As falling renewable energy costs and a shadow carbon price are making coal power investments unviable the Asian Development Bank (ADB) is making a decisive shift to clean energy, according to bank energy chief Yongping Zhai.
Coal plants are becoming unviable investments, Yongping Zhai wrote in Viet Nam News, as renewable energy costs fall and the bank puts a carbon price in excess of $36 a tonne on lending decisions. The bank last approved a coal power project five years ago, he said, to convert Pakistan’s Jamshoro plant to run on coal instead of heavy fuel oil. Last year it backed $2 billion worth of investment into renewable energy and energy efficiency, on the way to a $3bn target for 2020. Some of its more innovative projects include a battery storage pilot to back up wind power in Pakistan, and a floating solar farm in Vietnam. “Clean energy will power Asia’s future,” wrote the bank executive. “We will ensure that, as we meet our own climate finance targets, ADB’s lending portfolio has no place for ‘dirty energy’.” In the “transition” to clean energy, the bank continues to support gas-fired power plants, which emit roughly half the CO2 of coal plants.
Analysis by think-tank E3G based on 2015-16 data found that ADB was still investing slightly more in fossil fuel projects than green energy. On overall alignment with the goals of the Paris Agreement, it ranked ADB fourth out of six major development banks. The authors urged ADB to limit oil and gas lending and update its carbon price. How Asia meets its fast-growing energy demand is critical to meeting global climate goals. Many governments and financiers are still betting on coal, which would blow the targets, but development banks are moving towards cleaner options.
[This article originally appeared on climatechangenews.com.]
Ten years after committing to phase out fossil fuel subsidies, G20 countries still subsidise coal, oil and gas to the tune of around USD 150 billion annually. Peer review of fossil fuel subsidies help push the G20 forward on this issue, but these reviews need to be followed by action. Subsidy reforms could free up resources that could be channeled back into government programmes and on accelerating a clean energy transition.
Adapting to climate change and strengthening resilience are becoming priorities for the international community – however, they require greater ambition in climate policy. 107 governments and numerous international organisations have endorsed a call for action on raising ambition at the United Nations Climate Change Summit on 23rd September 2019. Following the summit, the Global Commission on Adaptation will begin its Year of Action to meet the climate challenges ahead. The Year of Action is here to accelerate climate adaptation around the world, to improve human well-being and to drive more sustainable economic development and security.
A new form of organized crime has recently been emerging in the Amazon: illegal mining. Miners fell trees, use high-grade explosives for blasting soils and dredge riverbeds. But the impacts go beyond environmental damage, bringing with it a slew of other social problems. Peace researcher Adriana Abdenur urges policymakers to improve coordination and argues that diplomacy may help prevent further conflicts, corruption and crime.
The severity of desertification and its mutual relationship with climate change cannot be overstated. In light of the recent launch of the Special Report on Climate Change and Land by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), Robert McSweeney from Carbon Brief explains what desertification is, what role climate change plays, and what impact it has across the world.