.. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT ..

A survey by CPNN

Here are two graphs published in the last few weeks that tell an important economic story.

The first graph was published in a report of the International Energy Agency (IEA) on December 6. We see that solar energy (photovoltaic) is predicted to surpass other energy sources within the next 3 years. Nuclear power is not shown in the graph, but it accounted for about 10% of global energy generation in 2019, down from a peak of 16.5% in 1997.

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According to an article published December 12 in Yahoo Finance, improvements in technology and increased economies of scale, have substantially decreased solar energy costs. While the cost of utility scale photovoltaic fixed tilt installation was $4.75 per watt in 2010, the cost was just $0.94 per watt in 2020. And for the future, it is likely solar costs will decline further.

According to an article in China Daily on December 26 quoting the IEA, the cost of photovoltaic production is lowest in China: costs in China tend to be 10 percent lower than in India, 20 percent lower than in the US and 35 percent lower than in parts of Europe.

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Are we making progress in renewable energy?

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The second graph was published by the website Cleantechnica on December 14, based on a report from Rethink Energy. We see that China and the United States were at the opposite extremes of solar power installation last year. China increased its solar installation more than anywhere else in the world, while the United States actually decreased its installations.

According to an article in the Business Wire on January 3, China exported solar cells to more than two hundred countries and regions around the world in 2021. The publisher’s analysis shows that India, Turkey, Vietnam, South Korea, Germany, Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand, the Netherlands and the Philippines are China’s major solar cell export destinations by export volume.

Solar exports from China to Europe are expected to increase as a result of the energy inflation and energy insecurity caused by the Russia-Ukraine tensions, as reported by the South China Morning Post on January 2. As for the United States, imports from China are reduced because Washington has imposed steep import tariffs on Chinese solar panels and banned solar energy components from China’s Xinjiang region over concerns of forced labour. “Chinese solar panels manufacturers will continue facing import restrictions imposed by the US government in the foreseeable future.”

Another impediment in the United States is the opposition to solar power by the right-wing Republicans, as described by the Los Angeles Times on December 13.

.. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT ..

An article by Juan Cole: Informed Comment

A new report  by the International Energy Agency suggests that the 2022 global energy crisis, caused in part by Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, has had the effect of greatly accelerating the world’s rush to green energy. The IEA suggests that its estimates for the pace of the transition to renewables, made only last year, now have to be revised upward by at least 30 percent, the highest revision the body has ever had to make. It estimates that the world will add 2,400 gigawatts of new renewable power over the next five years, equivalent to all the installed power capacity of China today.

Renewables were already growing with celerity, but they are now expected to rocket ahead.

Fatih Birol, the IEA executive director, said, “The world is set to add as much renewable power in the next 5 years as it did in the previous 20 years.”

The IEA projects that global solar capacity will triple 2022-2027, and that wind power capacity will double in the same period. Wind and solar will account for 90% of new power installations over these next five years. Solar alone will overtake coal by 2027 as the single biggest source of power.

The world is making good progress, then, on greening electricity. It isn’t doing nearly so well in using renewables for heating purposes, where coal and fossil gas still dominate. Renewables in heating buildings will only increase from 11% to 14% from now until 2027.

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Are we making progress in renewable energy?

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In Europe, IAE projections of renewables growth has have had to be upped by 50%, and in Spain 60%, given that governments in both countries are introducing streamlined permitting, increased auctions, and more generous payments to consumers with solar panels on their homes.

The rapid changes are being driven in Europe by the Ukraine War and consequent energy crisis. The U.S., China and India, which are less affected by the war, nevertheless are legislating incentives for private industry to turn to renewables at a pace far beyond what had been expected.

In India, new renewables capacity, primarily solar, are expected to double by 2025.

The Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act, which has already jump-started the construction of new battery factories and which incentivizes turning to renewables, is a case in point. The Act could scarcely be imagined in 2020, when Donald Trump, who called the climate emergency a “Chinese hoax” and actively promoted coal, was in power. Now the IEA is having to sprint to keep up with the new implications of the Act.

China alone is expected to account for over half of all new green energy installations during the half-decade leading up to 2027.

By 2025, only about two years from now, renewable energy will surpass coal as a power source globally.

The report also admits that it may be underestimating the speed with which these changes will take place, and if countries with advanced economies cut through the forest of regulation, we could see an addition 25% growth in renewables over the next five years.

All this is very good news if the projections are borne out, since only such an acceleration can hope to keep global heating to an extra 2.7 degrees F. (1.5 degrees C.) above pre-industrial averages. An increase in the average temperature of the earth’s surface any higher than that risks throwing the world climate system into chaos, according to scientists who are modeling these changes. We have already seen just this year a mega-flood in Pakistan that inundated a third of the country’s land area and briefly created a new inland sea 67 miles across. Cyclones and hurricanes are already more intense and more destructive than they had been in the twentieth century. Wildfires devastated Australia in 2020, and the U.S. Southwest also is suffering from them as it struggles into the 22nd year of a mega-drought. All of these phenomena will get worse, in unpredictable ways, if we shoot past a 2.7 degrees F. increase. We are already at a 2.16 degrees F. (1.2 degrees C.) increase over pre-industrial times, and we can see dangerous disruptions. You won’t like a 3C or 4C world.

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An article by Gaby Flores from Greenpeace

The 15th UN Conference on Biodiversity, known as COP15, has ended. The final deal, known as the Kunming-Montreal Agreement, is being labelled historic but is just the beginning of the work needed to halt mass extinction.

At a press conference in Montreal’s Hotel10 during COP15, global Indigenous leaders from Brazil, Canada, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cameroon and Indonesia gathered to call for nature protection that centres Indigenous rights and shifts power from industry to Indigenous Peoples and local communities.
© Toma Iczkovits / Greenpeace

What’s good about the agreement?

The final text recognises Indigenous Peoples’ work, knowledge and practices as the most effective tool for biodiversity protection. Indigenous Peoples represent 5% of humanity but protect 80% of Earth’s biodiversity, and the language in the text is now clear: the implementation of the Kunming-Montreal deal must respect their territories, ensure their rights and their free, prior and informed consent ─  according to the UN Declaration on the rights of Indigenous Peoples ─ and their effective participation in decision making.

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Indigenous peoples, Are they the true guardians of nature?

Sustainable Development Summits of States, What are the results?

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 In short, Indigenous-led conservation models must become the standard from now on if we are going to take real action on biodiversity.

What’s not so great?

The target to protect at least 30% of land and of seas by 2030 successfully secured a spot in the agreement but does not explicitly exclude damaging activities from protected areas. Without the crucial qualifiers, the needed goal risks remaining an empty number, with protections on paper but nowhere else.

Moreover, corporate schemes like nature-based solutions and offsets are included in the text and will allow industries seeking to profit from biodiversity to continue exploiting nature. These false solutions and greenwashing may prove to be costly mistakes. 

Finally, the often fought over question of finance is still not answered, with commitments made not yet sufficient to bridge the biodiversity finance gap. To save biodiversity, finance will not only be a question of how much, but how fast. 

What’s next for Biodiversity protection?

The Biodiversity COP15 left the most crucial work for nature protection as homework for world leaders. To start with: setting up a fund in 2023 to get money to developing countries faster as well as direct finance for Indigenous Peoples. Rights-based protections are the future of conservation and to global biodiversity protection. Additionally, vital to making 30 x 30 actually happen will be securing a historical Global Ocean Treaty at the reconvening of IGC5 in February 2023.

COP16 will convene in Türkiye in 2024, where governments will need to act fast to build upon the work done in Montreal.