have been given four months pretrial detention, according to Human Rights Watch.

In a statement released December 6, Meydan TV—which is headquartered in Berlin—said that “since the day we started our activities over a decade ago, our brave journalists have been arrested, and they and their families have been subjected to persecution. Journalists who cooperate with us have been illegally banned from leaving the country, and have been surveilled by Pegasus spyware, among other forms of pressure.” Meydan TV has also called the charges “unfounded” and the detention of its journalists “illegal.”

Since launching in 2013, Meydan TV has become one of the most important sources of independent news in Azerbaijan, broadcasting interviews with opposition politicians and publishing investigative reporting, according to the Eurasianet, an outlet that covers South Caucasus and Central Asia.

As part of its coverage of COP29, Meydan TV addressed the scrutiny that the Azerbaijani government has engendered for its human rights record.

Members of the Azerbaijani media were also arrested last year. Reporters with Abzas Media, Toplum TV, and Kanal 13 were arrested in 2023 and remain in pretrial custody, and like those targeted in this most recent wave of arrests they face smuggling charges, according to Human Rights Watch.

“Having created a network of laws and regulations in Azerbaijan designed to make it virtually impossible for journalists and activists carrying out legitimate work in full compliance, the government then invokes such bogus charges as politically convenient to silence critics,” wrote Arzu Geybulla, a research assistant with Human Rights Watch.

Geybulla added: “Azerbaijan’s international partners should take note and urge the authorities to end the crackdown, including releasing all those arbitrarily detailed, and dropping all politically motivated prosecutions.”

Another rights group, Reporters Without Borders, urged the Azerbaijani government to release these journalists, as well as others that have been “arbitrarily detained.”

Jeanne Cavelier, head of Reporters Without Borders’ Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk, said that “barely a month after Ilham Aliyev’s regime used the glitz of COP29 to polish its international image, it has resumed its relentless repression of journalists.”

Original article by Eloise Goldsmith republished from Common Dreams under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Continue ReadingIn Wake of UN Climate Summit, Azerbaijan Targets Independent Journalists

Climate crisis deepens with 2024 ‘certain’ to be hottest year on record

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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/dec/09/climate-crisis-deepens-with-2024-certain-to-be-hottest-year-on-record

A wildfire in California this year. Fires driven by severe droughts have affected the western US, Canada, the Amazon forest and particularly the Pantanal wetlands. Photograph: David McNew/Getty Images

Average global temperature in November was 1.62C above preindustrial levels, bringing average for the year to 1.60C

This year is now almost certain to be the hottest year on record, data shows. It will also be the first to have an average temperature of more than 1.5C above preindustrial levels, marking a further escalation of the climate crisis.

Data for November from the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) found the average global surface temperature for the month was 1.62C above the level before the mass burning of fossil fuels drove up global heating. With data for 11 months of 2024 now available, scientists said the average for the year is expected to be 1.60C, exceeding the record set in 2023 of 1.48C.

Fossil fuel emissions must fall by 45% by 2030 to have a chance of limiting heating to 1.5C. The recent Cop29 climate summit failed to reach an agreement on how to push ahead on the transition away from coal, oil and gas. The C3S data showed that November 2024 was the 16th month in a 17-month period for which the average temperature exceeded 1.5C.

The supercharging of extreme weather by the climate crisis is already clear, with heatwaves of previously impossible intensity and frequency now striking around the world, along with fiercer storms and worse floods.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/dec/09/climate-crisis-deepens-with-2024-certain-to-be-hottest-year-on-record

Continue ReadingClimate crisis deepens with 2024 ‘certain’ to be hottest year on record

Oil and Gas Investments of Donald Trump’s New UK Ambassador

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Original article by Adam Barnett republished from DeSmog

Warren Stephens. Credit: The Golfer’s Journal / YouTube

Campaigners warn that the UK will face “pressure from American fossil fuel interests” to slow its energy transition.

U.S. president-elect Donald Trump’s pick to be UK ambassador runs a firm with investments in several oil and gas companies, DeSmog can reveal.

Billionaire Warren Stephens, a major Trump donor who was nominated on Monday to be the next UK ambassador, is chairman, president, and CEO of Stephens Inc., one of the largest privately-owned investment banks in the U.S..

The firm’s portfolio includes at least five companies that make their money from oil and gas exploration and production, including one, Stephens Natural Resources, which is “solely owned” by the Stephens family business. 

“President-elect Trump’s promise to boost U.S. fossil fuel production is reflected in his choice of UK ambassador, raising concerns about the potential impact on the UK’s own climate leadership”, said Fossil Free Parliament campaigner Carys Boughton. 

Tessa Khan, executive director of the environmental campaign group Uplift, told DeSmog the appointment was a sign that “the UK is going to be under pressure from American fossil fuel interests to slow its transition away from oil and gas”.

Trump has vowed to “drill, baby, drill” for oil and gas in the U.S. while his presidential campaign received the backing of major fossil fuel interests. The president-elect has called climate change a “hoax” and is expected to once again pull the U.S. out of the flagship 2015 Paris Agreement, which established a global ambition to limit warming to 1.5C above industrial levels. 

The Stephens hire comes just weeks after the UK Labour government unveiled an ambitious new climate target to cut emissions by 81 percent by 2035. The move was criticised by Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch, who this week flew to Washington DC reportedly to build ties with senior Republicans ahead of a second Trump presidency.  

As DeSmog revealed last week, Badenoch has hired advisors who have criticised climate action and have links to fossil fuel-funded think tanks. Badenoch, who describes herself a “net zero sceptic” has also received donations from the head of Net Zero Watch, a climate science denial group.

Oil and Gas Investments

Stephens Inc.’s investments in oil and gas include Stephens Natural Resources, a company run by Warren’s uncle Witt Stephens. 

The company, which trades as Stephens Production, “has a rich history of drilling and producing both oil and natural gas”, according to its website, and “continues to expand its production and reserves in the continental U.S. and offshore Gulf of Mexico”. 

The company is “solely owned” by the Stephens family, whose investment stretches back to 1953, according to the website. 

Stephens Inc.’s other current investments, which date back to the mid-2010s, include Four Corners Petroleum, an oil exploration and production company based in Colorado. 

Stephens Inc. lists RK Supply in its portfolio, a “leading distributor of piping, oil and gas valves, fittings, and other oilfield service equipment” based in Texas. It also lists Dakota Midstream, a company that “provides infrastructure support to oil and gas exploration and production”, based in Colorado. 

Another company in the Stephen Inc. portfolio, Texas-based Basin Oil & Gas, buys “non-operating oil and gas interests”, and is developing carbon capture and sequestration projects. Carbon capture is a favoured climate solution of the oil and gas industry, and is often used simply to extract more fossil fuels. 

Stephens Inc. lists a firm called Capture Point in its portfolio, which specialises in enhanced oil recovery – a method for extracting hard-to-get oil. Capture Point told DeSmog that Stephens Inc. was not an investor in the company, though did not respond when asked if Stephens Inc. was previously an investor. 

All the companies cited were approached for comment. 

Trump Tensions

Stephens’s appointment comes at a critical time for the UK’s energy transition, and highlights the differences between the new Labour government and the incoming Trump administration. 

Prime Minister Keir Starmer last month attended the COP29 climate summit in Baku, Azerbaijan, pledging that the UK would restore its role “as a climate leader on the world stage”. In its 2024 election manifesto, Starmer’s Labour Party pledged to ban all new licenses for oil and gas exploration in the North Sea. However, after five months in office, the government has yet to implement that promise. 

“While the UK government has pledged to turn the UK into a ‘clean energy superpower’, it has not enacted its manifesto commitment to ban new licenses, nor provided a plan for a just transition away from fossil fuels”, Carys Boughton told DeSmog. 

“Trump’s choice of ambassador will gift the fossil fuel industry yet more influence within UK politics, which is particularly concerning while the government is still wavering on the future of fossil fuels. 

“It is therefore yet more important that the government take action to restrict fossil fuel industry influence – to protect its developing climate and energy policy from the industry’s polluting interests.”

As DeSmog has reported, Trump’s would-be energy secretary Chris Wright, chief executive of fracking company Liberty Energy, has praised Danish climate crisis denier Bjorn Lomborg as a friend. Wright’s nomination was welcomed by the CO2 Coalition, a climate science denial group which has received funding from the Koch Industries oil dynasty. 

Analysis by the climate outlet Heated found that all of Trump’s cabinet picks have made misleading statements about climate change. 

Science denial and an enthusiasm for fossil fuels are also views shared by Trump’s UK supporters. In September, DeSmog reported that Trump ally Nigel Farage, the Clacton MP and leader of Reform UK, was a keynote speaker at an event in Chicago run by the Heartland Institute, where he called on the U.S. to “drill, baby, drill” for more fossil fuels. 

“It’s no surprise that this appointment – like the rest of Trump’s administration – is shot through with oil and gas interests”, Uplift’s Tessa Khan, told DeSmog.

“Fossil fuel companies will prove extremely influential in the incoming U.S. government, and they want nations across the world to remain hooked on oil and gas for years to come just so they can keep profiting.

“The UK is going to be under pressure from American fossil fuel interests to slow its transition away from oil and gas. To succumb would be against the UK’s national interest”.

Original article by Adam Barnett republished from DeSmog

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Analysis: Why the $300bn climate-finance goal is even less ambitious than it seems

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Original article by Josh Gabbatiss republished from Carbon Brief under a CC license.

A man holds up a ‘pay-up’ sign at COP29 in Baku. Credit: Mike Muzurakis | IISD/ENB

At COP29 in Baku, developed-country parties such as the EU, the US and Japan agreed to help raise “at least” $300bn a year by 2035 for climate action in developing countries. 

The goal was welcomed by global-north leaders and presented as a “tripling” of the previous target for international climate finance.

Yet it faced a strong backlash from many developing countries, with some branding it a “joke” and “betrayal”.

Closer analysis of the goal and climate-finance data helps to explain this response.

Analysts have shown that the target is achievable with virtually “no additional budgetary effort” from developed countries, beyond already-committed increases. 

combination of pre-existing national pledges and multilateral development bank (MDB) plans will bring climate finance up to around $200bn a year by the end of this decade. 

Counting money already being distributed by emerging economies such as China – as “encouraged” under the new goal – could bring the total to $265bn by 2030. This could mean the target is well on its way to being met by that date, with minimal extra effort.

Moreover, as activists and academics have noted, the $300bn target does not account for inflation. When this is factored in, its “real” value could shrink by around a quarter.

The new target has emerged against a backdrop of financial strain and political uncertainty in developed countries.

At the same time, developing countries have stressed that they need climate finance to reach the “trillions of dollars” needed to cut emissions and protect themselves from climate change.

This article looks at three ways in which the $300bn goal could be met with little extra financial effort by developed countries – and provide fewer benefits for developing countries than the figure suggests. 

  1. Much of the goal will be met with ‘no additional effort’
  2. Developing-country contributions could cover part of the goal
  3. Inflation wipes out much of the increase in climate finance

1. Much of the goal will be met with ‘no additional effort’

The $300bn climate-finance target agreed at COP29 in Baku will be met with finance from a “wide variety of sources”, largely coming from developed countries. 

This part of the “new collective quantified goal” (NCQG) for climate finance is likely to be made up of public finance provided directly by governments, as well as money from MDBs, specialised climate funds and private finance “mobilised” by public investments.

article-9-paris-agreement_ragout
Source: UNFCCC.

The wording of the $300bn goal frames it as an extension of the $100bn target. This was the amount that developed countries agreed in 2009 to raise for developing countries annually by 2020 – a goal that was extended through to 2025 by the Paris Agreement.

Beyond the central goal of $300bn, the NCQG also includes a much broader “aspirational” target of $1.3tn a year in climate finance by 2035. 

However, this is harder to assess, as the text of the deal is vague about who will be responsible for raising the funds, which could include various sources that are beyond the jurisdiction of the UN climate process.

climate_finance_ragout
Source: UNFCCC.

Developed countries and MDBs had already committed to raising their climate-finance contributions before a deal was struck at COP29, as noted in a joint analysis by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), ODIGermanwatch and ECCO.

The collective impact of these pre-existing commitments can be seen below, with climate finance from developed countries set to increase from $115.9bn in 2022 – the most recent year for which data is available – to $197bn in 2030. This can be seen in the chart below, which does not account for inflation. (See: Inflation wipes out much of the increase in climate finance.)

Estimated climate finance in 2030, based on funds that have already been pledged, and target set at COP29 for 2035 (red).
Estimated climate finance in 2030, based on funds that have already been pledged, and target set at COP29 for 2035 (red). Dark blue bars show historical climate finance recorded by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), 2013-2022 (grey). The light blue bars indicate an estimated trajectory to reach the 2030 and 2035 levels. These figures do not account for inflation. Source: OECDNRDCNCQG text.

The expected increase between 2022 and 2030 comes from a few different sources.

The analysts calculated that climate finance distributed “bilaterally” – as grants or loans via overseas aid and other public funding – was already expected to increase $6.6bn annually by 2025, based on existing pledges, bringing the total to $50bn. (The chart above assumes that bilateral finance remains at this level up to 2030.)

They also estimated that existing pledges and reforms at specialised climate funds, such as the Green Climate Fund and Climate Investment Funds, would add another $1.3bn per year by 2030. This would bring their contribution to $5bn. 

The biggest increase that was already locked in before the COP29 deal was a pledge by MDBs – which provide 40of existing climate finance – to increase their contributions further.

joint statement by the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and others in the first week of COP29 committed to raising $120bn of climate finance per year by 2030 for low- and middle-income countries. Of this, $84bn can be attributed to developed countries, based on their shareholdings in these banks.

On top of this, the climate-finance analysts estimated that $58bn of private finance would be mobilised by these bilateral and multilateral contributions in 2030 – up from $21.9bn in 2022. 

The chart below shows the estimated breakdown, by source, of climate finance in 2030, compared to 2022.

Historical climate finance in 2022 and estimated climate finance in 2020, by source.
Historical climate finance in 2022 and estimated climate finance in 2020, by source. Source: OECDNRDCNCQG text.

These expected increases over the course of this decade mean that with “no additional efforts”, beyond what had already been agreed prior to COP29, developed countries would have been on a trajectory to reach around $200bn per year by 2030, and $250bn per year by 2035. (The latter was the first numerical target proposed by developed countries at COP29, which was, ultimately, negotiated upwards to $300bn on the final day.)

NRDC climate-finance expert Joe Thwaites, one of the researchers who undertook the Natural Resources Defense Council’s (NDRC) analysis, tells Carbon Brief that bilateral funding directly from governments is the “big constraint” in climate finance. COP29 came just after the re-election in the US of climate-sceptic Donald Trump and many European countries have cut their aid budgets. Thwaites says:

“The MDBs are growing and doing all kinds of reforms and getting bigger and better, but the bilaterals are what are politically very stuck.”

Moreover, the COP29 climate-finance deal contains no pledge by developed countries to provide a set amount of public, bilateral finance, despite strong pressure from developing countries to include such a goal.

Following COP29, Thwaites released updated modelling to calculate different ways of reaching the $300bn target. He wrote:

“What is clear is that $300bn by 2035 is eminently achievable, with little to no additional budgetary effort required from developed countries, let alone other contributors, to meet the goal.”

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2. Developing-country contributions could cover part of the goal

Unlike the earlier $100bn target, contributions from developing countries could count towards the new climate finance goal.

Only developed countries are obliged to provide climate finance to developing countries under the Paris Agreement. But the NCQG outcome says that developing countries can “voluntarily” declare any climate-related funds they contribute, if they choose to do so.

voluntary-contributions_ragout
Source: UNFCCC.

This allowed negotiators at COP29 to skirt the controversial issue of formally expanding the list of official donors that are required to help with financial aid.

Developed countries had previously been pushing to enlist relatively wealthy developing nations, such as China and the Gulf states, to share the financial burden.

Several countries described since the early 1990s as “developing” under the UN’s climate convention are known to already make large, climate-related financial contributions to other developing countries. Examples include China’s Belt and Road initiative supporting clean-energy expansion and South Korea’s contributions to the GCF.

In fact, at COP29 China announced for the first time that it had “provided and mobilised” more than $24.5bn for climate projects in developing countries since 2017 – confirming that its contributions are comparable with those of many developed countries.

This roughly aligns with calculations by research groups that have placed China’s annual climate finance at around $4bn a year. 

Both developed and developing countries pay money into MDBs. As well as “encouraging” developing countries to voluntarily contribute directly to climate finance, the NCQG outcome also specifies that these countries could start counting the share of climate-related money paid out of MDBs that can be traced back to their inputs.

multilateral-development-banks_ragout
Source: UNFCCC.

Roughly, 30% of the banks’ “outflows” can be attributed to developing countries in this way.

Counting the developing-country share of the projected increase in climate finance from MDBs by 2030 would add an extra $36bn to the global total, plus an extra $20bn of private finance mobilised by the funds.

It is not possible to say for sure how much climate finance new contributors such as China will choose to officially declare. 

However, the chart below shows an estimate based on an “illustrative scenario”, by NRDC and others, of bilateral finance and multilateral climate funds, combined with expected MDB outflows and the associated private finance that this would mobilise. This could bring total annual climate finance up to $265bn by 2030.

Voluntary_contributions_from_developing_countries..
Potential voluntary contributions of climate finance by developing countries, including bilateral finance, contributions to multilateral funds, outflows from MDBs allocated to developing countries and private finance mobilised by developing country contributions to MDBs (lighter red), on top of estimated climate finance from developed countries in 2030 (red). The second red bar indicates the NCQG climate-finance target agreed for 2035 at COP29. The light blue bars indicate an estimated trajectory to reach the 2030 and 2035 levels. These figures do not account for inflation. Source: OECD, NRDC, NCQG text.

Some observers at COP29 said they hoped that officially counting developing-country contributions towards UN “climate finance” targets would enable parties, such as the EU, to set more ambitious goals. 

However, Michai Robertson, lead finance negotiator for the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), dismissed this as an “accounting trick”, because these funds are already being provided.

Li Shuo, head of the China climate hub at the Asia Society Policy Institute (ASPI), tells Carbon Brief that the NCQG outcome could bring more attention to China’s climate-related aid and lead to “stronger and better climate support from Beijing”. However, he notes that this is in the context of a low-ambition global target that is a “far cry” from what is needed:

“I take this as a classic example of geopolitical competition weakening environmental ambition, namely, the geopolitical desire of including China as a donor without corresponding desire of developed countries to contribute more limited the overall scale of climate finance.”

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3. Inflation wipes out much of the increase in climate finance

One issue that has surfaced in the wake of COP29 is the impact of inflation. Campaigners have noted that the failure to factor this into the 2035 climate-finance target means that, by the time it is met, the true value of the money pledged will be far lower than it is today.

In an article highlighting this issue, the Guardian reported that the $300bn goal was, therefore, “not the tripling of pledges that has been claimed”.

Researchers had flagged this before COP29, pointing out that the previous $100bn annually by 2020goal, which was first set in 2009, had also not accounted for inflation. 

They noted that merely correcting the $100bn for inflation would bring it to between $139bn and around $150bn a year. (Such calculations depend on the rate of inflation applied to the starting figure, as well as the base year for the calculation.)

Civil-society groups at COP29, such as Power Shift Africaestimated that the impact of inflation would cut the “real” value of the $300bn to $175bn in today’s money by 2035. This is based on an annual inflation rate of 5%.

In its analysis, the Guardian opted for an inflation rate of 2.4% – based on the average rate in the US over the past 15 years. This is taken to reflect the conditions for governments contributing climate finance and the currency much of it would be provided in.

The figure below shows the impact of an inflation rate of 3%. This is based on input from economists and analysis by the Center for Global Development (CGD), which, in turn, is based on the World Bank’s global GDP deflator

If inflation over the next decade follows this trend, the $300bn pledged in 2024 would only be worth $217bn in today’s money in 2035 – a 28% reduction in value.

In order to offer climate finance with a real value of $300bn in 2035, countries would have needed to set a goal for that year of around $415bn.

Increase in climate finance between 2022 and 2035 under the NCQG commitment in nominal terms
Increase in climate finance between 2022 and 2035 under the NCQG commitment in nominal terms (red line), and based on the “real” value of the $300bn climate-finance pledge in 2024 value terms (blue dotted line). Source: Carbon Brief calculation based on a 3% inflation rate, as used by CGD.

(The figures in the chart above cannot be directly compared with the existing pledges made by governments and MDBs, as those too would need to be adjusted for inflation.) 

CGD modelling suggests that if developed countries’ climate-finance contributions simply increase in line with expected inflation and gross national income (GNI) growth, they would reach $220bn by 2035.

The CGD analysts write in a blog post that “by the time the new goal is met, beneficiary countries will find that the purchasing power of these resources has eroded significantly”.

Independent experts, as well as climate-vulnerable countries themselves, emphasised both before and during COP29 that more than $1tn dollars will be needed each year to help developing countries deal with climate change. Many developing nations said that around $600bn of this should come directly from developed countries’ public coffers.

With such a relatively small amount of finance pledged for the NCQG, some developing countries have already indicated that they may scale back their future climate ambitions.

Original article by Josh Gabbatiss republished from Carbon Brief under a CC license.

Continue ReadingAnalysis: Why the $300bn climate-finance goal is even less ambitious than it seems